Medicine in the Heartlands

Now, nearly a century after its founding in 1903 on the Bloomington campus, the School is beginning preparations to celebrate. The 100th anniversary will be observed in a variety of ways during the months leading up to 2003. In the works are a traveling exhibit, a special video and a book.

During the 19th century, medical schools abounded throughout Indiana. Between 1806 and 1906, twenty-four schools were chartered, but many of them were small, loosely organized and short-lived.

However, Indiana medical schools received neither supervision nor financial support from any academic institution. These independent, proprietary colleges did not earn the income necessary to provide the kind of education required by the new era of scientific medicine. In 1903, when he began his quest to establish a four-year medical school on the Johns Hopkins model, IU President William Lowe Bryan saw a way to help ensure that physicians in the state met high standards at the same time that he bolstered the prestige of the university.

Despite Bryan's praiseworthy goals, IUSM's future was not assured. In 1905, when Purdue University formed a medical department merging the Indiana Medical College, the Central College of Physicians and Surgeons, and the Fort Wayne College of Medicine, the right to have the state's medical school became a political football. The conflict that ensued between Indiana's two major universities became so heated that athletic competition between them was suspended in 1906 and 1907. In the end, cooler heads prevailed; the School of Medicine remained at Indiana University and athletic rivalry returned.