Farquhar, Robert D., 1872-1967.

Historical Note

As a service to the students of the College of Medicine, University of Southern California, of which he was a faculty member, and to the practicing physicians of Los Angeles, Dr. Walter Jarvis Barlow funded the construction of a handsome domed building just across the street from the College to house a medical library open to all members of the medical profession. The building was dedicated in 1907 and deeded by Dr. Barlow to the Los Angeles College Clinical Association (a non-profit holding corporation of the College of Medicine). Control and management of the library collection was vested in the Board of Trustees of the Barlow Medical Library Association.

In 1909 the College of Medicine changed its affiliation to become part of the University of California, with the buildings including the Barlow Library building deeded to the University of California. The Barlow Medical Library Associates continued to run the Library and retained ownership of its books and journals. On November 7, 1932, the Board of Trustees of the Barlow Medical Library Association adopted resolutions providing for the transfer of the books and journals of the Barlow Medical Library to the Los Angeles County Medical Association, and by December 1934 that transfer was completed.

The building was sold and torn down in the 1950's. In 1958 money from this sale established the Walter Jarvis Barlow History of Medicine Collection Fund in the History and Special Collections Division of the Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library, for the purchase of secondary historical materials.