Phineas J. Montgomery, M. D., homeopathic physician and surgeon, is one of the leading physicians of his school in western Iowa. Dr. Montgomery was born in Delaware County, New York, December 1, 1841. His father is Charles Fowler Montgomery. The family was originally from Vermont and of Scotch ancestry. The mother of the subject of this sketch was formerly Emeline E. St. John, and descended directly from the St. Johns and Abbotts of England, her mother having been an Abbott. Her family were early settlers of Connecticut. The parents of Dr. Montgomery emigrated from the State of New York to Wisconsin in 1852 and settled in Rock County, and later removed to Jefferson County, and are still residents of Waterloo in that county. The Doctor is the third in order of birth of six sons. There were also three daughters in the family.

The subject of this sketch was educated at Albion Academy, Wisconsin, and was for two years engaged in teaching, and for a times had charge of Waterloo Academy. He had contemplated from early life fitting himself for the medical profession, and entered upon a regular course of medical study in 1862, at which he continued until 1864, when he entered the army as assistant physician and surgeon in the hospital of the quartermaster's department. He continued in the army until after the destruction of the Confederate General Hood's Army by the Army under General Thomas; his field of service being with the Army of the Tennessee. On his return from the army he entered the Hahnemann Medical College at Chicago, at which he graduated in 1866. After his graduation he located in Medina County, Ohio, where he remained three years, when he returned to Wisconsin and located at Watertown. There he continued in the practice of his profession until 1872, when he came to Iowa and located at Osage, where he practiced until 1879. In the winter of that year he took a special course of lectures at Hahnemann College, Chicago, and also in the College of Physicians and Surgeons in that city. In 1880 he came to Council Bluffs, where he has built up a large practice and is one of the leading physicians of the city.

Dr. Montgomery was married in Wisconsin in 1864, to Miss Helen A. Castle, a native of Ohio. They have two children: Charles Frederick, born in Ohio in 1869, and now a student of Grinnell College, and a daughter, Ruth Evangeline, born in Council Bluffs in 1881.