HARRY LOREN ARNOLD

Dr. Harry Loren Arnold, Sr., was born in Owosso, Michigan on August 13, 1887, the son of Dr. Alfred L. and Florence (Mountford) Arnold. He received an A.B. degree from the University of Michigan in 1909 and an M.D. degree in 1911. He was "literally in horse and buggy practice" with his father in Owosso, Michigan, for five years before graduating from the Army Medical School and receiving his commission in the Army in 1917. On October 7, 1911, he and Meda L. Sheldon were married in Bay City, Michigan.

Dr. Arnold's parents were naturalized American citizens, having been born and raised in Ontario, Canada. His great grandfather had moved there from Pennsylvania at the time of the Revolution because of his loyalty to the British crown. His grandfather was a miller; his father and an uncle were physicians, graduates of the Detroit College of Medicine. His brother, four years his junior, and his son were later to become physicians, too. His father practiced medicine till the age of 80.

While in medical school, Dr. Arnold was a member of Nu Sigma Nu medical fraternity, Sigma Xi honorary scientific fraternity, and Alpha Omega Alpha honorary medical scholastic organization.

After World War I, in 1919, he was stationed in Hawaii. In 1921, at the invitation of Dr. Straub, he resigned his commission as a major and joined "The Clinic". Dr. Arnold was not one of the five original doctors who started "The Clinic, but came in April of that first year of its existence.

Dr. Arnold was always a leader in the island medical profession. He served as president of the Honolulu County Medical Society in 1928, head of the Territorial Medical Association a decade later, chief of Medicine at Queen's Hospital in 1939, and chief of staff from 1954 to 1957.

Dr. Arnold was a charter member and past president of the Hawaiian Academy of Science. He was also one of the original members of the incorporating body of the Hawaii Heart Association in 1948. In 1956 he was made a Life Member of the Honolulu County Medical Society.

From 1931 to 1946 he was a member of the Board of Trustees of Leahi Hospital for Tuberculosis and in 1946 he became president of the board, a position which he held for 17 years by annual re-election. He was Governor of the Hawaii Chapter of the American College of Physicians from 1938 to 1948; was Chief of the Emergency Medical and Ambulance Service of the Office of Civilian Defense in Hawaii from 1941 to 1946; and was an appointed member of the Loyalty Appeals Review Board of the U.S. Civil Service Commission from 1949 to 1953.

In 1944, Dr. Arnold had published "Poisonous Plants of Hawaii', a book which has become a classic in the field. On April 28, 1956 he was awarded the Hawaii Medical Association's distinguished service award. He was praised for "services to the medical profession and to the citizens of this community above and beyond the call of routine professional responsibilities." He was name: "scholar, leader, distinguished physician, good citizen, author, and past president." Thus he was acclaimed and given recognition for his innumerable services to the medical profession.

After 46 years at the Straub Clinic, he retired at the age of 80, on August 14, 1967. His outstanding orchid collection, his talent for woodwork and his book-lined study kept him happily busy in his retirement years. He died of pancreatic carcinoma on July 25, 1971, at the age of 83.

Dr. Arnold's survivors are his wife, Meda; his son, Dr. Harry L. Arnold, Jr., a well-known dermatologist and long-time editor the "The Hawaii Medical Journal"; his daughter, Mrs. Sally Lowrey; seven grandchildren; and 11 great grandchildren.

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