Obituary Record

Morris (Doctor) Nielsen
Died on 1/15/1955
Buried in Blair Cemetery

Nielsen, Dr. Morris 1/15/1955

Note: portrait in paper

Printed in the Jan. 20, 1955 Pilot-Tribune, Blair, Nebraska

Dr. Morris Nielsen, 79, Succumbs Saturday After an Illness

Many Honors Had Come to Blair Physician

Dr. Morris Nielsen, 79, an immigrant boy who succeeded in his determination to become a physician despite almost unbelievable difficulties, died at his home in Blair Saturday evening.

A physician in Blair since 1911, Dr. Nielsen had been in failing health since early fall. He was one of the deans of Nebraska medicine, and had been frequently honored by his colleagues and others for his service to community and state.

Dr. Nielsen was Nebraska’s candidate for the “Doctor of the Year” award of the American Medical Association in 1949.

In 1952 he was awarded the Lincoln Kiwanis Club’s distinguished service medal for “unselfish and unlimited service to his community”. This award, an annual honor, earlier had gone to such Nebraskans as Bess Streeter Aldrich, General John Pershing, Father E.J. Flanagan, Louise Pound, Carrie Belle Raymond, Charles H. Morrill and William J. Jeffers.

Funeral Was Tuesday

The body of Dr. Nielsen was removed from his home at 300 West Grant St. to the Bendorf Funeral Home.

Services were held at 2 p.m. Tuesday at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church. Officiating was the Rev. Samuel R. Elliston, and interment followed in the Blair Cemetery.

Here from Tiffin, O., to assist with the services was the Rev. Charles D. Hering, onetime Blair Episcopal pastor.

Pallbearers were George T. Hedelund, Sam Haller, Dr. E.T. Jipp, B.F. Lundt, Ernest A. Schmidt and Wayne Anderson.

Dr. Nielsen is survived by his wife, Mary; four sons, Morris, Jr. of New York, Damon of Blair, Vance of Kearney and Jules of New York. There is one grandson, Stephen Nielsen of Kearney.

Dr. Nielsen, who was born in Copenhagen, Denmark Oct., 3, 1875, and came to America with his parents at the age of 7, had a story-book career.

In 1892, while serving as a seaman on a tramp freighter to earn money for a medical education, he was shipwrecked in a great storm off the coast of Japan.

Seventeen survivors jammed into one lifeboat and escaped the ship with a small amount of water and sea biscuits as their only provisions.

Five Survived

The supplies soon disappeared and days of raging thirst and hunger and exposure to the elements followed.

When the boat was approached by a Japanese fishing craft 18 days later only five of the survivors were still alive. Some had gone insane and jumped overboard—others had died of exposure.

Three of the five who were rescued died soon afterward. Dr. Nielsen recovered after several months hospitalization in Kobe, Japan.

Dr. Nielsen, who had gone to sea at 14, spent four years sailing to most of the ports of the earth. He sailed around the Cape of Good Hope and Cape horn on a windjammer.

In 1893, having saved enough money as a seaman, he enrolled at the Omaha College of Medicine, which was to become the University of Nebraska Medical College of Medicine. After two years at medical college his money ran out. He headed for Texas and signed on as a cowboy in Marfa.

Worked Hard

Soon the ex-seaman, ex-medical student was helping drive a herd of steers up the Chisholm Trail through the India Nation to Fort Keogh, Mont.

From Montana he drove an overland freight wagon to Southern Utah. There he tried his hand as a miner in the Horn Silver Mine working in water above his knees for $4 a day.

Hanging on to every cent possible he saved enough to return to medical college. But he couldn’t quite make it through his last two years. He needed another job.

He found it at Cortland Beach on Carter Lake—parachute jumping.

For $5 a jump he would ascend 400 or 500 feet on a heated balloon and bail out. He made an estimated 80 jumps before returning to medical college, where he was graduated in May, 1900.

His first practice was in Belden. There he married Mary Nielsen, a farmer’s daughter. They celebrated their 50th wedding here in August, 1953.

In 1907 he moved to Sioux City and after practicing there for three years went to Harvard University for graduate study.

Studied in Europe

After work at Harvard, Dr. Nielsen, still possessed of a determination not only to be a doctor but a good one, went abroad to Europe. He studied at the Imperial University of Vienna in Austria, and at Heidelberg University in Germany. He became a specialist in anatomy, diagnosis, pathology and surgical technique.

So prepared, he returned to America –and then came to Blair in 1911, his home since, to become a general practitioner. During his 43 years as a physician here, he had delivered over 3,500 babies and also served the medical needs of thousands of families. Despite his skills and specialties, he preferred to be known as “just a country doctor”.

His skill was not without recognition at home and elsewhere, however. While he apparently avoided a career which could have made him wealthy, his talents brought him many high honors, and a steady procession of medical authorities sought his advice on matters large and small.

He held every important office in the local and state branches of the Nebraska State Medical Association. He was president of the state group in 1927. More recently, he was chairman of its council on medical ethics.

A Civic Worker

Dr. Nielsen found time to devote without charge to civic duties. A resume of his activities is at the same time an enumeration of all the major responsibilities and thankless jobs of a community.

Dr. Nielsen was for years a member of the Blair Board of Education, and for several years its president. During his membership he realized four aims: the hiring of a permanent school nurse, establishment of kindergarten, erection of a vocational agriculture building and organization of a top school band.

Dr. Nielsen was long a Chamber of Commerce member. As this organization’s president at the end of World War I, he saw paved streets come to Blair.

He was a charter member and first president of the Blair Rotary Club. He was a Mason for many years, and had served many terms as official Blair City physician.

~~~ Obituary courtesy of the Washington County Genealogical Society. Newspaper clippings on file in the Blair Public Library at Blair, Nebraska.~~~

FindaGrave memorial # 117625474

Printed in the Washington County Pilot-Tribune on 1/20/1955


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