The History of the Medical Department of Transylvania UniversityPeter, Robert
History
The History of the Medical Department of Transylvania University
Peter, Robert
Medicine -- Kentucky; Medicine -- Kentucky -- History; Transylvania University. Medical Department
In the spacious lecture-room in the front of the building many
fashionable and distinguished audiences had assembled on various
occasions, not only to hear the gifted incumbent professors in due
discourse of introductory or valedictory, but to be charmed with
concerts by Ole Bull, Strakosch, Adelina Patti--who sang there on her
first tour in this country--and other celebrities of the period. There
the learned Guyot had instructed in geology; there unique "Tom
Marshall" had uniquely delivered a unique course of lectures on
History. Over the rostrum hung the portrait of Doctor Samuel
Brown--the first medical professor. This lecture hall was lighted for
evening assemblages, from the sides mostly, by "scounches," as they
were called by the "ole Virginny" negro janitor. This factotum,
"Absolom Driver," is unforgotten by any whose path some time ran
parallel with his. For many years the keeper of the Medical Hall, his
zeal and vigilance were unimpeachable, his dignified solemnity on
state occasions unsurpassed. Contemptuous of letters--except for
doctors--and with unshakable prejudice against "book learnin' for
niggers," he was faithful in trusts with the matchless fidelity of the
dog. "Bad boys"--the problem of philosophers and ordinary folk in all
ages--was one of easy solution by "Uncle Absolom" with a bent nail at
the end of a long pole. Charged upon with _elan_ with this
unprecedented weapon, accompanied by an ominous war-cry, no truant
could withstand, even though the artfully strewn broken bottles on
the high back fence had been successfully outflanked. "Robbers" had
their everlasting antidote at hand in the peculiarly uncanny, long,
"one-barreled shotgun" with curious lock, which stood in the corner of
the Faculty room. Nobody ever heard it "go off," but the mystery of it
was what appalled one. Happily "Uncle Absolom's" death was nearly
coeval with the closing of the medical school. To have witnessed the
burning of his sacred temple, the Medical Hall, after all his "keer,"
would have broken his heart indeed.
And now, bidding adieu to the shades of the grand old Transylvania
Medical Department, conjured from the past by one now numbered with
them, may the earnest wish be permitted with hope of realization, that
some other hand with cunning in such craft will unveil to us the
portraits of that bygone throng of brilliant men which constituted and
which were the exponents of the honored Transylvania Law School.
APPENDIX
SCHEDULE A.
SUCCESSION OF THE MEDICAL PROFESSORS IN THE MEDICAL DEPARTMENT OF
TRANSYLVANIA UNIVERSITY, FROM 1799 TO 1857, INCLUSIVE.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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