History of medical practice in Illinois - Bushnell Historical Society

Physiology 411chemical and physical laboratories. Since he had to work alone, hiswas a stupendous one. It was fortunate that he was a skilled and ingeniousartisan, glass-blower and latheman, and could make special apparatus asneeded.Up to that time, there had been no one on the faculty who was not amedical graduate; Dreyer was the first full-time professor, and he was thefirsttaskto depend on the institution for a living. Being a strictly proprietaryschool with no financial resources but fees, the treasury was chronically inthe red. Stockholders were obliged to dip into their own pockets for contributions.Not infrequently Steele and Quine were forced to advance Dreyer'ssalary, and not always were they reimbursed by the corporation.Physiology at the University of Illinois at UrbanaWhen the main University of Illinois was opened in 1868 in Urbana, aProfessor of Zoology and Animal Physiology was included in the facultylist but no appointment was made. Instead, physiology was taught by theProfessor of Geology and Natural History. The first to hold that title wasDon Carlos Taft who was appointed in 1871. He appears to have shared theteaching of physiology with Frederick M. Prentice, a physician who was alsoa Lecturer in Veterinary Science. The catalog states that the anatomy andphysiology of domestic animals was taught by lectures, demonstrations anddissections. In 1883, Charles Wesley Rolfe was appointed Assistant Professorof Natural History. Later he became Professor of Geology but continuedto teach physiology and hygiene.Henry Elijah Summers was appointed Assistant Professor of HumanPhysiology in 1893. He was responsible for the exhibits presented at theWorld's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. He remained at Urbana until1898, when he became Professor of Zoology at Iowa State College in Ames,Iowa.The following year John Hancock McClellan came as Instructor inZoology, but after four years left for study abroad. Returning in 1907 asAssociate in Zoology, he later was advanced to Assistant Professor of Physiology.He was to have served in the Chicago Department also but there isno available record that he actually did so.In 1897 the appointment of George T. Kemp was made. He had receivedthe baccalaureate from Johns Hopkins University in1883 and a doctoratethree years later. He was graduated in medicine from Long Island CollegeHospital in 1891. In the meantime, he was Demonstrator in Physiology inthe University of Pennsylvania from 1886 to 1887. He continued as Professorof Physiology at the University of Illinois from 1899 to 1908.In none of the other schools in Illinois are there records of even didacticphysiology, to say nothing of productive scholarship, before 1900. Despite