Ohio History Journal

MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND FROM 1890 TO 1945

by CLYDE L. CUMMER, M.D.

 

Part I

THE REVOLUTIONARY NINETIES

Since 1810 when Dr. David Long moved to Cleveland from

Hebron, New York, and became Cleveland's first physician, there

was no decade in its medical history so fraught with change as that

extending from 1893 to 1903. This development in medicine was

but a part of the times. Although preparing to celebrate its cen-

tennial in 1896, Cleveland as a city had really only started its

adolescence and was suffering severe growing pains. Cleveland had

prospered since 1827 as the lake terminus of the Ohio Canal and

later as the principal harbor to receive the ungainly freight vessels

bringing iron ore from the rich deposits in the Lake Superior district.

However, it was like many of the New England villages from which

most of its founders had come and to whose conservative ways of

life and thinking their descendants adhered. To be sure, its popula-

tion in 1890 was over 260,000, but it was still the country village in

its provincial outlook and its deficiency in most of the cultural ad-

vantages marking a large city. Less than 10 years previously (1882)

Western Reserve University had been moved from Hudson and

Case School of Applied Science had been founded. Museums of

art and natural history and a symphony orchestra were far in

the future. Certainly in cultural development and regional im-

portance Cleveland was outclassed by Cincinnati, its rival to the

south.

However, the period was destined to see developments which

would mean much to Cleveland, with the result that in the twenty

years from 1890 to 1910 the population would almost double.

Electric railroads were to push out in the nineties to the surround-

ing country and make northeastern Ohio definitely tributary to

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MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND            345

 

Cleveland, which was becoming more and more a manufacturing

center.

During the nineties the impact of invention was beginning to

affect the doctor's daily life. Electric current was used more and

more for office, hospital, and domestic lighting. Communication

between doctor and patient was accelerated by the increasing use

of the telephone, and personal transportation for the doctor was

revolutionized-probably more than for any other class or occu-

pation-by the "horseless carriage." In 1890 all doctors, urban or

rural, were dependent on the horse for transportation; in 1900

many were making their calls in electric, gasoline, or steam powered

vehicles. In 1915 the doctor who did not drive his own car was

indeed an exceptional specimen.

Since Cleveland was an early center for automobile manufac-

turing-Winton, Stearns, Peerless, White, Baker, Rauch and Lang,

and other motor cars were made here-it was inevitable that its

industrial life would be profoundly altered by this tremendous

industry.  Even though Cleveland later lost its leadership in

automobile manufacture, it has continued to this day a large volume

of production in automobile parts. A growing industrial popula-

tion required increased medical service.

In the nineties the city had indeed become an industrial leader,

and its industrialists felt an urge to influence national legislation,

especially in favor of the high tariff to protect "infant industry."

The activities of Mark Hanna, which led to the seating of William

McKinley in the White House, with Hanna himself as the real

power behind the throne, were part of the Cleveland scene in this

period. And in this decade came the Spanish-American War and

the appearance of the United States as a major world power.

The year 1890 found Cleveland with four medical schools:

the medical department of Western Reserve University, the medical

department of the University of Wooster,the Cleveland Homeopathic

Medical College, and the Cleveland Medical College. The first

two were regular; the latter two homeopathic. The most popular

hospital was St. Vincent's Charity, built in 1865, then as now at

the corner of Central Avenue and East 22nd Street (then called

Perry Street). Lakeside Hospital in the early nineties was rela.

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346   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

tively small and located in a building belonging to the federal

government on Lakeside Avenue east of Ninth Street (then called

Erie Street). However, during the nineties Lakeside Hospital was

to build a large new hospital on the adjoining property to the

east and to be completely modernized in its organization, a devel-

opment of profound significance to Cleveland medicine.

Western Reserve University had control of the clinical facili-

ties of these two hospitals for teaching purposes. The Wooster

school had the Cleveland General Hospital which occupied two

remodeled dwellings on Woodland Avenue, while the two homeop-

athic schools used for teaching purposes the adjoining Huron Road

Hospital, located on the south side of Huron Road west of East

Ninth Street, the site now occupied by the Ohio Bell Telephone

building. St. Alexis Hospital on Boardway Avenue at McBride

Street was then very small, and St. John's had not been built. The

Cleveland City Hospital was used for teaching purposes by regulars

and homeopaths.

In large part the revolutionary changes in Cleveland medicine

in this period were stimulated by the advances in medical knowl-

edge which preceded and accompanied this period. The movement

of events was so rapid that it can hardly be appreciated by the

younger reader of today, for medicine was emerging from the era

of dogmatism into one of scientific inquiry. Remember that of

the practicing physicians of that day, few owned a microscope and

still fewer could use one. Modern pharmacology was in its

embryonic stage; the recognition of disease-producing bacteria was

still going on, and there were many doctors even after the turn

of the century who proclaimed openly that they did not believe

in germs and acted accordingly in the operating and sick rooms.

There were encouraging signs evidenced by restlessness in regard

to medical education which already had improved in some of the

leading schools, but there were still too many schools, especially

those of the proprietary type conducted for the financial gain of their

faculties. Though the proprietors may not have realized it, their

schools, many of them diploma mills, were destined for early death.

Encouraging developments were in progress, for the Johns Hopkins

Hospital was opened in 1889 and the Medical School in 1893.

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MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND             347

 

In the session 1888-89 a three-year graded course had been started

at the medical school of Western Reserve.¹ This marked a great

step in medical education. Changes in the methods of licensure

were in the immediate future.

Higher standards for entrance to medical schools and lengthen-

ing of the courses were being insisted upon, and soon the American

Medical Association and nonmedical foundations were to take up

the fight for higher educational standards. These steps were to be

reflected in coming years in a reduction in the number of schools in

Cleveland.

For many years the medical population of Cleveland was com-

posed largely, although by no means exclusively, of the graduates

of local schools. In the nineties there began to filter into the

city graduates of eastern schools, some to fill important posts in

the Western Reserve school, like Carl A. Hamann (University of

Pennsylvania, a pupil of Deaver), Hunter Robb (University of

Pennsylvania, trained by Howard Kelley), William T. Howard,

Jr. (University of Maryland, from William H. Welch's service at

Johns Hopkins), Charles S. Hoover (trained in Germany and at

Harvard), and George Neil Stewart (universities of Cambridge and

Edinburgh). Also in this epoch came other younger men including

William Evans Bruner and P. Maxwell Foshay, roomates in medical

school and both destined to play important roles in the rebuilding

period to come, Oscar Thomas, and Walter and William Lincoln,

all five from the University of Pennsylvania.

During the nineties the new Lakeside Hospital affected the

medical life of the city, for it increased the clinical and scientific

facilities and introduced a type of house-officer staff arrangement

then new to Cleveland with services definitely divided as medical,

surgical, gynecological, and "private ward," the latter set up to

serve physicians not on the visiting staff. Each service had a

chief resident, internes, and externes, and the larger ones an

assistant resident. This permitted a prolonged service for prom-

ising men who desired to have thorough training. Of course such

a plan is almost universal now, but then it was new in the Midwest

 

1 Frederick C. Waite, Western Reserve University. Centennial History of the

School of Medicine (Cleveland, 1946), 186.

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348   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

and served to attract men from the eastern or Canadian schools,

many of whom stayed in Cleveland after the completion of their

services and became junior visitants. Among some of those who

came in the nineties and years immediately following and remained

to have a potent influence on medical affairs were Edward Carter,

Louis W. Ladd, Russell H. Birge, William H. Weir, Howard Dit-

trick, Roger G. Perkins, and Henry L. Sanford.

In 1890 there were two medical organizations in the city: the

Cuyahoga County Medical Society and the Society of the Medical

Sciences of Cleveland. The latter had been organized in 1887 by

some of the city's older and more prominent physicians for the

cultivation of medical science and for the purpose of promoting a

medical library. It met at the homes of its members and elected

as first president the aloof and dignified H. Kirke Cushing, who

held office until 1895. This group was definitely exclusive and

conservative and not for the new and unknown man who came into

a new city without influence. The programs of the society do not

seem to have been better or worse than the average of the times,

but it may be said to the eternal credit of the society that it charged

dues of twenty dollars a year to build up a fund, eventually amount-

ing to $2,000, for a library.

The Cuyahoga County Medical Society was of rather ancient

lineage and was actually the heir to the traditions of the earliest

medical societies in the Western Reserve. It does not seem to

have been exclusive, because a young doctor, P. Maxwell Foshay,

came to Cleveland a comparative stranger in September 1892 and

was admitted to membership on November 28, 1892, contributing

an essay in the following February and reporting a case of "inter-

mittent fever" in April.

Contemporary recollections are valuable in giving some of the

color of the times. Frank E. Bunts came into the society in its

later years as a relatively young man, becoming one of its last

presidents. In 1926 he wrote:

I wish that I had known the Cuyahoga County Society earlier, for if

one may judge of it as I knew it, its earlier history must have been full of

excitement and interest. Scientific discussions were often interspersed with

bitter personal discussions which sometimes seemed destined to result in per-

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MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND                    349

 

sonal encounters. The relation of one interesting case was too often countered

by one still more interesting and when they became too interesting the veracity

of the narrator was apt to be called to account and one brilliant debater

usually took refuge in quotations from ancient literature, which few had read

and therefore could not dispute, except by doubt and innuendo. There were

giants in those days, however, men whose dictum we younger men were prone

to accept without question, except as they themselves disputed about it. There

was the dignified and handsome G. C. E. Weber, Professor of Surgery, and

formerly Surgeon General of Ohio during the Civil War, whom we looked up

to as embracing all that was worthwhile in the art of surgery; whose word

was law in the College; and whose great learning preserved him from the

too heavy assaults of those of lesser attainments. There was Vance, with his

ever ready battery of knowledge gained from familiarity with the writings of

the old masters of medicine and surgery. There was the fiery little curly

grey haired Thayer, Professor of Surgery, medical expert, anatomist, geologist,

controversialist and implacable, unappeasable foe of homeopathy, somewhat

profane, skeptical of the germ theory and ready to fight at the drop of the

hat. One cannot but remember with affection and lasting appreciation that

Nestor of medicine, W. J. Scott, Professor of Medicine, whose vast clinical

experience and sly humor added much to the value and piquancy of the

medical discussions. There came occasionally to the meetings Dr. H. W.

Kitchen, Apollo of the medical profession, Professor of Anatomy, County

Clerk, suave, courteous, respected and admired and equally feared by those

who came under his instruction.

Further description follows, but enough has been given here to

convey some idea of the caliber of the men in an age of strong

individualism.

In the early nineties meetings were held twice a month in the

afternoons at a variety of places, moving in about two years from

20 Euclid Avenue to the Engineers Club rooms in Case Library,

then to the Hollenden Hotel and next to the Y.M.C.A., then at

Prospect Avenue and Erie Street. The rules provided that the

president should appoint an essayist and two leading speakers for

the next meeting. This method was not very productive of results

for many of the essayists did not appear at the next meeting, or

even in fact in many instances at any subsequent meeting. The

attendance for the years 1890 and 1891 averaged 25, with a peak

of 37.

This general state of affairs was very irksome for the younger

men. As the eminent medical historian Henry E. Handerson, him-

self president in 1895-96, wrote:

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350    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

In the last decennium of the nineteenth century the Cuyahoga County

Medical Society, now more than thirty years old, began to exhibit the ordinary

signs of senescence, e. g., inordinate respect for precedent, lack of initiative

and a tendency to drift behind the rapid current of medical progress which

characterized this period. Again the younger members of the profession com-

plained (probably with some justice) that the exaggerated conservatism of

the older society was a hindrance to the advancement of local medicine, and

that the older members of the society were unwilling to do anything them-

selves, and still more unwilling to entrust the administration of affairs to

younger and more energetic hands. And again the experience of the '60s

was repeated. A new society was organized on February 3, 1893, under the

old name of "The Cleveland Medical Society," and under the presidency of

Dr. W. J. Scott, now seventy-one years "young," whose scientific zeal and

energy were absolutely impregnable to the assaults of age and infirmity, and

whose popularity was equally general and well merited.2

The new man in Cleveland whom we have been watching, P.

Maxwell Foshay, was one of a group of thirteen designated in the

printed roster of 1895 of the Cleveland Medical Society as "Incor-

porators and Committee which made the original call for the meet-

ing to organize." The others were William      F. Brokaw, Harold T.

Clapp, Joseph E. Cook, Etienne P. Crow, William H. Humiston,

E. Preble, N. Stone Scott, William J. M. Scott, George Stoskopf,

Frederick C. Taylor, Oscar T. Thomas, and William E. Wirt. Note

that Foshay had been in Cleveland only about a year and was

already one of the organizers of a new society.

The new society was virile, supercharged with youthful vitality.

Enthusiastic young men were in the saddle, and the organization

promptly swung into action not only as a scientific body in pro-

viding its members with top-flight meetings but as a crusader in

public affairs when health was involved. It took the lead also in

efforts for local medical organization.      As an example of its

vigorous method of attack, we will take the medical library which

long had been cherished as a dream by Cleveland doctors. Fre-

quent references to this dream are found in the minutes of both

older societies. The Cuyahoga County Medical Society had made

periodic additions to its library fund and had even set up a small

 

2 Samuel P. Orth, A History of Cleveland, Ohio (3 vols., Chicago and Cleveland,

1910), I, 202. Some time after 1895 the erudite Handerson joined the Cleveland

Medical Society although he retained his membership in the older society until the

merger in 1902. He was very active in the new Academy of Medicine and also in

the Cleveland Medical Library Association, of which he was president from 1896 to

1902, inclusive.

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MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND           351

 

collection of books in Case Library, while the Society of the Medical

Sciences of Cleveland had taxed its members twenty dollars a year

for dues to build up a fund. The new Cleveland Medical Society

had met in the Royal League Hall of the Case Block and the rooms

of the Chamber of Commerce in the Arcade. Its members were

irritated by the lack of suitable quarters and they wanted a library

in the present, not the future.

Early in 1894 the president, Dr. William H. Humiston, in an

address to the society, urged the appointment of a special com-

mittee to have in hand the project for a permanent medical build-

ing and library. The society started what were termed quarterly

meetings with distinguished guest speakers. At the very first one

Dr. Howard Kelley of Baltimore appeared before an attendance of

nearly 300. Preceding his scientific address with a short talk on the

library question, he presented two old and valuable books, one a

copy of the second edition of Vesalius' work on anatomy, published

in 1514, and the Century of Observations, published in 1716 by

Tulp of Amsterdam. The bibliophile's enthusiasm was contagious,

and taking advantage of the spirit of the occasion Dr. Humiston

proposed that the three societies unite on the library question.

Upon motion of Dr. Joseph E. Cook, a committee of three, with

the president as one member, was authorized to confer with

similar committees from the other two societies. The president

designated Dr. P. Maxwell Foshay and Dr. Cook to act with him.

At the December 14 meeting he announced that the Cleveland

Medical Library Association had been organized as an independent

society and moved that the Cleveland Medical Society turn over to

it all books, pamphlets, and money then in charge of the library

committee, which was agreed to unanimously. And so was born

the Cleveland Medical Library Association which at the celebration

of its semicentennial in 1944 was able to report the ownership of

a building costing over $600,000, a library of more than 63,000

volumes of books and bound journals, an outstanding museum of

cultural and historical medicine, endowment funds amounting to

almost $400,000, and a membership of 1,228.    And in that

semicentennial year over 10,000 visitors registered in the library.

They were divided approximately as follows, viz., members, 33

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352   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

per cent, medical and dental students, 29 per cent, other students

and nonmembers, 38 per cent. This indicated a wide service to

the public, one of which its founders could well be proud.

The quarterly meetings of the Cleveland Medical Society, at

which distinguished authorities from other cities spoke, and a

clinic, held at one of the local hospitals, served to attract local men

and also to focus public attention because the sessions were usually

well covered by the local newspapers. Indeed the new society had

a good press from the start. The Howard Kelley meeting was well

publicized. Also any internal differences were equally well aired.

The papers grasped at the sensational value of Dr. Xenephon C.

Scott's fight against the society's relaxation of the rule against

consulting with the homeopaths, and gave apparently verbatim

accounts of the remarks of the speakers, some embarrassingly per-

sonal. Later rounds in the fight were printed in the papers under

such headlines as

KNIVES OUT

The Doctors Draw Their Scalpels

and Go At It

 

WAR PAINT

It Is Donned by Many Cleveland

Doctors

 

 

THE COLUMBUS MEETING

A Chance That It Will Be the

Scene of a Fierce Conflict

However, the sense of publicity value was turned to good use

in promoting public health measures. In 1893 George M. Stern-

burg, surgeon general of the United States Army, was brought to

address the society on what should be done in case of an invasion

of Asiatic cholera-at considerable expense to the society, we are

informed in one of its notices.

The Cleveland Medical Society also arranged a large public

meeting in the Y.M.C.A. hall, holding afternoon and evening ses-

sions to discuss the water supply, sewage, and garbage questions

in Cleveland. Distinguished speakers included Dr. William A.

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MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND            353

 

Knowlton, the orator of the profession; Dr. David H. Beckwith;

Dr. Cady Staley, president of the Case School of Applied Science;

Dr. Charles O. Probst, secretary of the Ohio State Board of Health;

Dr. J. L. Hess, the city health officer; Col. George A. Waring of

New York City, nationally known sanitary engineer; Mayor Rob-

ert E. McKisson; Dr. George C. Ashmun, a former health officer;

and the Hon. Liberty E. Holden. Mr. Holden opposed carrying

the intake pipes further out but strongly advocated a system of

intercepting sewers with a sewage farm to the east of the city.

In the course of the discussion Dr. Hess stated that a garbage

furnace was expected within the year. Garbage was dumped in the

lake and sewage was emptied into the Cuyahoga River and by

fourteen sewers into the lake, Lakeside Hospital being located

directly between two of them.

At the conclusion of the meeting, Mr. Holden, a public-spirited

citizen and the proprietor of the Cleveland Plain Dealer, moved a

vote of thanks to Col. Waring, and to the society for arranging the

meeting. This was seconded by Wilson M. Day, president of the

chamber of commerce. All of this was evidence of the place

which the youthful Cleveland Medical Society was making for

itself as a public body.

The Cleveland Medical Society was an immediate success.

The local membership grew rapidly, and leading physicians from

the surrounding cities, such as Akron, Massillon, Elyria, Marion,

and points between, affiliated as nonresident members. Business

was divorced from the scientific programs by entrusting most of

the routine to the council. In 1894 the quarterly meetings attracted

from 300 to 400, and the regular meetings ordinarily held twice

weekly averaged 93-quite a contrast to the attendance of the

older society. Its vigor was shown in the record of the committee

on legislation headed by Dr. Louis B. Tuckerman, an able and

learned practitioner with a flair for civic affairs. He kept the

society and the public stirred up with his constant activities for

public health improvement, making frequent trips to Columbus

on legislative matters. The society showed a much more tolerant

attitude toward homeopaths than was then generally prevalent and

thereby found itself in trouble with the national organization, the

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354     OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND            HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

American Medical Association. This episode could be given a

chapter by itself.

Definitely it was a young man's organization in a rapidly

changing medical world. This does not mean that the older men

were excluded; on the contrary, they were attracted to it, but the

impetus came from the alert and ambitious younger members. It

might be difficult to select any one of them as the leader, because

the evidence indicates unanimity of purpose and great teamwork,

but the one who stands out for his energy and accomplishments is

P. Maxwell Foshay whom we have mentioned before. He signed

the first call for the new society and was an incorporator in 1893;

he was elected its first librarian; he became secretary in 1897,

leaving minutes which are today a joy to the historian and could

well serve as a model for secretaries; and he was the last president

in 1902 helping to effect the merger.³

After droning along in its dull way for most of the nineties,

the old Cuyahoga County Medical Society made efforts toward

rejuvenation. Younger men were elected to office in 1898. Frank

E. Bunts was elected as its president. After serving two years he

was followed successively by Charles J. Aldrich, Carl A. Hamann,

and John P. Sawyer. Under the leadership of these younger men

there were distinct signs of new life. The programs were better

organized and much more ambitious in scope.

 

3 This reflects only part of his activities, for in 1896 Dr. Foshay with Henry S.

Upson started the Cleveland Journal of Medicine which was designated as the official

organ of the new society. It was a sprightly periodical, excellently edited and far ahead

of its time in its stand about clean advertising. The Cleveland Journal of Medicine was

combined with the Cleveland Medical Gazette to form the Cleveland Medical Journal

with Dr. Foshay as the editor-in-chief.

No man in Cleveland medicine has accomplished so many and so important pro-

gressive changes in as short a time. He was the first secretary of the Cleveland Medical

Library Association in 1895. He was secretary of the Ohio State Medical Society from

May 1901 to May 1904 and edited its transactions from 1899 to 1904. His efforts

in the American Medical Association entitled him to a place in its hall of fame, for in

1900 with J. N. McCormack of Bowling Green, Kentucky, and George H. Simmons

of Chicago, he was appointed by Charles A. L. Reed of Cincinnati, then president, to

report on reorganization. The revised constitution and by-laws submitted by this com-

mittee and adopted in June 1901 brought about a complete reorganization of both

state and county societies as directly subsidiary to the association, so that it became a

confederation of the state societies of the country which in turn were made con-

federations of the local societies in the states. Much of the credit for this scheme of

reorganization, which has resulted in the present strength of the American Medical

Association, should be given to Dr. Foshay who had had his organizational training

in the business of the Cleveland Medical Society. In 1904-7 he served as a member

of the judicial council of the American Medical Association. It was a great loss to

Cleveland and to American medicine when he left practice in Cleveland in 1904 to

assume an executive position in Chicago with the Mutual Life Insurance Company of

New York. In 1906 he went to the home office in New York and was vice president

and manager of selection at the time of his death in 1939.

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MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND            355

 

The Cleveland Medical Society started off with meetings twice

a month, omitting the summer months. As in the older society,

absenteeism on the part of the scheduled speakers was not uncom-

mon, and casual excuses were sometimes given. However, an at-

tempt was made at better organization, and a time limit was set

on case reports. Case reporting as a means of self-expression

seems to have been greatly abused, and practically all cases were

described by the secretaries as "interesting."  The new society

made a departure from the beaten path in what were termed

"quarterly meetings" at which out-of-town speakers were feature

attractions. According to contemporary medical journals this was

a national innovation and was rapidly copied by societies in other

cities. These meetings were extremely effectual in bringing out

the crowds, especially when the program was followed by a

"smoker." The list of speakers included such famous men as

Howard Kelley, M. Allen Starr, George Henry Fox, William S.

Thayer, T. M. Rotch, Alfred Stengel, Nicholas Senn, Robert Mor-

ris, L. Emmett Holt, and William Pepper.

The programs of the societies were in step with the times. For

example, Albert P. Ohlmacher, the professor of pathology and

bacteriology in the Wooster school, on February 22, 1895, told of

the first horse immunized in the United States and the preparation

of antitoxin. Dr. Samuel Webster of Cleveland informs me that,

as a student, he helped Ohlmacher in this work, having secured a

culture of the bacillus from a sick child. The horse was donated

by Dr. Charles B. Parker. Ohlmacher missed by a very short time

being the first to carry out this work in this country. At this same

medical meeting Louis B. Tuckerman, who was always ready with

the apt resolution on public health matters, promptly introduced one

to the effect that the members of the society felt that "antitoxins such

as those used in the treatment of diphtheria, tetanus, etc., should

be manufactured under the supervision of the health authorities

of the city, State and Nation and distributed for use free of cost."

This motion was carried.

On April 3, 1896, Prof. Dayton C. Miller, professor of

physics at the Case School of Applied Science, read an illustrated

address on "Roentgen X-rays," showing apparatus and stereopticon

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356   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

views of the work which had been done. At about the same time

(March 1896) the Cleveland Journal of Medicine referred to X-ray

work as "Skotography," meaning, from its Greek derivation, dark

writing. It showed a skotograph by Roentgen. (The discovery of

X-rays had been announced to the world by Roentgen on January

6, 1896.) On November 13, 1896, there was an X-ray exhibit with

use of fluoroscope by Mr. Krebs and Mr. Rupert, and a report

was made by Dr. Ralph J. Wenner on a series of lumbar punctures

which he had performed. (Quincke had introduced lumbar punc-

tures in 1891.) Two weeks later Dr. Ohlmacher read a paper on the

newly discovered specific serum reaction for the diagnosis of typhoid

fever, showing slides under the microscope. (Bacterial agglutina-

tion had been described that year.) In September 1897 Dr. George

W. Crile read portions of his Cartwright prize essay on "Experi-

mental Research into Causes of Shock." These researches on shock

will go down in medical history. On February 23, 1900, Dr.

William E. Lower reported a case of amputation at the middle

third of the leg under cocaine anaesthesia of the spinal cord.

(Intraspinal anaesthesia with cocaine had been introduced by Bier

the preceding year.)

Part II

ORGANIZATION OF THE ACADEMY OF MEDICINE OF CLEVELAND

The inevitable merger of the two societies came in 1902, ac-

complished by the exercise of considerable statesmanship on both

sides. Doubtless it was accelerated by a letter read on November

7, 1901, to the Cuyahoga County Medical Society. Coming from

Dr. P. Maxwell Foshay, who in the preceding May had been

elected secretary of the Ohio State Medical Society, it called at-

tention to the closer organization of the state medical society and

the establishment of county societies in the several counties of Ohio.

The adoption of the federation plan by the American Medical

Association and the state societies would have forced such a merger

eventually.

The committees on merger were composed of the following:

from the Cuyahoga County Medical Society, Drs. Frank E. Bunts,

Charles J. Aldrich, George W. Moorehouse, Benjamin L. Millikin,

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MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND           357

and John B. McGee; and from the Cleveland Medical Society, Drs.

Marcus Rosenwasser, William T. Howard, Jr., Thomas C. Martin,

William E. Bruner, and Henry W. Rogers. Dr. Bunts served as

chairman of the joint committee. John P. Sawyer was then presi-

dent of the older society and Dr. P. Maxwell Foshay of the

younger.

No record of debate or discussion about the merger was found

in the minutes of the Cleveland Medical Society, perhaps because its

members had favored it strongly from the start, but fortunately

there is a stenographic record in the minutes of the Cuyahoga

County Society which reveals much of character, foresight, and

breadth of vision of some of the men of that day. They envisioned

a strong society and a strong independent medical library. Those

whose discussions were of this general character included Drs.

Bunts, Millikin, and Sawyer. In reply to a question, Hamann

stated that the younger society had about 400 members, while the

older one had only 125. All but about 25 men belonged to both

societies; of course there were many doctors in Cleveland who

belonged to neither.

The merger was accomplished by having each society adjourn

at the call of its president after having agreed upon the constitution

and by-laws for the new society with the understanding that all

members of either society would be eligible to join the new one.

Both organizations turned over all money on hand to the new one

and deposited their records with the Cleveland Medical Library

Association, fortunately for the historians of today and tomorrow.

And so it came about that the Academy of Medicine of Cleve-

land was organized on May 28, 1902, in the Chamber of Commerce

Building (a structure on the northwest corner of the Public Square

now occupied by Cleveland College of Western Reserve University).

At this meeting Dr. Hart of Elyria reported a case of fracture of

the femur in a child treated by vertical suspension, and Dr. Wil-

liam T. Corlett presented a case of epithelioma of the right cheek

much improved by the use of X-ray. The latter is worthy of

passing note since it is the first reference found in the minutes

of any society regarding the use of this agent in the treatment of

malignant disease.

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358   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

A nominating committee was appointed consisting of Drs

Sawyer, Foshay, N. Stone Scott, William E. Wirt, and Corlett.

Two names were nominated for each office, and the following were

elected:

President ............Dr. Frank E. Bunts

Vice President........Dr. William T. Howard

Secretary .........Dr. Walter H. Merriam

Treasurer .............Dr. John M. Ingersoll

Trustees ................Drs. Joseph E. Cook, John B. McGee,

Carl A. Hamann, Henry E. Handerson,

Marcus Rosenwasser and William H.

Humiston.

These officers and the men who served on the important com-

mittees should be remembered for their great service to medical

organization and the profession. All were outstanding in that

era; the only survivors today are Dr. William T. Howard, Jr., and

Dr. William E. Bruner.

In its form of organization the new society profited by the

experiences of its members with preceding societies. Business was

entrusted to a council which assumed more and more the duties

of management and even direction of policy, bringing business

only occasionally to the floor of the academy. This effected great

saving of time and allowed for concentration on scientific affairs,

thus permitting more careful study and calmer deliberation than

was possible in a professional "town meeting." Another great

forward step was the provision in the constitution and by-laws for

sections. These had existed in the Cuyahoga County Medical So-

ciety to a limited extent, but strangely enough, a proposal to

establish them had been voted down by its younger and usually

much more progressive rival. At the first meeting of the council

of the academy on May 28, the president appointed Drs. Foshay,

Howard, and McGee as a committee to organize the clinical-

pathological section, which was accomplished on October 3, 1902,

by the selection of Dr. Bunts as chairman, Dr. Walter H. Merriam

as secretary, and Dr. Roger G. Perkins as councillor. This section

became the forum for the presentation and reports of patients and

pathological specimens. It has been very popular over the years

• 15
 

MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND           359

 

and has had a continuous existence to this day. Later in the month

a second section was organized, that on experimental medicine,

with George Neil Stewart as chairman and Torald Sollman as sec-

retary.

The opthalmological and otolarynological section held its first

meeting on February 27, 1903, with Dr. Benjamin L. Millikin as

chairman and John Lenker as secretary. A medico-legal section

was not authorized by the council until November 10, 1908.

At the very first meeting the academy showed its interest in

public health by designating a public health committee. The mem-

bers chosen were Henry E. Handerson, who had long experience

in sanitation; George C. Ashmun, a former health officer; William

O. Osborn; William T. Howard, Jr., professor of pathology and

bacteriology in the medical school of Western Reserve University,

and Dr. Martin Friedrich, the incumbent health officer. For some

time there had been great difference of opinion between the health

officer and the medical profession regarding the best means of

controlling smallpox, the profession advocating compulsory vac-

cination and Dr. Friedrich, house-to-house disinfection. At this

meeting the academy adopted resolutions favoring general vaccina-

tion and issuance of vaccination certificates signed by the health

officer and countersigned by an authorized deputy. Later in the

year the Cleveland Medical Journal was able to state that over

200,000 of vaccine points had been distributed by the health office

(with of course admitted waste) and that private physicians had

vaccinated another 100,000. Evidently much trouble had previously

been encountered with impure vaccine, but this year the quality had

improved, and only 3 cases of tetanus were reported. At an early

meeting resolutions were adopted regarding the place the city

health department would occupy in the municipal government ac-

cording to the new code being drawn up in Columbus, the academy

demanding that the health department be made independent of any

other department and subject only to the legislative and executive

authorities of the municipality.

An important campaign for public safety was waged by the

academy to bring about the "sane Fourth of July," in other words,

to abolish the use of fireworks. Even the middle-aged doctor of

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360   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

today has no idea of the carnage, maiming, and loss of life which

resulted in former days from the promiscuous and unrestrained

use of firecrackers, pistols, cannons, and other explosives. An

opthalmologist, Dr. W. B. Shackleton, told me that in the nineties

he was obliged to remain in his office all day on each Fourth of

July to be in readiness to care for eye injuries, many of which led

to permanent or total blindness. Hospital emergency wards could

not keep up with the influx of the injured, and general practitioners

too were kept busy on this holiday. The number of fatal injuries

and cases of tetanus are matters of record. To Cleveland's phys-

icians this seemed a terrifying and unnecessary tragedy. The first

academy action was a resolution offered by Dr. William E. Lower

asking for an ordinance forbidding the use of toy pistols (July

20, 1903). On May 27, 1904, Dr. Lower was able to report that

an ordinance had been introduced. On June 29, 1906, the council

instructed its legislative committee to publish the fireworks ordi-

nance with appropriate suggestions in the daily papers immediately

preceding the Fourth of July.

To its responsibilities in regard to public health the academy

was just as alert as its predecessors had been. We can merely

enumerate some of the more significant actions for 1902 to 1908

inclusive. On March 15, 1904, it approved of making Ohio a

registration state for the collection of vital statistics. On the same

day it endorsed the appointment of William T. Howard, Jr., as city

bacteriologist, a post that the preceding Cleveland Medical Society

had striven for years to have established.  The choice was an

especially fortunate one, for Dr. Howard with the aid of Roger G.

Perkins carried on this work effectively for many years and ac-

complished great good for the city. (Later Dr. Howard became

health commissioner of the city of Baltimore.) At this same meet-

ing resolutions were passed regarding the water and sewage supply,

and three days later the academy devoted an entire meeting to the

problem of typhoid fever.

The physicians had been agitating for a pure milk supply for

years. In fact the minutes of the Cleveland Medical Society show

that resolutions were introduced by Dr. Louis B. Tuckerman on June

8, 1894, asking for dispensatories for distributing pasteurized

• 17
 

MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND           361

 

milk at cost, but it was not until October 10, 1904, that a milk

commission was established by the action of the academy under

the leadership of some of its members. The heroic efforts of this

commission, often struggling against apparently insuperable diffi-

culties, established a new epoch in Cleveland's public health situa-

tion. From the first the leader was John J. Thomas, later a presi-

dent of the academy, aided by Hunter H. Powell and Edward F.

Cushing.

At the instigation of Dr. John H. Lowman, on December 7,

1904, it voted to participate in the formation of the Antitubercu-

losis League. Dr. Lowman was one of the national leaders in this

movement.

On April 11, 1905, the academy gave its hearty approval to the

creation of the council on pharmacy and chemistry of the Ameri-

can Medical Association, to its general policy, and to the ten rules

governing admission of articles. This council, which has done so

much to guard the public against fraud and deception in the sale

of drugs, included from the start to the present day Torald Soll-

man, a member of the academy and an officer of its section on

experimental medicine.  His participation in the work of the

council on pharmacy and chemistry and his original investiga-

tions, had profound influence on the progress of medical science.

On April 3, 1906, resolutions were passed declaring that hydro-

phobia was a definite disease, that it was then prevalent in Cleve-

land, that all dogs should be muzzled, and that stray dogs should

be picked up and, if not claimed, disposed of in a humane manner.

The pronouncement that hydrophobia was a definite disease seems

odd to us today, but skepticism as to the reality of hydrophobia

had been expressed in a meeting of the Cleveland Medical Society

as late as 1901.⁴

The prevalence of goiter in the Great Lakes region was the

subject of study in this period-on the clinical side by Crile and

Sawyer, and experimentally by David Marine, whose classic re-

search was started here while he was connected with Lakeside Hos-

pital as resident pathologist. On November 13, 1906, a committee

was appointed by the academy to study the goiter problem in the

lake region.

 

4 Cleveland Journal of Medicine, VI (1901), 527 et seq.

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362   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

The old societies had been vigorous in securing amendments

to the state medical practice act to require higher educational

qualifications before matriculation in medical schools and also in

asking for reciprocity with various states. Constant watchfulness

was required then as now, and there were frequent demands for

the detection and prosecution of illegal practitioners. The first

reference found in the minutes to a local investigator for the board

of medical registration and examination was a suggestion by the

council on January 16, 1907, that the medical board together with

the state board of pharmacy jointly employ an investigator to

work in this vicinity.

A watchdog over many matters involving public health, the

council of the academy called upon its members to comply with

the law in reporting births, deaths, and other vital statistics. It

demanded action from the municipal authorities in stopping the

sale of vital statistics to proprietary medicine concerns and house-

furnishing establishments; called for the reopening of the case

against a famous abortionist; investigated conditions in the con-

tagious ward of the City Hospital; and recommended that members

of the council on the staff of the hospital endeavor to improve

hygienic and other conditions at the hospital. Ambulance service

was investigated and recommendations were made for one which

would not be a mere subsidiary to the undertaking business, a goal

not yet fully accomplished. Frequent attempts were made through

the years to study the conditions in the coroner's office and to

substitute modern methods suited to large urban counties for the

antiquated procedures designed for rural counties. This is another

goal still to be reached.

The active participation in community life inaugurated by

the Cleveland Medical Society and carried forward so vigorously

by the academy in its early days has been continued. Because of

the number and complexity of the problems it has been necessary

to assign them to numerous committees subordinate to the council.

In its programs the academy of medicine held-and has con-

tinued to hold-its general meetings on the third Friday of the

month except during the summer. On those occasions there was

usually although not invariably an invited speaker. On some of

• 19
 

MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND           363

the other Fridays came the section meetings. During the first decade

of the new organization the usual attendance at the general meetings

was about 100, although a famous speaker like B. G. A. Moynihan

of Leeds, England, attracted 250. Other notables to address the

academy in those days included J. C. Bloodgood, J. H. Anders,

Harvey Cushing (a native son), and Homer F. Swift.

Through the years the medical profession had frequently ex-

pressed its hopes for a home of its own. This finally was accom-

plished in 1897 by the purchase of the Childs property, a substantial

stone residence at 2318 Prospect Avenue (new numbering), by the

recently organized Cleveland Medical Library Association. For a

time this furnished a meeting place for the Cuyahoga County society

during its last years and also for the sections of the academy of

medicine, but a brief trial showed that its rooms were inadequate

for the Cleveland Medical Society, which proceeded to hold its

meetings in the chamber of commerce quarters in the Arcade until

the chamber's new building was completed on the public square,

when the medical society became a tenant.

Due to the active leadership of Dr. Dudley P. Allen a two-story

brick building was erected in 1906 behind the stone residence occu-

pied by the library. There was a side entrance from the driveway

which served to connect the two buildings. On the ground floor of

this annex were stacks for the library's books, while on the second

floor was an auditorium seating about 300 which was used by the

academy for its meetings. The residence in front was occupied at

first solely by the library association, the owner of the entire prop-

erty. Here were cheerfully furnished club-rooms, reading rooms,

and a librarian's office. The academy was permitted to use the

building, contributing voluntarily to the library association one

quarter of the amount received by it from membership dues, with

$300 as a stated annual minimum.

In these quarters the two sister organizations continued to

function until 1926. The auditorium furnished a setting for a real

forum in medicine. Here met the profession at large including the

faculties of the two regular medical schools. The meetings were

stimulating for young men, indeed, in the opinion of at least one

who was then young, definitely more so than today because dis-

• 20
 

364   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

cussion was open and free and had intimacy and the spirit of give

and take. It would be a dull or inconsequential subject which

failed to bring the erudite Charles F. Hoover to his feet with bluntly

outspoken and critical remarks. Waiting like a hunter stalking his

prey was George Neil Stewart, that sturdy Scot, learned, suave, and

always ready to disagree with Hoover on some point, but in such

courteous and charming manner and with so much wit that his

opponent was invariably disarmed. There was the ever enthusiastic

and magnetic Crile; the dignified, scholarly, and gentle Bunts; the

charming John James Rickard Macleod, a Scotsman from Aberdeen,

then engaged in the fundamental researches on diabetes without

which we Clevelanders of that day will always feel that Banting's

work would have been impossible; the quiet and modest but precise

and informed Marine; and Hamann, truly the king, such was the

respect in which he was held by his former students and associates.

These men and others like them by their contributions really

conducted an informal graduate extension course in medicine.

In the period from 1902 to 1912 the academy increased its

membership from 459 to 610, but in the six succeeding years it

seemed to reach that static point so often attained in the life of

organizations. This may be explained in some part by the disrup-

tion caused by World War I with many men in service and those

left at home struggling with the increased burdens the medical pro-

fession always bears in times of war. In part it may have been

due to the reaction from the accelerated pace of the preceding

years.

Unfortunately also the Cleveland Medical Journal stopped publi-

cation in 1918, for the members of its board of directors could no

longer afford to meet, out of their own pockets, a perennial deficit.

The absence of any local medical periodical was bound to have

effects.

• 21
 

MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND            365

Part III

RECONSTRUCTION PERIOD

1919-1926

In that cool analysis which is possible only in retrospect, it seems

that the earlier growth had been too much for the machinery. The

administration of an organization with a membership of 600 and

holding three or four meetings monthly calls for endless work,

much thought and correspondence in the arranging of programs,

and much mechanical labor in sending out notices, collecting dues,

attending to the routine of securing and electing new members, to

say nothing of the necessity for the constant readiness for action in

situations where medicine is involved with public health or welfare.

Many of the members of all ages felt that the situation was acute,

and in 1919 the president, Dr. Frank Oakley, proposed a plan for

reorganizing the academy. This included the employment of a

layman as a full-time executive secretary and involved raising the

dues from ten to forty dollars per year. After considerable dis-

cussion the proposal was accepted, and a committee consisting of

George Edward Follansbee, Clyde L. Cummer, and Ralph K. Upde-

graff was charged with the responsibility for perfecting the details,

suggesting necessary changes in the constitution and by-laws, and

putting the plan in operation. By this action the academy became

the first county medical society in this country to employ a full-

time executive secretary.

The original appointee was Guy M. Wells. After a brief tenure

of about a year he was succeeded by H. Van Y. Caldwell, a graduate

of Amherst College who had served on the faculty of Ohio Wesleyan

University in the English department and had had experience on

the staff of the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

The two front rooms on the second floor in the Cleveland

Medical Library Association's building were assigned to the acad-

emy for office space, and some furniture and modern office equip-

ment was purchased. Miss Hazel Sintzenich (who later became

Mrs. Elmer Dearborn) was employed as stenographer and book-

keeper. Mr. Caldwell and Mrs. Dearborn are both still in the

service of the academy. Mrs. Dearborn has handled the detailed

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366    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

work, especially in connection with finances and membership

records.

The faint-hearted had been fearful that the increase in dues

would drive out members. Unquestionably some withdrew, but

nevertheless the membership grew from 584 in 1919 to 665 in 1920

and to 714 in 1921. Meanwhile the treasury balance increased

from $4,453.99 in 1919 to $11,087.11 in 1920 and to $14,176.70

in 1921.

The radical reorganization marked a turning point in the life

of the academy. A monthly bulletin was started in 1920. Designed

to be an organizational affair of the "house organ" type, it carried

news notes of interest to the members, the elections of new mem-

bers, obituaries, academy activities, timely editorial comments on

current affairs, and reports of officers and committees. It has been

utilized also for publishing notices of coming meetings.

In 1923 the officers and trustees were instructed to take the

necessary steps to incorporate the academy. At this time Clyde L.

Cummer was president, and working with H. Van Y. Caldwell and

Howard Barkdull of the law firm of Messrs. Squires, Sanders, and

Dempsey, he reported a new constitution and by-laws which were

ratified at a special meeting of academy members on August 8,

1924. The articles of incorporation were signed by members of

the council as incorporators on August 8, 1924.5

In the early twenties many of the same men who had agitated

for a reorganization of the academy and had been instrumental in

effecting it became restless about the library building situation.

The quarters were dingy and the stack space entirely inadequate.

Some of this group had strong reason to believe that influential

friends would come to its aid in a new building program for the

Cleveland Medical Library Association although this was discounted

by the president of the library. With the exercise of some political

finesse a sympathetic president, William E. Bruner, was elected in

1921. One of his first official acts was to appoint a building com-

 

5 The incorporators were the following: Jacob E. Tuckerman, Edward P. Monaghan,

Frederick J. Wood, Frank S. Gibson, John J. Thomas, C. W. Stone, Samuel S. Berger,

Lawrence A. Pomeroy, Harry V. Paryzek, Arthur J. Skeel, Samuel J. Webster, John

D. Osmond, Clyde L. Cummer, Roy B. Metz, Vernon C. Rowland, Harry D. Piercy,

Marion A. Blankenhorn, and Roger G. Perkins.

• 23
 

MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND           367

 

mittee consisting largely of some of the agitators, namely, George

E. Follansbee, Carl H. Lenhart, and Clyde L. Cummer, with the

addition of John Stephan and, later still, John Phillips. Dr. Fol-

lansbee was chairman and Dr. Cummer secretary of this committee.

Messrs. Walker and Weeks were retained as architects, eastern

libraries were studied, plans were drawn, and a campaign for funds

was conducted, at first quietly among potential large givers. Mrs.

Francis F. Prentiss, whose first husband had been Dr. Dudley P.

Allen, the most active of the founders of the library, signified her

willingness to give the Cleveland Medical Library Association

$400,000 if the new building were erected near the campus of

Western Reserve University on land donated by the university. The

university met this condition. About $100,000 was raised from lay

friends by the almost single-handed efforts of John Phillips, and

somewhat less than that sum from the medical profession. Enough

to bring up the total to almost $650,000 was taken from a building

fund which the association had been accumulating from the income

of a bequest of Dr. Dudley P. Allen.

Before the plans were drawn and contracts let it was necessary

that the library association know whether the academy desired to

be housed in the same building. It was estimated at the time that

to make the necessary provisions for double occupancy would re-

quire about $75,000 more than to build a structure to accommodate

the library alone.

The arrangement for joint use of the proposed building was

worked out by two committees, Marion A. Blankenhorn being chair-

man of the one representing the academy and Clyde L. Cummer of

that representing the library. The arrangement for joint use was

approved by post card ballot vote of the academy members on

February 5, 1924.

In the fall of 1926 the two organizations moved to their perma-

nent new home which provides ample space for both with an audito-

rium seating about 600, a lecture room seating about 100, offices for

the academy, supper room, reading rooms, museum, private studies,

and fireproof stacks. This was an almost perfect realization of the

dream expressed by Dr. Marcus Rosenwasser in his inaugural ad-

dress as president of the Cleveland Medical Society in 1897 when

• 24
 

368   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

he said: "The ideal medical society is housed within its own walls,

beneath its own roof. The plain yet classic building contains the

assembly room, the library and reading rooms, the refectory and the

museum. The medical home constitutes the center for the social

amenities of life. It is the Mecca of the resident and the stranger.

It is the resort of the author and the student. It is the meeting

place of congenial groups engaged in special work. The library is

open to all students of medicine and of the collateral sciences."6

The good doctor backed up his hopes and faith by leaving the

Cleveland Medical Library Association $10,000, its first bequest.

When this move was made the academy was 24 years old. Its

membership had more than doubled, 459 to 1,070.

Part IV

THE MODERN ERA

1926-1945

The effect of the academy's new location on its development

cannot be overemphasized. On a university campus in the cultural

center of the city, sharing an impressive building with a medical

library open to the general public and much consulted by scholars

and holding its meetings in a dignified and commodious auditorium

with permanent offices and executive staff, the academy has gained

in dignity and prestige. In turn its position in the community has

enhanced its standing with the profession. Since the students in

the medical school and internes in the university hospital, both in

the immediate neighborhood, have utilized the library's facilities

freely and attended the meetings of the academy, they usually look

both to the academy and the library as organizations with which

they will affiliate themselves. The academy is in a position to

attract prospective members young, treat them well, and develop in

them an appreciation of its ideals and purposes. This has been

furthered by special memberships at minimal dues for internes and

residents. At the time of the move to the present location in 1926

the membership was 1,070; in 1945, it was 2,035, almost double.

 

6 Inaugural address read before the Cleveland Medical Society, January 22, 1897.

Cleveland Journal of Medicine, II (1897), 1180.

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MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND            369

 

The latter years have marked a gradual change in the relation-

ship to the public. It was difficult for a body of 300 to 400 men

to carry much weight with the average elected public officials, espe-

cially when the organization was felt to be a class group and was

often known to be far from unanimous about some of the policies

it advocated. In the early days it had very little prestige, meeting

as it did in rented quarters and moving frequently from one place

to another. It had had no permanent office and no full-time rep-

resentatives, and the officers were ever-changing. Some were active

and alert; others took their responsibilities lightly. The move in

1926 marked the climax of internal organizational changes resulting

in a compact, unified, well organized, and efficiently managed body.

Of course all of this could have been true and still the organization

might have been a mere trades-union or employers' association,

interested only in the economic welfare of its own members. To in-

crease its usefulness it possessed educational and scientific features,

but above all it constantly evinced an interest in public welfare

through the prevention of disease and the improvement of public

health procedures. The development of this phase of its activities

had always been in the minds of the early members, but in what

we have called the modern era it became readily possible to convert

aspirations into effective action.

For many years the relations between the division of health of

the city of Cleveland and the academy of medicine have been

friendly and cooperative. A factor which has helped has been the

long tenure of the last two commissioners, Dr. Harry L. Rockwood

serving from 1918 to 1930 and Dr. Harold J. Knapp from 1930 to

date, the office having been removed from partisan politics. Both

incumbents were invited to serve on important committees of the

academy and attended the meetings of council until its duties were

taken over by the board of directors. Changes of policy procedure

in the health department have been referred to appropriate academy

committees by the commissioner of health before being put into

operation. On the other hand the academy has always been rep-

resented on the advisory board of the division of health by several

members, usually the president and the chairman of the public

health committee. When the community has been faced with any

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370   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

epidemic it has been routine procedure for the commissioner of

health to call upon these academy representatives for cooperation

and participation in any activities undertaken.

In the late twenties the academy took decided exception to the

operation of tonsil clinics in the public schools of the county by

one of the county (not city) health officers. Children were exam-

ined in the schools and, if regarded as in need of tonsillectomy,

were herded together at certain appointed times with the coopera-

tion of groups enlisted for the purpose in what were frankly termed

"round ups."  Operations were done in school buildings or other

unsuitable places with utterly inadequate facilities, particularly

inappropriate in case of complications. This was done at a low

cost, without study by social agencies of the ability of the families

to pay reasonable fees of private doctors. After long continued

pressure by the academy this practice was finally stopped and the

clinics were removed to hospitals.

In the field of public education academy-sponsored radio pro-

grams were started in 1925. The longest series continued for two

years prior to the depression with H. Van Y. Caldwell, the acad-

emy's executive secretary, acting as WGAR's health reporter and

interviewing 200 members of the academy in weekly programs. In

latter years radio talks have been given by academy members under

the aegis'of the Cleveland Health Museum.

A committee on health education was established in 1927 with

Adam B. Denison as chairman. On its recommendation a speaker's

bureau was established under its auspices to provide machinery for

supplying civic groups with speakers from the academy member.

ship with proper introduction for them to the audiences and

appropriate newspaper releases.

The committee was an able one and included those who had

had long experience in organization work or public health work

or both. It was composed of Adam B. Denison, Roger G. Perkins,

Richard Dexter, Samuel C. Lind, Charles G. LaRocco, Harry L.

Rockwood, Wallace J. Benner, Robert Lockhart, and George W.

Stober.⁷

 

7The chairmen have been Adam B. Denison, 1927-29; Lester Taylor, 1930-33;

Hubert C. King, 1933-35; Ralph M. Watkins, 1936-38; M. Paul Motto, 1938-43; Fred

W. Dixon, 1943-45; Chauncey W. Wyckoff, 1945-47; Spencer A. Wahl, 1947-48.

• 27
 

MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND           371

In March 1931 upon the recommendation of this same com-

mittee the board of directors created an academy trust fund of

$10,000 as the nucleus of a "Health Education Foundation." The

slender income from this fund has sufficed to cover only a portion

of the academy's expenditures annually for public health education.

In the same year upon the initiative of this committee a series

of public health lectures was started in the medical library audi-

torium with T. Wingate Todd as the first speaker. Hundreds were

turned away for lack of seating space. The second lecture of that

year's series, given by George W. Crile, was moved to Severance

Hall which was filled to capacity.

The practice of having three public lectures each year was

continued through 1936. Decreasing interest in the last two years

indicated that the novelty was gone, and the lectures were discon-

tinued. They will be resumed, however, in 1948.

The committee on health education and also individual mem-

bers of the academy in lecturing to the laity found themselves

greatly handicapped by a dearth of visual material to display to

audiences. Discussion of this deficiency led the committee to rec-

ommend to the academy the calling of a community council to

establish a museum of health equipped with shops and manned by

technicians so that permanent or temporary displays could be made

of objective material in the field of public health and exhibits

might be manufactured for sale or loan. In March 1936 the

academy called together representatives of influential public groups

and the local newspapers. Upon recommendation of this conference

trustees were chosen to assure broad public and lay representation

and the Cleveland Museum of Health was started. Financing was

accomplished originally by a campaign among the members of the

academy with the aid of a generous gift from Mrs. Francis F.

Prentiss.

Among the leaders of this movement were Dr. Lester Taylor,

during whose term as president it had had its incipiency, H. Van

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372    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

Y. Caldwell, and Dr. T. Wingate Todd. Since the incorporation

the academy's only relationship has been of an advisory nature.8

Unquestionably the feeling between the academy and the daily

newspapers has improved with the passing of the years. In no small

part this is due to the fact that the executive secretary had had

newspaper experience and had developed a sense of news value

which helped him furnish the reportorial staffs with suitable mate-

rial. In latter years the papers have not been as ardent in digging

up and presenting the purely sensational as they had been in the

first part of the century. For reporting informative and factual

medical news, particularly that with scientific bearing, we became

indebted to such representatives of the press as David Dietz of the

Cleveland Press (one of the pioneer local science writers), Joseph-

ine Robertson of the Cleveland Plain Dealer, and Severino Severino

of the Cleveland News.

Early in 1925 the council of the academy began discussing

with the Ohio Bell Telephone Company the inadequacy of the

classified section heading "Physicians & Surgeons." Since in Ohio

the words "physicians" and "surgeons" are construed as common

nouns applying to anyone who treats the ill, this list contained, by

error or otherwise, dentists, chiropractors, Christian Science healers,

and others in the list with doctors of medicine.

The council proposed to the telephone company that it adopt

the heading, "Physicians & Surgeons, M.D.," thus confining the

listing to doctors of medicine; and placing other practitioners or

healers under their own respective headings.

The telephone company thought well of the suggestion but in-

formed the academy that since the listings in the classified section

were established nationally for all subsidiaries of the American

Telephone and Telegraph Company, it could not adopt the new

heading locally. Instead, the company suggested that the academy

 

8 The Cleveland Museum of Health was incorporated on December 28, 1936, by

Dr. Lester Taylor, Dr. Hubert C. King, Dr. James A. Doull, Howard W. Green, and

H. Van Y. Caldwell. The first officers were Lester Taylor, M.D., president; Napoleon

H. Boynton, vice president; Howard W. Green, secretary; Warner Seely, treasurer.

The first trustees were Kenneth L. Allen, Paul J. Aufderheide, D.D.S., Carl W. Blossom,

James A. Bohannon, H. Van Y. Caldwell, James A. Doull, M.D., John A. Hadden,

Rt. Rev. Msgr. John Hagan, E. R. Hankins, William C. Keough, Hubert C. King,

M.D., Mrs. Francis F. Prentiss, Robert M. Stecher, M.D., Abraham Strauss, M.D.,

Mrs. Herman L. Vail, and Frederick E. Watkins.

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MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND            373

 

buy as much space in the classified section as it needed and list its

members under an academy heading. Negotiations on this plan

soon broke down when the telephone company withdrew its offer.

The academy countered with its original proposal, and arrange-

ments were made for a conference in New York between Mr. Cald-

well and the vice president of the American Telephone and Tele-

graph Company in charge of the commercial division.

The conference was entirely successful, the American Tele-

phone and Telegraph officials agreeing that the suggestion had

merit. They conferred by phone with the Ohio Bell officials, and

as a result the next Cleveland directory appeared with the heading

"Physicians & Surgeons, M.D."

The academy office submits to the Ohio State Medical Board

each new list as it appears. If persons are listed under this heading

improperly, either by design or accident, the state medical board

notifies them officially that unless their names are removed in the

next directory, action will be taken against them under the provi-

sions of the medical practice act. As a result of this three-way

cooperation, lists are now free from all except excusable errors.

The academy's negotiations with the American Telephone and

Telegraph Company bore more than local fruit since the heading

"Physicians and Surgeons, M.D." has now become a standard

heading in most telephone directories throughout the entire country.

The year 1931 saw the establishment of the call bureau. This

telephone "Call and Emergency Service" operating 24 hours a day

is open to the public and makes it possible for patients to reach

subscribing members not available when called. Under the names

of subscribers in the telephone book appears the condensed sentence

"IF NO ANSWER CALL ACADEMY OF MEDICINE CEdar 3500."

In addition the bureau renders invaluable aid to the public in

securing doctors during emergencies, a service of vital importance

during the war years, and in answering hundreds of inquiries each

month as to physicians, medical products, and health activities. At

first this service was popularized as "The Health Number-

CE 3500." 9

 

9 This service has grown to such an extent that by 1948 a two-station switch-

board and six operators were required to give service around the clock. It calls for

an annual budget of $23,000.

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374   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

In the forties it became painfully obvious that the machinery

of the academy was creaking badly. Since the academy was incor-

porated under the laws of the state of Ohio it was necessary to

provide for a board of directors and vest it with the complete control

of the business affairs. To provide representation of the commit-

tees and sections, a council had been set up which included all of

the members of the board of directors and all chairmen of standing

committees with representatives from each section. In theory this

gave each section a voice in the management of the academy's

affairs, and occasionally the voices were much louder than the size

of the section justified; in other words, there was a tendency to

minority rule. Also this gave some who were interested in a certain

section or sections what really amounted to double representation,

for they could reach the council through the regular channels open

to all members and also through their section representative. How-

ever, the main objection to the board-and-council arrangement was

a practical one arising from the cumbersome method of doing busi-

ness. The council met first and thoroughly discussed all items of

business except those dealing with finances which were reserved for

the board. This was in the presence of a number of invited repre-

sentatives of other organizations who often participated in the delib-

erations, usually long and exhausting and often lasting until after

midnight. Then the council adjourned, but the members of the

board of directors met to ratify the actions taken. They might

have been outvoted in the council's deliberations, but they had the

right to ratify or reject any action taken by the council. As time

went on, this right was exercised more and more frequently, leading

to much feeling and to endless confusion.

In 1945 revision of the constitution and by-laws was entrusted

to a committee consisting of Charles G. LaRocco, chairman, Clyde

L. Cummer, Roscoe D. Leas, M. Paul Motto, John E. Rauschkolb,

and H. Van Y. Caldwell. The major changes recommended and

adopted by the academy provided for abolishing the council and

vesting the entire control in the board of directors which was in-

creased in size from 15 to 24 with a provision for broad representa-

tion on hospital and geographic lines and extremely democratic

methods for nomination and election. Section representation was

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MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND             375

provided for on a committee on sections. No member was eligible

to serve more than six consecutive years on the board. These

changes have proved very helpful in making the control more rep-

resentative and have accelerated the conduct of the academy's

business.

Reference has been made to the establishment of the first four

sections of the academy in its earlier years. The reconstruction

period saw the establishment of the obstetrical and gynecological

section, organized on April 10, 1923, with Dr. John J. Thomas as

chairman and Dr. Paul M. Spurney as secretary; the section on

industrial medicine and orthopedics, organized on February 12,

1924, with Dr. Norman C. Yarian as chairman and Dr. Albert G.

Cranch as secretary; and the pediatric section, formed November

20, 1925, with Dr. Samuel W. Kelley as chairman and Dr. Joseph

E. McClelland as secretary.

Later came the military section, started on March 21, 1933,

with Dr. George W. Crile as chairman and Dr. John C. Darby as

secretary. This section held no meetings after 1942. The section

on internal medicine was organized on October 11, 1933, with Dr.

Russell L. Haden as chairman and Dr. Chester D. Christie as

secretary.

In addition there have been established in Cleveland a number

of other medical organizations. Some are of a semi-social char-

acter like the Pasteur Club, the Medical Arts Club and the Clinical

Club. Then there are those of specialty groups, including the

Cleveland Radiological Society, the Cleveland Dermatological So-

ciety, the Cleveland Allergy Society, and the Ophthalmological

Club. In the latter groups the membership is restricted to those

limiting themselves to the respective specialty, whereas the academy

sections are open to all members of the academy. The special

societies are entirely independent of the academy and usually meet

in a hospital or at a club or restaurant. Some of them insist on

membership in the academy as a prerequisite for membership.

All the hospitals have their own staff societies which hold

meetings at stated intervals. These meetings are usually of clinical

nature. Such organizations are obligatory according to the stand-

ards of the American College of Surgeons.

• 32
 

376   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

Reference to voluntary health insurance proposals is to be

found frequently in the official minutes of the academy, its council,

and its board of directors in the late thirties and early forties. The

matter came to a head in 1941 with the drafting of a volunteer

medical care plan to be operated by the academy under an enabling

act which had been submitted to the legislature by the Ohio State

Medical Association and passed in 1940. The chief requirement of

this plan was that no medical care corporation could operate with-

out approval of 51 per cent of the physicians practicing in the

community in which the plan was to become effective. The eco-

nomics committee of the academy, which had been working with

legal assistance for several years on a plan, submitted a proposal

which was balloted on in May 1942, the vote resulting in Yes, 342;

No, 347. A group of academy members with others proposed a

plan without the academy's approval. This group was never able

to secure approval of 51 per cent of the practicing physicians of

the community. Later the Cleveland Hospital Service Association

turned down a proposal of the Ohio State Medical Association to

handle its state plan. The Cleveland association inaugurated a

surgical and maternity benefit plan of its own, still in operation.

The sharp difference within the academy over its own plan, and

the intervention of World War II, put an end to the discussion of

medical care plans by the academy.

World War II found the academy well organized and prepared

to assist the armed forces and other branches of the government in

their local efforts. The Cleveland Medical Library loaned the

use of the supper room to the army recruiting board which met

here at stated periods for enrollment of physicians in the medical

corps. The academy assisted under the guidance of the procure-

ment officer of the county, Dr. James M. Wychgel, loaning the use

of some of its office staff, records, equipment, and telephone service.

Headquarters for procurement and assignment for the Cleve-

land area were located in the executive office where its records, inter-

views, committee meetings, etc. were held.

Faced with the problem of deciding on extra food points for

invalids, etc., the regional rationing board felt the need of profes-

sional guidance in making its decisions. Therefore an anonymous

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MEDICAL SOCIETIES IN CLEVELAND            377

group of academy members was set up to advise the rationing

board for or against extra points written by doctors for their

patients.

With its accurate and up-to-date record system, the academy

was able to maintain a nearly complete file of addresses of its

members during their service with the armed services. It advised

doctors' families and physicians themselves on many problems

arising as collateral to their war service.

During war service the dues of all members were rebated by

the academy and the Ohio State Medical Association. Upon their

return, the academy members who had entered the service while

members were given a 25-dollar credit on their future dues.

The executive office was able to help greatly in securing office

locations for returned physicians by keeping informed on vacancies

and by asking academy members to share their own offices tempo-

rarily with returned servicemen unable to secure a location.

Finally, from each returned serviceman the office requested the

filling out of a war service blank giving a history of engagements,

assignments, and citations. These records are being completed on

especially prepared blanks and bound in beautiful tooled leather

covers as a permanent war memorial.

We have referred to the building of the Lakeside Hospital on

Lakeside Avenue in the nineties as changing the course of medicine

in Cleveland by attracting young men to the city to take posts on

its resident and interne staffs. This tendency was seen to greater

extent in the twenties after the opening of the Cleveland Clinic, the

removal of Lakeside Hospital to the university campus with the

building of the affiliated Maternity and Babies' and Children's hos-

pitals, and the expansion and modernization of the Cleveland City

Hospital. Many of those who came here for training or to accept

staff or faculty posts remained as permanent additions to the local

profession and came to wield great influence in its medical societies.

This had been a factor in overcoming the tendency to provincialism.

• 34