Antanas BIRŽlŠKA
(1855-1922), physician, born in the estate of Lapkasiai, near Vainutas,
county of Taurage, on Jan. 17,1855. His ancestry can be traced to the noble
Samogitian family formerly called Sudimantas; from the middle of the 17th
century the family changed its name to coincide with its manor of
Biržulaukiai. This family participated actively in the resistance movement
against the Russian occupation of Lithuania in the 19th century. Biržiška,
having graduated from the High School at Šiauliai in 1875, studied medicine
at Moscow University and graduated in1880, While a student, he was a close
friend of Vincas Pietaris and Jonas Basanavičius, both active in the
Lithuanian movement. He declined an offer to remain as a faculty member at
the University of Moscow and chose to reside at Vieksniai in western
Lithuania, where he practiced medicine for the rest of his life and earned a
reputation as a devoted and skilled doctor, at a time when there were few
doctors in Lithuania. He later bequeathed his large medical library to the
medical school of the University of Kaunas. He married Elzbieta
Rodzevičiūtė, a music teacher (1858-1938), and raised three
sons, Mykolas, Vaclovas and Viktoras, who became famous as scholars and
public leaders. He died in Vieksniai on Oct. 31, 1922.
Text from the ENCYCLOPEDIA
LITUANICA I-VI. Boston, 1970-1978
