If one tried to locate the above scene today, he would stand on the Tenth street overpass into a chasm of speeding traffic that is now 1-70. The block pictured here at the southeast corner of Tenth and Campbell streets, and the University Medical college have simply disappeared. But at the turn of the century the school was the pride of Kansas City and known nationally for the skilled physicians and surgeons it produced. The medical school first opened in the fall of 1881 on the Southeast corner of Twelfth and McGee, and was planned as the first unit of a complete university. This idea was abandoned in 1888 and the college was reorganized strictly as a medical school. At that time the school moved to the new building at Tenth and Campbell. The faculty was composed of 15 of Kansas City's leading physicians. In 1900, when its graduating class numbered 130, an addition was build which made an impressive 4-story building with a tower at the east corner. Three years later the 4-story hospital and clinic (right) completed the Campbell street side of the L-shaped facility. Browne's bakery and a grocery and butcher shop occupied the small building on the corner. Two thousand students were graduated in the 30 year existence of the school. The 1909 city directory lists Jabaz N. Jackson, president; George W. Davis, Secretary: Calbe Ritter, treasurer; John M. Frankenburger, dean, and Charlotte B. Forester, hospital manager, Dr. Jackson was at one time president of the American Medical association. The school was a fee-supported college and early in the century increasing medical requirements and the growth of heavily endowed or state supported medical schools were making it difficult for fee-supported medical schools. In 1911 Dr. Jackson recommend that the college close its doors while it still had an honorable record. Negotiations to give the institution to the University of Missouri and to William Jewell college had failed, and so the medical college passed out of existence when the members of the class of 1911 received their diplomas. The University of Kansas City had no connection with the old medical school. Kansas City Times, February 8, 1969.
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