Dr. Frederick Augustus Fickardt

"Dr. Frederick Fickardt was a Bethlehem doctor and community leader who also was an impassioned orator who urged men to enlist in the Union Army. After Lee's army invaded Pennsylvania, Fickhardt told a crowd in front of Bethlehem's Eagle Hotel, "Men, all that I have to say to you is, 'Fight!'" His speech inspired his sons Augustus and Frederick, to enlist in the Union Army. Both youths served only briefly before dying of typhoid fever within five days of each other in 1864. The brothers, ages 18 and 20, were buried in a joint funeral in Bethlehem. Fickhardt continued to be vocal about the war and spoke at a memorial service for Abraham Lincoln."

• Source - http://articles.mcall.com/2012-04-07/news/mc-civil-war-stories-touc...

"Dr. Fickardt, who figures often on such and a variety of other kinds of occasions as a favorite speaker, had been a resident and practitioner at Bethlehem since 1843, when he removed to the place from Easton and occupied part of the house of Dr. Abraham Stout, the elder, who had been established at Bethlehem since 1821. Dr. Stout was the nect in the succession of regular Bethlehem physicians, after Dr. Frietag. He died in 1857. Cotemporary with Dr. Fickardt was Dr. Wm. Wilson who, in 1844, came to Bethlehem from Bath and first opened his office in a part of Sr. Fickardt's house which had previously been occupied, for a while, by Stout and Dixon as a drug-store."

• Source - http://digital.lib.lehigh.edu/cdm4/beyond_viewer.php?CISOPTR=10662&...

"Dr. Frederick A. Fickardt, one of the oldest and best known practising physicians in Eastern Pennsylvania, died at Bethlehem, March 13th, aged eighty-four. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania when he was twenty years old and practised medicine for sixty years, about forty of which were passed in Bethlehem."

• Source - The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, page 283.

"This model was filed with the application to the U.S. Patent Office for Patent Number 23 issued to Frederick A. Fickardt of Easton, Pennsylvania on September 8, 1836. His patent was for an improvement in furnaces for heating the upper rooms of a building. He claimed as new the use of an inner and outer chamber with insulating material on the outer chamber to reduce loss of heat into the furnace room. A gap of three to four inches was provided between the inner and outer chambers to further reduce loss of heat into the furnace room. The stove, or combustion chamber, was located within the inner chamber. Access to it for fueling and cleaning was via doors in both the inner and outer chambers. The inner chamber was open at the bottom allowing fresh air entry. The flue of the stove exited through this chamber via a sealed pipe. Heated air in the inner chamber was supplied to rooms above the furnace via a larger pipe, or duct, surrounding the flue of the stove. A sliding lid for the hot air duct was provided to stop cold or foul air entering the heated rooms from the cellar when the furnace was not in use. One of Fickardt’s claims was “Immediate heat, great heat, and economy of heat, and consequently economy of fuel, money, time, patience, and domestic comfort are the advantages which the subscriber hopes he is but reasonably led to anticipate by these improvements.” Research of available trade literature and other sources has not revealed any commercial use that may have made use of Mr. Fickardt’s invention.

The patent model is constructed of painted tinplate. The central stove can be seen through access doors in the inner and outer chambers. The stove flue and hot air ductwork are shown at the top of the model. The sliding lid for the hot air duct is also shown. Diagrams showing the complete design can be found in the patent document online (www.USPTO.gov/patents/process/search/index.jsp). The diagram submitted with the patent shows the shape of the furnace to be rectangular with a sloping top while the patent model submitted is cylindrical with a conical top."

• Source - http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_1402617

"DR. FREDERICK A. FICKARDT, M. W. S.

Frederick A. Fickardt, is a native of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. His family is German from a stock originally French. His father was a medical graduate of one of the German universities, and emigrated early in life to this country. His mother was the eldest daughter of a Southern clergyman of talent and repute. At a proper age the subject of our sketch entered upon the study of Medicine, and in due time graduated at the Medical University of Pennsylvania. An arduous pursuit of his profession in the flourishing town of Easton, of that state, proved eventually an overmatch for his constitution, and induced him to exchange that locality for the city of Philadelphia, where he now resides. From his youth, Dr. Fickardt has been a firm and consistent advocate of Temperance. In 1828, he actively engaged in the formation and support of the first Temperance Society in Northern Pennsylvania, of which he subsequently became an efficient President. Since then he has been associated with the reform in all its phases. On his arrival at Philadelphia in 1845, he was elected Grand Worthy Patriarch of the Grand Division of "Sons of Temperance," of Penn. In 1846, at the third annual session of the National Division, he was elected Most Worthy Scribe of that body; and in 1848, at the fifth annual session, was re-elected to the same honorable and responsible position."

• Source - The National Temperance Offering: And Sons and Daughters of Temperance Gift by Samuel Fenton Cary, page 165.