A Century of Caring: The Health Sciences at the University of Iowa, 1850-1950: College of Medicine
Cradle of the Medical Department
The drive to relocate the State University of Iowa Medical Department from Keokuk to Iowa City was led by three men: surgeon Washington Freeman Peck, U.S. Circuit Judge John Dillon, and newspaper publisher-University Trustee John Irish. Their medical expertise, legal clout, and influence on public opinion helped convince the Board of Trustees to create a Medical Department at Iowa City in 1868. |
The Department was given $3,000 to remodel two floors of Old South Hall, a former dormitory which the medics shared with the literary societies and the registrar. Lectures and the occasional clinical surgery were held in the 213-seat first-floor amphitheater. Directly beneath the amphitheate |
13. Surgical amphitheater, University Hospitals, c. 1897, courtesy of the Calvin Collection, University of Iowa Department of Geology |
| was a dark, cold, "dungeon-like" dissection room where seven or eight students would work on the few available corpses. South Hall served as the medical department's quarters from its first session in Fall 1870 until the opening of the new medical building in 1881. |
14. Operating amphitheater, University Hospitals, c. 1900, courtesy of the University of Iowa Photographic Service
15. Operating theater, State University of Iowa, c. 1909. courtesy of Frances Knott Engblom |
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