University of Maryland School of Pharmacy - Terra Mariae Yearbook (Baltimore, MD)

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3fistor of tl)e ICniversltY of !! arYlan6 HE history of the present University of Maryland practically combines the history of two institutions. It begins with the chartering of the Col- lege of Medicine of Maryland in Baltimore in 1807, which graduated its first class in 1810. In 1812 the institution was empowered to annex other departments and was by the same act constituted an University by the name and under the title of the University of Maryland. As such, its Law and Medical schools have since been especially prominent in the South and widely known throughout the country. The Medical School building in Baltimore, located at Lombard and Greene Streets, erected in 1814-1815, is the oldest structure in America devoted to medical teaching. For more than a century the University of Maryland stood almost as organized in 1812, until an act of the Legislature in 1920 merged it with the Maryland State Col- lege, and changed the name of the Maryland State College to the University of Mary- land. All the property formerly held by the old University of Maryland was turned over to the Board of Trustees of the Maryland State College, and the Board of Tr is- tees changed to be the Board of Regents. The Maryland State College first was chartered in 1856 under the name of the Maryland Agriculture College, the second agricultural college in the Western Hemi- sphere. For three years the College was under private management. In 1862 the Con- gress of the United States, recognizing the practical value and increasing need of such colleges, passed the Land Grant Act. This act granted each State and Territory that should claim its benefits a proportionate amount of unclaimed Western lands, in place of scrip, the proceeds from the sale of which should apply under certain conditions to the endowment, support and maintenance of at least one college where the leading object shall be, without excluding other scientific and classical studies, and including military tactics, to teach such branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts, in such manner as the Legislatures of the States may respectively prescribe, in order to promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes in the sev- eral pursuits and professions of life. This grant was accepted by the General As- sembly of Maryland. The Maryland Agricultural College was named as the bene- ficiary of the ( rant. Thus the College became, at least in part, a State institution. In the fall of 1914 its control was taken over entirely by the State. In 1916 the General Assembly granted a new charter to the College and made it the Maryland State College. The University is co-educational and under the charter every power is granted necessary to carry on an institution of higher learning and research, comparable to the great state universities of the West, in which Agriculture and Engineering hold a domi- nant place along with the Liberal Arts and professions. This is in full accord with the Morrill Act of the National Congress and the subsequent acts above referred to. This institution, therefore, is the representative of the State and the Nation in higher education and research. The charter provides that it shall receive and administer all existing grants from the national government and all future grants which may come to the State for this purpose. Sixteen

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