Jefferson Medical College (1824-1895) --- Chapter 1: the Early Struggles (Pages 1-45)
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Thomas Jefferson University Jefferson Digital Commons Thomas Jefferson University - tradition and heritage, edited by Frederick B. Wagner, Jr., MD, Jefferson History and Publications 1989 January 1989 Part I: Jefferson Medical College (1824-1895) --- Chapter 1: The Early Struggles (pages 1-45) Follow this and additional works at: https://jdc.jefferson.edu/wagner2 Let us know how access to this document benefits ouy Recommended Citation "Part I: Jefferson Medical College (1824-1895) --- Chapter 1: The Early Struggles (pages 1-45)" (1989). Thomas Jefferson University - tradition and heritage, edited by Frederick B. Wagner, Jr., MD, 1989. Paper 50. https://jdc.jefferson.edu/wagner2/50 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Jefferson Digital Commons. The Jefferson Digital Commons is a service of Thomas Jefferson University's Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL). The Commons is a showcase for Jefferson books and journals, peer-reviewed scholarly publications, unique historical collections from the University archives, and teaching tools. The Jefferson Digital Commons allows researchers and interested readers anywhere in the world to learn about and keep up to date with Jefferson scholarship. This article has been accepted for inclusion in Thomas Jefferson University - tradition and heritage, edited by Frederick B. Wagner, Jr., MD, 1989 by an authorized administrator of the Jefferson Digital Commons. For more information, please contact: [email protected]. PART I The Proprietary Years ofJeJferson Medzcal College (1824-1895) Jefferson Medical College (ca. 18505) ,' .',\,'. ~ til....:,~ '."~ CHAPTER ONE l~.. ,." ..: , ,- I .••..... ."tJ ,iJI~ . The Early Struggles FREDERICK B. WAGNER, JR., M.D. "If there is no struggle) there is no progress.J) -FREDERICK DOUGLASS (1817-1895) The Jefferson Connection: for funds and books included Benjamin Franklin, An Overview who sent £50 and some books. Shortly after Franklin's death in 1790 his portrait was sent. 2 In 1802 the trustees chartered the institution as a How the medical institution we call Jefferson college and gave it the name of Jefferson in honor today actually got its name is a complex narrative. of the then third President of the United States It involves a relationship of three cities (1801- 1809). J As a token of appreciation Jefferson Canonsburg, Charlottesville, and Philadelphia. It made a gift of some books, and in 1803 sent a also involves a relationship of three men-Thomas portrait of himself by an unknown artist. 2 In spite Jefferson, the namesake; George McClellan, the of the great statesman's reputed wealth, generosity, founder; and Robley Dunglison, the bridge and interest in education, he had serious financial (Figure I-I). troubles. Because of a flamboyant life style, lavish The first root of the gigantic family tree may be maintenance resulted in a personal debt of traced to about 1773, when an itinerant $20,000 by the time Jefferson left the presidency. Presbyterian minister named John McMillen (1752 After the British destroyed the Library of 1833) traveled to western Pennsylvania to preach Congress in 1814, the former President sold 13,000 the gospel to the Scottish settlers of that area. volumes from his own library to the nation for After founding the Chartiers Hill Presbyterian $23,950. This temporary relief was erased by the Church near Canonsburg, he founded Canonsburg hordes of relatives, guests, and strangers who Academy in a log cabin around 1780, the first unashan1edly wined, dined, and boarded at his chartered literary institution west of the expense, even keeping their horses in his stables. Alleghenies.' The only good road into the area His threatened bankruptcy was saved by a national was a military one from Virginia, constructed in subscription of $16,500 in 1826, the year of his 1754 through the forest by General Braddock's death. A few months later Monticello itself (now a pioneer battalion of 300 axemen. Because the national memorial) with its furniture, pictures, and western part of Pennsylvania was largely blocked silver, was sold to cover the debts. 3 Small wonder by impassable mountains, this area was more that Jefferson was unable to send any money to closely linked to Virginia than to Philadelphia. the college honoring his name. The Reverend Mr. McMillen's appeal to In 1824 events took place in Canonsburg, prominent citizens of Virginia and Pennsylvania Philadelphia, and Charlottesville that marked the The Early Struggles • 3 CANONSBURG --- -----7 PHILADELPHIA (1824) Jefferson College (1802) Jefferson Medical College GEORGE McCLELLAN (1796-1847) The Founder THOMAS JEFFERSON (1743-1826) ROBLEY DUNGLISON (1798-1869) The Namesake The Bridge CllARLOTrESVILLE College of Medicine, Univ. of Virginia (1825) FIG. I-I. The Jefferson-Dunglison-McCldlan Connection. 4 Thomas Jeffirson University in the main exhibition hall of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, and its replica stands in the Board of Trustees' Room of the Scott Administration Building.7 Dunglison became a professor at the University of Maryland in I833 and, in I836, at Jefferson Medical College, where he remained for the rest of his life. He was just two years younger than birth and aided the future of Jefferson Medical McClellan the founder and was the bridge College. It was the year in which Dr. George between Jefferson the man and Jefferson the McClellan negotiated the establishment of the institution. Medical Department of Jefferson College at In I838 Jefferson Medical College obtained its Canonsburg as the Jefferson Medical College of independent charter from the Pennsylvania State Philadelphia. 4 His attempts to obtain a separate Legislature, "with all of the rights and privileges charter from the Pennsylvania legislature for a of the University of Pennsylvania." second medical college in Philadelphia had been In I870 Samuel D. Gross founded the Jefferson unsuccessful. Alumni Association, which spearheaded a building In the same year at Charlottesville, Thomas fund campaign for a new detached hospital that Jefferson was busy with the creation of a medical was completed in I877. The goal of $250,000 was school for the University of Virginia, which had oversubscribed at $350,000 in two months. first opened its doors in I8I9.5 At age 76 Jefferson Until I895 Jefferson Medical College, like most had already designed much of the physical other medical schools, was a proprietary structure and curriculum of the University. Now institution, in that the students paid the faculty at 8I years, in full possession of the intellectual professors directly for tickets to the lectures as energy and humanitarian spirit that characterized well as for clinical instruction in the hospital. The his genius, he was searching for the best possible professors in turn paid rent to the College to young man "to teach medicine on historical lines cover taxes and maintenance. On June I, I895, with explanations of its successive theories since under Board President Joseph B. Townsend, Esq., the time of Hippocrates for the purpose of Jefferson became a nonprofit-sharing corporation affording such information as educated persons with a single board of trustees responsible for the would want for the sake of culture." The post was complete integration and management of the deemed of such importance that the search College and Hospital. In I949 the first President extended to London, where Francis E. Gilmer, of the Corporation, Vice Admiral James L. Esq., Jefferson's representative, enlisted Dr. Kauffman, U.S.N. Ret., was appointed. Through \. Robley Dunglison.6 Dunglison was given this new office the Medical College began to academic tenure, with $I,500 annual salary, free benefit from yearly appropriations from the rent in one of the University pavilions, and a Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Also in I949, a five-year covenant secured by a guarantee of graduate program in various basic medical sciences $5,000. It was the first full-time clinical teaching was organized that led to tlle formation of the position in a university medical school in this College of Graduate Studies in I969. country. In I96I Jefferson Medical College first admitted \. Within two months of Dunglison's arrival at women students, and in 1965 seven received their Charlottesville, he was summoned to become the M.D. degrees. Increasing numbers and personal physician of Thomas Jefferson. Until then involvement of women in all aspects of the Jefferson had distrusted the medical profession, institution have most favorably enhanced its preferring nature's healing. Yet in his twenties, welfare and prestige. Dunglison found himself attending the former A College of Allied Health Sciences was President of the United States and serving as chartered in I967 to provide both academic and faculty head in the School of Medicine of the clinical education in the health professions and University of Virginia. He faithfully attended occupations. Jefferson's last two years and closed his eyelids at Through the untiring efforts of President Peter his death on July 4, I826. Jefferson had arranged A. Herbut, M.D., the scope of Jefferson Medical for Dunglison to receive as a gift the grandfather College of Philadelphia was expanded with a new clock in his bedroom. The clock is now displayed charter and the adoption of the name Thomas The Early Struggles • 5 Jefferson University in April, 1969.8 Jefferson is a privately endowed, tuition- and gift-supported, nonsectarian, nonprofit corporation, which also receives certain grants and appropriations from the federal government, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and the State of Delaware. The Jefferson Medical College of Philadelphia retains its original identity and is officially known as the Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson Thomas Jefferson: Influence on University. The three other components of the Medical Theory and Practice University are the College of Graduate Studies, the College of Allied Health Sciences, and the In the context of their times, Thomas Jefferson Thomas Jefferson University Hospital. remains unchallenged as the most informed and On JaIlUary 18, 1972, at the second session of the versatile of all u.s.