FEATURE
Fig. 2 The 1908 anatomy class at the Louisville and Hospital Medical College.
Fig. 1 The Old Medical School, at First and Chestnut Streets. Built for the Louisville Medical
College in 1891-3.
T
he years leading up to the 1908
transfer of the Old Medical School
building from the Louisville Medi-
cal College (LMC) to the University
of Louisville (UofL) were tumultu-
ous for medical education locally and nation-
ally. In the latter 19 th century, Louisville be-
came one of the three largest national centers
for medical education (vying with New York City and Philadelphia),
and it hosted 1,200-1,500 students annually, who attended the many
medical schools in the city. Louisville then enjoyed a thriving econ-
omy, much of it coming from the post-Civil War reconstruction of
the South. As a steambo at and railroad transportation crossroads,
Louisville gave students from afar ready access. There was a gen-
erous supply of cadavers for anatomic education, although the
great demand outstripped supply, and surreptitious grave-robbing
thrived. Louisville’s seven stable medical schools (five allopathic,
one African-American allopathic, and one homeopathic) supplied
physicians not only for all of Kentucky, but for the entire South (still
struggling to recover from the war) and for the vigorous national
westward expansion. The great symbol of medical education for this
vibrant era was Louisville’s elegant new LMC building, which was
hailed as “the finest medical edifice in the nation.” (Fig. 1)
A GATHERING STORM
Under this gleaming surface of vigorous activity, prosperity and
pride, however, profound troubles were brewing. All Louisville
schools, and most elsewhere, were funded purely from tuition
revenue, which fostered overly large classes and low standards. An
early prophet of a coming crisis was Louisville’s pioneering obstetri-
cian, Henry Miller, MD, who made this concern a focus of his 1860
American Medical Association (AMA) Presidential Address. In the
Fig. 3 An amphitheater in Philadelphia, similar to those of the Old Medical School (no
photograph of the LMC amphitheater has been located).
late 19 th century, the rapid growth of science in medicine greatly
escalated school expenses as they equipped student laboratories
and hired basic science faculty (who did not bring private practice
revenues with them for support). By the turn of the century, alarm
at the overproduction of marginally qualified physicians was being
widely voiced from public health advocates, the AMA and the few
schools with higher quality standards. New organizations, such as
the AMA’s Council on Medical Education and the American Asso-
ciation of Medical Colleges, formed to address those concerns. The
structural deficiencies in medical education and the schools’ finan-
cial crises were about to intersect, with tumultuous consequences.
THE BUILDING SURVIVES CRISES, CLOSURES AND
MERGERS
The elegant Old Medical School Building was constructed in 1891-
1893 with bank financing obtained by the LMC faculty under lead-
ership of Dean Clinton Kelly, MD. Classes began in late 1893, only
to see onset of a harsh, multi-year national depression, the panic
of 1894. This depression would fatally cripple the financial stability
of LMC and its new building. By the turn of the century, pressure
to close or merge over-proliferated schools was growing on local,
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