Throughout the 19th century, the study of _materia medica_ (dealing with
the nature and properties of drugs of various kinds and origins, their
collection and mode of administration for the treatment of diseases, and
the medicinal utilization of animal products) held an increasingly
important place among the medical sciences. In the United States, as in
other civilized countries, this topic was greatly emphasized in the
curriculum of almost every school teaching the health professions.
Today, the subject matter contained in this branch of science is taught
under the heading of several specialized fields, such as pharmacology,
pharmacognosy, and drug analysis of various types. However, when the
decision was made in 1881 to promote greater knowledge and interest in
the healing arts by creating a section devoted to such pursuits in the
U.S. National Museum, the title of Section of Materia Medica was
adopted. Added to this, was the fact that the bulk of the first
collections received in the Section was a great variety of crude drugs,
which constituted much of the material then taught in the academic
courses of _materia medica_.
The new Section was included in the Department of Arts and Industries,
then under the curatorship of Assistant Director G. Brown Goode. From
its beginning and for two decades, however, the Section of Materia
Medica was sponsored and supervised by the U.S. Navy in cooperation with
the Smithsonian Institution. For this reason, the Navy decided not to
establish a similar bureau for a health museum as did the Army in
starting the Medical Museum (of the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology)
in 1862 through the efforts of Dr. William Alexander Hammond. The
Smithsonian did, however, provide a clerk to relieve the curator of much
of the routine work. The Section's early vigorous activities were the
result of the ingenuity of the first honorary curator, Dr. James Milton
Flint (1838-1919), an Assistant Surgeon of the U.S. Navy. From the
establishment of the Section, in 1881, to 1912, Dr. Flint was curator
during separate periods for a total of nearly 25 years. For three of his
tenures (1881-1884; 1887-1891; 1895-1900), he was detailed to the
Smithsonian Institution by the Surgeon General of the U.S. Navy. During
the interim periods, other naval doctors were detailed as curators.
Finally, in 1900, Dr. Flint retired from the Navy with the rank of Rear
Admiral and volunteered to continue his services to the National Museum.
The proposal was gladly accepted and he continued as a curator until his
retirement from the Smithsonian Institution in 1912.
[Illustration: Figure 3.--REAR ADMIRAL JAMES M. FLINT, U.S. Navy surgeon
and first honorary curator of the Section of Materia Medica. (_Photo
courtesy of the Library of Congress._)]
The Section commenced with a wealth of material. After the close of the
1876 centennial exhibition, its _materia medica_ collection had been
stored with the other collections in a warehouse, awaiting an
appropriation by Congress for transfer and installation. This collection
was gradually brought into the new National Museum after that building's
completion in 1881. Many other _materia medica_ specimens were
transferred from the Department of Agriculture. In addition to these
large collections of crude drugs, generous contributions came from
several prominent pharmaceutical firms such as Parke, Davis & Company of
Detroit, Michigan; Wallace Brothers of Statesville, North Carolina; and
Schieffelin and Company of New York City. These manufacturing houses are
mentioned here because they and their agents abroad were the first to
take interest and donate to the Section, complete assortments of
contemporary remedial agents then in common use throughout the United
States and Europe, besides many hundreds of "rare and curious drugs."
Thus, in spite of difficulties encountered from bringing several
collections into the building at one time, the _materia medica_
exhibition got off to a good start.
It was Dr. Flint, the first curator, who stated in 1883 that remedial
agents used by a nation or a community are as indicative of the degree
of their cultural development and standard of living as is the nature of
their food, the character of their dwellings, and their social and
religious traditions. Therefore, he felt that collections of drugs and
medical, surgical and pharmaceutical instruments and appliances should
not be thought of or designed as instructive to the specialist only, but
should also possess a general interest for the public. Because of these
objectives, Dr. Flint added, this section was conceived as a
departmental division for the collecting and exhibiting of objects
related to medicine, surgery, pharmacology, hygiene, and all material
related to the health field at large.[4]
During his first term of curatorship (1881-1884), Dr. Flint devoted much
of his time to sorting, examining, identifying, and classifying the
_materia medica_ specimens.[5] In 1881, he issued a memorandum of
instructions to be followed by collectors of drugs and urged them to
give detailed and accurate information regarding acquired specimens so
that they might be "more than mere museum curiosities." In addition, in
1883, he prepared a brief manual of classification of the _materia
medica_ collection in the Museum as well as a useful, detailed catalog
of informational labels of the individual objects on exhibition. The
unpublished catalog is still the property of the Smithsonian Institution
Archives, Division of Medical Sciences' Library.
It was Dr. Flint's ambition to obtain a comprehensive, worldwide
collection of all substances used as remedies. Then, in order to
identify drugs from foreign countries, he tried to collect illustrated
works on medical botany and printed pharmacopoeias of all nations having
them. He rightly defined an official pharmacopoeia as "a book containing
directions for the identification and preparation of medicines prepared
and issued with the sanction of a government or organized and
authorized medical and pharmaceutical societies. Its purpose is to
establish uniformity in the nomenclature of remedies and in the
character and potency of the pharmaceutical preparations. It is enacted
by legislation, and thus becomes binding on all who prepare drugs or
sell them for medication." By soliciting the help of various American
consuls and Navy officers abroad, about 16 such official pharmacopoeias
were collected, making an almost complete international representation
of all available, official, drug standards. With these sources of
information, Dr. Flint compiled and arranged an international list of
_materia medica_ specimens, indicating the authorized preparations of
each. By so doing, the first curator of this Section took the initiative
at least in proposing and, to some extent acting, on the preparation of
an international pharmacopoeia of drugs used in existing authorized
formularies giving "official synonyms, and tables showing the
constituents and comparative strength of all preparations."[6] This
undertaking is of special importance in the history of American
pharmacy, since it was probably the first attempt of its kind in the
United States.[7] In addition, colored plates and photographs of
medicinal plants were collected, forming the nucleus of the Division's
current collection of pictorial and photographic material related to the
history of the health field.
Dr. Flint also put on exhibition 630 Chinese _materia medica_ specimens
from the 1876 Philadelphia centennial. These had been collected
originally by the Chinese Imperial Customs Commission for the centennial
and were subsequently given to this country.
In 1881, the numbered objects in the Section's register amounted to
1,574 entries. In the following year, 1,590 more specimens were added,
most of them drugs in their crude state. By the end of 1883, the total
collection had reached 4,037, out of which 3,240 individual drugs in
good condition were classified and put on display. Of these, about 500
specimens with beautiful illustrations of parts of their original plants
had been mounted for exhibition. The drug exhibitions also included
materials transferred from the Department of Agriculture in 1881, which
originally had been brought from Central America and South America for
the 1876 centennial exhibition, a variety of opium specimens from
Turkey, and a number of rare drugs listed in the official formulary
which were acquired from the Museum of Karachi in what was then India.
Dr. Flint commented in the _Smithsonian Annual Report_ for 1883 that the
collection of cinchona barks was especially complete. It was comprised
of specimens of nearly all the natural cinchona barks of South America
and every known variety of the cultivated product from the British
government plantations in India. In addition, there were specimens from
Java, Ceylon, Mexico, and Jamaica. The Indian and Jamaican barks were
accompanied by herbarium specimens of the leaf and flower (and, in some
cases, the fruit) of each variety of tree from which the bark was
obtained.[8]
In an attempt to protect specimens liable to attack by insects, a small
piece of blotting paper moistened with chloroform was inserted
underneath the stopper in each bottle. Later on, bichloride of mercury
was found to be a better insecticide.
These early collections of the Section were brought into admirable
condition and received compliments for their organization and
completeness. In the _Smithsonian Annual Report_ for 1883, the
collections were praised as "superior to any other in the United States
and scarcely excelled by any in Europe."
[Illustration: Figure 4.--DR. HENRY GUSTAV BEYER, the second honorary
curator of the Section of Materia Medica (1884-1887). (_Photo courtesy
of American Physiological Society._)]
In spite of the apparent emphasis on the displaying of drugs, the first
curator of the Section had envisioned that the exhibits eventually would
embrace the entire field of the healing arts. In the _Smithsonian Annual
Report_ for 1883, Dr. Flint noted that "in the establishment of a museum
designed to illustrate man and his environment, it is proper that the
materials and methods used for the prevention and cure of disease should
have a place." However, his plans were temporarily interrupted when his
first term as honorary curator ended in 1884.
On June 4, 1884, Dr. Henry Gustav Beyer was detailed by the Department
of the Navy to become the second honorary curator of the Section of
Materia Medica. As a young man, Dr. Beyer (1850-1918) had come from
Saxony, Germany, to the United States and, in due course, became a
naturalized citizen. He was graduated from the Bellevue Hospital
Medical College of New York City in 1876.
Because of his interest in physiological experimental research, Dr.
Beyer enrolled at the Johns Hopkins University, where he was awarded a
Ph. D. degree in 1887. Unlike his predecessor, Dr. Beyer was primarily
interested in carrying on research on the physiological action of
certain drugs and in pharmacology. This was evident from the original
scientific papers mentioned in the _Smithsonian Annual Reports_ and
published by him during the period of his curatorship from 1884 to 1887.
Despite the pressure of his postgraduate studies at Johns Hopkins
University, Dr. Beyer helped in arranging and classifying the _materia
medica_ collection without trying to extend materially the scope of the
Section.
After the term of Dr. Beyer expired in 1887, Dr. Flint returned to take
charge of the Section. Surprisingly, at this time, it seems that he
showed less enthusiasm and devotion to the work of the Museum which he
had previously served so well. It could have been a disappointment
resulting from a lack of evidence of any real progress in the Section
since he had left it three years before. Whatever the reasons may have
been, the _Smithsonian Annual Reports_ show that only a few hundred
specimens were added to the _materia medica_ collections between 1887
and 1890, bringing the total to 5,915 preserved in good condition.
Further curtailment of the Section's activities began in November 1891
when Dr. Flint was again transferred to other duties for the U.S. Navy.
From November 1891 to May 24, 1895, curatorship of the Section was
charged to five physicians of the U.S. Navy: Drs. John C. Boyd (from
November 1891 to April 6, 1892); William S. Dixon (April 1892 to January
5, 1893); C. H. White (January 1893 to July 15, 1893); C. U. Gravatt
(July 1893 to January 22, 1894); R. A. Marmion (January 22, 1894 to June
15, 1894); and to Medical Inspector Daniel McMurtrie (June 1894 to May
24, 1895). During this interim of nearly three and a half years, there
were neither literary contributions nor additions made to the
collections of the Section that were of any significance. The reason is
obvious, for all of these curators averaged less than seven months of
service which is not enough time, even for a well-trained individual, to
accomplish very much in a museum. Therefore, it is easy to imagine that
when the Secretary of the Navy detailed Dr. Flint for a third time to
take charge of the Section, he was rather discouraged. Nevertheless, at
the Cotton States and International Exposition in Atlanta, Georgia, from
September 18 to December 31, 1895, the _materia medica_ was represented
by two displays: one on mineral waters and amounts of solid constituents
in pure state; and another showing the quantities of minerals after
analysis of the composition of the human body.
A similar project was undertaken in 1897 at the Tennessee Centennial
Exposition (May 1 to October 31) in Nashville, where there were two
displays of _materia medica_. One showed several kinds of the cinchona
barks and the medicinal preparations made from them, and another
containing the commercial varieties of the alkaloids of opium.
At this time, Dr. Flint's attention turned to a new phase of medical
exhibition. He felt the need for a program of exhibits on the practice
and the historical development of the healing arts. A change of the
Section's name was deemed necessary and, thus, in 1898 the more
comprehensive title of Division of Medicine was adopted.