Howard McCrum Snyder

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Howard McCrum Snyder (1881–1970) was a Major General in the U.S. Army Medical Corps and served as Physician to the President for Dwight D. Eisenhower from 1953 to 1961.

Born February 7, 1881, in Cheyenne, Wyoming, Snyder was the son of Albert Snyder and Priscilla McCrum. His father died when he was ten. He studied at the University of Colorado (1899–1901) and earned his medical degree from Jefferson Medical College in 1905. After an internship at Presbyterian Hospital in Philadelphia, he joined the Army Medical Corps and graduated from the Army Medical School in 1908, becoming a first lieutenant.

Snyder began his military medical career in the Philippines (1909–1911) with the Research Board of Tropical Medicine, where he met Alice Elizabeth Concklin. They married on July 12, 1910. Over the next 25 years he held various command and teaching positions in the United States and Puerto Rico. From 1936 to 1940 he was medical adviser to the National Guard Bureau. From 1940 to 1945 he served as assistant to the inspector general of the War Department, traveling to different theaters of World War II. Near the end of the war he became close to Eisenhower and, although retired in March 1945, remained on active duty in Europe as Eisenhower’s personal physician until after Germany’s surrender. He also treated Mamie Eisenhower for pneumonia in November 1945.

After the war, Snyder stayed near the Eisenhower family and joined Eisenhower’s presidential campaign train in 1952. He returned to active duty in January 1951 with SHAPE and became a special adviser to Eisenhower. After Eisenhower’s inauguration in 1953, Snyder served as Physician to the President, providing close medical care to Eisenhower and his family, and accompanying them on trips and vacations. He administered daily medical advice, recorded observations, and tended to the president’s health, including assisting after a heart attack in September 1955 and during the ileitis operation in June 1956.

Howard McCrum Snyder died on September 22, 1970, in Washington, D.C., at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. He was survived by his wife and two children.