Medical College of Virginia - X Ray Yearbook (Richmond, VA)

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BOOK ONE THE COLLEGE

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The Campaign Bears Fruit HE campaign for funds conducted by the Medical College of Virginia last spring began first with students and fac- ulty, followed by an appeal to alumni and the city of Rich- mond. When the student body had pledged more than forty thousand dollars, and the faculty had contributed somewhat more than sixty thousand dollars, it was pretty well assured that the alumni and the city of Richmond would respond. Thus far the total of campaign pledges runs considerably beyond a half million dollars, and the campaign is still going forward in a quiet way. As a direct result of the campaign there have been written into wills several large sums, ultimately to come to the college. Moreover, it is believed that other individuals are likewise contemplating pro- viding for the college. How fine it will be when every friend and alumnus of the institution will make at least some provision for the future of the Medical College of Virginia when planning for the settle- ment of his estate! This ideal objective is definitely attainable, it is believed. Many are the moral advantages which have accrued from the cam- paign: The college is better known, respected, and loved; old friends rejoice in it anew, and additional friends have been won for it. As a direct outcome of the campaign the first full-time clinician in the modern sense has been added to the staff of the School of Medicine; and when campaign pledges have been paid in larger numbers, work upon two new buildings will start. One of these will be a women ' s dormitory and the other a laboratory and clinic building. Then, just as soon as possible, the new college library will be constructed in physical association with the magnificent library and home of the Richmond Academy of Medicine, which will be erected on the northeast corner of Clay and Twelfth streets, facing the Confederate Museum.

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The Founding of the Medical College of Virginia By Wyndham B. Blanton, M.D. Richmond, Va. |HE STORY of the founding of the Medical College of Virginia forms a natural chapter in the general history of medical education in this country. The Revolu- tion did not emancipate America politically without creating a natural desire for freedom and self-expression in education. The practice of indenture and the habit of going abroad for a medical education — the grand tour — both stopped with Yorktown. The first American medical school was opened at the University of Pennsylvania in 1765. By 1783 similar institutions were planted in New York City and at Harvard. By 1837 twelve medical colleges were in operation, three of which were in the South. In Virginia med- ical education was early a prominent issue. An abortive medical department was organized at William and Mary College in 1779 when the famous Dr. James McClurg was made professor of medicine. Quesney ' s Academy in Richmond was an ambitious scheme for higher education, and among its chairs was one devoted to Anatomy. In 1825 the University of Virginia opened the first real medical school in the! state, and by 1838 Dr. Peter Mettauer was attracting scores of students to his academy in Prince Edward. He was teaching and practicing brilliantly in the neighborhood of Hampden-Sidney College. His reputation was national. Why his school was not taken over as the medical department of Hampden-Sidney College is difficult to understand. He was an alumnus of that college and his flourishing school was less than a mile away. The amalgamation of his school with Randolph-Macon some years later, and the tenor of a letter of his, now in possession of Dr. Joseph L. Miller, of Thomas, West Virginia, shows that Mettauef evidently had strong feeling in the matter. The immediate events which led to the founding of this school are interesting. It was gen- erally realized that the great majority of medical students from Virginia were drifting North for an education in spite of the fact that the University of Virginia had been in the field thirteen years. It was even claimed in 1843 that since 1810, 4,140 out of a total of 5,900 Virginia students of medicine had matriculated at the University of Pennsylvania. Another effort to stem the exodus of Virginians must be made. The lay papers joined with the profession in urging the study of medicine at home. Unconsciously, the ' fortunes of the men who were to found the new college were drawing them td Richmond, so that by 1838 there were three ex-professors of medicine and others with fine academic training on the field. Two of them had occupied important positions in the medical faculty of the University of Virginia. Dr. Thomas Johnson held the chair of Anatomy and Surgery at Charlottesville for ten years before he resigned. He then moved to Richmond. Dr. Augustus L. Warner of Baltimore was appointed to succeed Dr. Johnson. He also resigned, and in 1837 moved to Richmond. So strong was the teaching instinct in him that he advertised in the Richmond daily papers the immediate opening of a private medical school of his own. By October 2, 1837, he announced that he was prepared to receive students. These private plans appear to have been cut short by a more ambitious scheme for medical education in Richmond centering around Warner, John Cullen, R. L. Bohannon and L. W. Chamberlayne. The reso- lution which the Hampden-Sidney College Board of Trustees ac ted upon on December i, 1837, must have originated with them. At any event a medical college was created in Richmond on that date as a department of Hampden-Sidney College.