Idaho Falls Medical Pioneer Clifford M. Cline, M.D. [otd 08/11]

Idaho Falls physician Clifford M. Cline, M.D., was born August 11, 1884 in a rural area sixty miles or so north of Des Moines, Iowa. Accounts of his early life are a bit skimpy. However, in 1900 he was living west of Des Moines with his mother and stepfather, a physician. Years later, Dr. Cline said that browsing his stepfather’s medical library inspired him to pursue that career. He proved to be an outstanding scholar. In 1902 – aged 18 – he was listed among the anatomy faculty of the University of Iowa (officially the “State University of Iowa”). 

C. M. Cline. Family Archive.

From there, Cline moved to the Northwestern University School of Medicine, attaining his M.D. degree in 1905. He then won an internship to a well-respected teaching hospital in Chicago. Married in late 1906, he and his wife moved to Idaho Falls early the following year. “C.M” – as he was almost universally identified in the news – quickly teamed with another physician to operate one of the first hospitals in Idaho Falls.

Already a highly skilled surgeon, Cline continued to travel east during most summers to learn new techniques. However, sorrow visited the Cline household in the summer of 1909, when an infant son died at the age of six months.

In January 1911, the Idaho governor appointed Dr. Cline to the state Board of Medical Examiners. (He would be appointed to the Board again sixteen years later.) In 1912, he briefly moved his practice to Boise, and the couple’s daughter was born there. However, the family was back in Idaho Falls by early 1913. C.M. then made the first of several trips overseas. Leaving Idaho Falls in June 1914, he attended medical conferences in Philadelphia and Atlantic City, then spent until August visiting hospitals in London, Paris, Berne, and Berlin.

All that study was put to good use in 1915, when he and another doctor opened a new hospital, known as the “General Hospital.” This was the first structure built specifically as a hospital in Idaho Falls.
 

General Hospital. Bonneville County Historical Society.

Besides operation of the hospital, C.M. had other business interests in the city. He further expanded those in 1919, when he and a partner worked with a local contractor to erect the Colonial Theater. Said to have the largest and finest stage in the Mountain West, the venue hosted all kinds of theatrical and musical performances. He sold his investment after several years, and it was later adapted for motion pictures.

The General Hospital ceased operation in 1923, when the Mormon Church spearheaded construction of a larger facility, initially known as the “L.D.S. Hospital.” Dr. Cline served on the medical staff as well as the executive board for that hospital.

A Fellow  of the American College of Surgeons, Dr. Cline was a member of the American Medical Association and the Idaho State Medical Society. Also, in 1921, he helped organize the Idaho Falls Medical Society and became its first president. As a sideline, he chaired the funding-raising committee for the local chapter of the American Red Cross.

C.M. participated in the Commercial Club, the Elks, and the Idaho Falls school board. He also helped found the Idaho Falls Rotary Club and served as its president for a time. Even all that wasn’t enough to fill his life: He was reportedly an ardent sports fan and a fine gourmet cook.

Dr. Cline  was also a frequent traveler. Besides in-country trips to conferences and educational venues, Dr. Cline took has wife and daughter to Europe in the summer of 1927. Ten years later, he and his second wife traveled to South American, where a group of doctors toured a wide variety of clinics and hospitals. (His first wife died in 1934; he remarried two years later).
 

Boeing 247. Smithsonian Air & Space.

C.M. also kept up with the times outside his profession. Scheduled airline passenger service came to Idaho Falls in 1934, in the form of a innovative ten-passenger Boeing aircraft. That fall, he and his daughter boarded a flight destined for San Francisco. That familiarity served Dr. Cline well a few months later, when he flew to Moscow in response to a medical emergency.

Although he apparently cut back his travel after his second wife died in 1952, he stayed active in his profession until right near the end. Dr. Clifford M. Cline passed away on September 13, 1962, after a career that spanned over a half century.

                                                                                 

References: [Hawley]

Bulletin of Northwestern University, 1905-1906, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois (1906). Catalogue, State University of Iowa [University of Iowa], Iowa City, Iowa (1903).

“[C. M. Cline News],” Idaho Statesman, Boise, Post-Register, Idaho Falls, Idaho; Winona Daily News, Minnesota; Deseret News, Salt Lake City, Utah (July 1909 – March 1952).

Harold S Forbush and Contributors, The Idaho Falls LDS Hospital, Ricks College Press, Rexburg, Idaho (1987).

Mary Jane Fritzen, Idaho Falls, City of Destiny, Bonneville County Historical Society (1991).).