University of Minnesota. Medical School

The 1851 territorial legislative act establishing the University of Minnesota provided for a Department of Medicine. This department, as originally instituted, was not an educational department but rather a credentialing board that provided examinations and conferred degrees upon physicians who had learned to practice medicine by studying with a preceptor. In April 1887, Percy Millard, Charles Hewitt, D. Hand, and President Cyrus Northrop petitioned the Board of Regents to abolish the existing department and replace it with a new department that would consist of the College of Medicine and Surgery, the College of Homeopathic Medicine and Surgery, and the College of Dentistry all reporting to a single dean. The Regents approved their proposal for a new Department of Medicine in February 1888, establishing what would become the University of Minnesota Medical School. The first class of medical students entered in October 1888.

In 1892, the three separate colleges of the Department of Medicine, the College of Medicine and Surgery, the College of Dentistry, and the College of Homeopathic Medicine and Surgery, were restructured to each have its own dean, faculty, and curriculum. The College of Pharmacy was added as the fourth college organized under the Department of Medicine. By 1909 the College of Homeopathic Medicine and Surgery had closed and the remaining colleges no longer resided under the administrative structure of the Department of Medicine. In 1913, the College of Medicine and Surgery was renamed the Medical School after a reorganization of the clinical and laboratory faculty under then President George Vincent. In 1931 a new position was created for a dean of Medical Sciences. This position oversaw the dean of the School of Medicine and the directorships for Nursing and the Hospitals. Beginning in 1936, the deanships for Medical Sciences and the School of Medicine were held by the same person, the dean of the College of Medical Sciences. In 1943, the Medical School's Department of Preventative Medicine became the School of Public Health with an administrative director who reported to the dean of the College of Medical Sciences along with the directors of the School of Nursing and the University Hospitals.

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