Founding On December 1, 1837, the president and trustees of Hampden–Sydney College created a medical department to be located at Richmond.
Founders of the college • Richard Lafon Bohannan – Professor of Obstetrics and Diseases of Women and Children • Lewis Webb Chamberlayne – Professor of Materia Medica and Therapeutics • John Cullen – Professor of Theory and Practice of Medicine The college began as the Medical Department of
Hampden-Sydney College. There were forty-six students enrolled in the first class, which lasted from November 5, 1838 – April 4, 1839. Students paid $20 to the professors for each of the six courses.
1850–1861 The Medical Department of Hampden-Sydney College received an independent charter from the
General Assembly in 1854, and became the Medical College of Virginia (MCV) Shortly thereafter, in 1860, it transferred all its property to the Commonwealth and became a state institution. There had not been a separate hospital where patients could be housed within the college buildings since the beginning. A new hospital, known as the College Infirmary, was built at a cost of $22,336.57 and opened in April, 1861.
Civil War Soon the
Civil War erupted, and the college found itself playing an important role in the education of Confederate surgeons and in the hospital care of sick and wounded military personnel. During the war, the school remained open, and it graduated a class every year throughout the conflict. The MCV is the only Southern medical school still in existence to have done so.
1866–1882 For several years after the Civil War, the faculty included James Brown McCaw, a member of a family long prominent in the medical field, who had commanded a Confederate hospital. McCaw served as a professor, dean of the faculty, and president of the board of visitors. In the late 1800s, African-American janitor Chris Baker became notorious for obtaining cadavers for dissection by students. One case in 1898 was subject to an exposé by
Richmond Planet publisher
John Mitchell Jr. and included grisly sketches of the proceedings. Baker's success, however, led to one professor saying in 1898 that the school could be called "Chris Baker's College".
The University College of Medicine A second medical school, the "College of Physicians and Surgeons" (later the "University College of Medicine"), was founded by
Hunter McGuire in 1893, just two blocks from the Egyptian Building. The new college was composed of three schools: medicine, dentistry, and pharmacy. The University College of Medicine was destined to have a lifespan of only twenty years as an independent institution. The
Flexner Report of 1909 suggested that the two schools would be better off merging, which they then did in 1913, retaining the Medical College of Virginia name.
1913 Rankings with Christopher Tompkins Dean Tompkins said in his retirement speech in 1913, "From a school whose matriculants numbered, as I can remember it, 22 during the session and whose standing amongst medical colleges in the country was so insignificant that it was not worth noticing, the matriculants have increased to—in one session—as many as 306. In a recent table compiled in December 1911, from the reports of the Council on Medical Education of the American Medical Association, it was found that of all the medical colleges in the United States and taking them in the order in which their graduates passed the various medical examining boards, the Medical College of Virginia stood fourth; the order in which they came being, (1) Rush, (2) Johns Hopkins, (3) Cornell, (4) Medical College of Virginia, and about one hundred and forty behind them."
Aborted consolidation with the University of Virginia In 1920, a discussion that had gone on for years without resolution of the issues involved was revived. Repeatedly, the view had been expressed that the Medical College of Virginia and the University of Virginia Department of Medicine might well be consolidated with benefit both to the schools and to the public. In 1867, 1905, and 1913, the question had been raised; and, finally, in 1920 a serious study was undertaken. In reviewing appropriations, Governor
Westmoreland Davis noted that Virginia was supporting two medical schools, seemingly in competition, and surmised that this might well be uneconomic, particularly at a time when money was tight. Acting on the Governor's recommendation, the General Assembly authorized a Commission on Medical Education. The commission made a thorough study that recommended that Virginia support only one medical school; that this school be in Richmond; that it be the Department of Medicine of the University of Virginia under the full and sole control of the Rector and Visitors of the university; and that the plan be effective upon the unconditional transfer of all Medical College of Virginia properties and assets to the Rector and Visitors of the university. The Board of Visitors of the Medical College of Virginia was in favor, and by resolution determined that the college would willingly embrace the plan should the commission's recommendations be accepted by the legislature. Instead, the alumni of the university, under the leadership of
Hugh H. Young, of Johns Hopkins Medical School, waged a campaign to preserve the medical school at Charlottesville. The report was approved overwhelmingly in the House but died by a 24-16 tally in the Senate. In view of the state's growth, the action of the Senate was fortunate. Had the report won approval, Virginia would have found herself today facing the need to establish another medical school, with a minimum price tag of 30 million dollars. The issue of consolidation was to rise again, in 1947, but only briefly, as the handwriting on the wall was by that time quite clear.
The Great Depression and expansion The Great Depression struck the college with perhaps more force than in the case of some other institutions. MCV was struggling to secure funds without which specialized structures and trained personnel, both expensive, could not be had. Plans laid prior to 1930 with early fruition apparently possible had to be put aside, notably the projected laboratory and outpatient building. Salaries, never high, had to be cut. However, by 1941 the modern 600-bed, 18-story MCV Hospital was completed; the Egyptian Building had been completely reconstructed to provide up-to-date facilities for the departments of bacteriology and pathology and to create the 300-seat Simon Baruch Auditorium, in the Egyptian motif, named for
Simon Baruch, class of 1862, whose distinguished son, Bernard M. Baruch, helped make the restoration possible. Also by 1941, new quarters were provided for the departments of physiology and pharmacology by adding a fourth story to McGuire Hall. In the brief span of five years, a remarkable program of physical expansion had been completed. In 1945, a certificate in physical therapy program was created by
Frances A. Hellebrandt 1956–1963 The interest of individuals, organizations, and agencies, other than those of the Commonwealth, may be gauged by their provision, since 1956, of gifts, grants, and contracts for teaching, research, and capital improvements totaling a little over $15 million. Reflecting the stimulating influence of such support, the college is fully accredited, with university status, and alive with enthusiasm, as the faculty and staff go about their mission of providing for the education of some 1200 students enrolled in 10 schools—plus some 200 young physicians in residence for further training—of caring for the sick who occupy its 1308 beds, and, finally, of seeking new knowledge for their benefit. In 1962, the college absorbed the black students from the
St. Philip School of Nursing during the implementation of
integration. The $6.5 million Medical Education Building was completed in the summer of 1963. It was the most important addition to the physical plant of the college since the completion of the Medical College of Virginia Hospital in 1940. With the added facilities of this building, the school of medicine was able to increase enrolment from 84 to 128 students.
Becoming VCU In 1968, the state legislature merged the Medical College of Virginia with the
Richmond Professional Institute to form
Virginia Commonwealth University. During this merger, the agreement stipulated that the MCV would retain its name in perpetuity. The exact title by the act was "The Medical College of Virginia Health Sciences Division of Virginia Commonwealth University."
Envisioning a great urban university At the 1969 convocation for VCU, Brandt envisioned a great urban university, stating, "we are caught up in a thing you might call the Virginia Commonwealth University Idea. It's an exciting concept....an academic approach without precedent, VCU will become a name that will mean a great deal to you in years to come...as one of the leading educational institutions." In 1983, the
VCU Massey Cancer Center opens.
1994 Kontos Building construction and the discovery of the East Marshall Street Well During the construction of the Kontos building, a well was accidentally uncovered which was found to be full of human remains. The capping of the well dates to about 1860. The discarded remains belong to various individuals, mostly enslaved and free people of color, whose graves were robbed in order to supply the medical college with cadavers for medical study and training. The medical college's primary source for obtaining cadavers from the time of its establishment until 1879 was the
Shockoe Hill African Burying Ground. After its closure in June of that year, African American pauper burials were conducted at Oakwood Cemetery. Oakwood then became the new primary target of the grave robbers. From its beginning, the Medical College of Richmond, Virginia, boasted of its unique ability to acquire medical cadavers in abundance. It was routinely stated in their advertisements. As such was the case in the May 11, 1838 edition of the Richmond Enquirer, which stated: "In no city in our Union are anatomical materials so abundant and easily procured as Richmond..." What was not stated was that the anatomical material was acquired through participation in the illegal cadaver trade, through grave robbing. There were many persons involved in the practice of grave robbing for the medical college, including various hired resurrectionists, medical students, the demonstrator of anatomy, as well as the professor of anatomy.
2004 name change The previous administration led by President
Eugene P. Trani had pursued a policy of promoting the VCU name as a unified identity to the outside world. This policy had included directing faculty, staff, and students to use the VCU name, instead of MCV, in any official meetings or correspondence. This was accomplished by, first, the creation of the MCV Hospital Authority, ostensibly to better administer the MCV Hospitals, to a later name change of this Authority to the VCU Health System Authority (with MCV Hospitals being a component thereof). This Authority, under the direction of Sheldon Retchin MD, then went about changing the physical appearance of the structures and advertising materials, to include letterhead and websites. The faculty and medical students at that time were instructed to cease referring to the institution as the Medical College of Virginia. The main cited evidence for this was misrepresentation of the institution in the press. In 2004, Retchin sent an e-mail that described a 2003 front-page USA Today article that incorrectly referred to MCV as the "Virginia Medical College, a teaching arm of the University of Virginia", when in fact MCV is not a part of that university. The VCU Medical Center now resides on the MCV Campus of
Virginia Commonwealth University. Since that time, the schools of that institution have been listed as a part of the VCU Medical Center rather than as a part of a university or college.
Research university VCU expanded its research programs significantly over the decade since 2001 and has over $255 million in sponsored research. In 2010, VCU was selected by the NIH for a $20 million grant to become part of a nationwide consortium of research institutions working to turn laboratory discoveries into treatments for patients. In 2006, VCU Health System received magnet status. ==Architecture and design==