The 40th anniversary of the official opening of the Albert
Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University (AECOM) seemed an appropriate
time to record its genesis and evolution. During these four decades, it became a
premier institution for medical education, biomedical research and patient care.
With Dean Dominick P. Purpura's endorsement and support, I eagerly undertook this project to ease my transition from service on the full-time faculty for 37 years to retirement. The project's initial objectives were three-fold; 1) to probe and record where the College of Medicine came from; 2) to state in outline form what it has accomplished and; 3) to project where it is going. This history may be viewed as an effort to trace AECOM's conception, gestation, birth, infancy, childhood and maturation to its current status. The present essay is a personal effort to deal with the first objective.
I am privileged to have obtained salient information by interview or correspondence with many who were actively involved at the time of the institution's beginnings. I have had ready access to the archival materials at the College and at Yeshiva University. The officers and staff of the Association of American Medical Colleges have graciously permitted me to review records relating to the College's accreditation. To all who have helped, I am most grateful. Regrettably, due to constraints of space and time, they cannot be acknowledged here in detail.
I am not an historian or a professional writer. Any sins of omission or commission are strictly my own. I do hope, however, that this summary will prove to be of interest to those who read it. Because histories are rarely best sellers, unless they contain racy or intriguing anecdotes, this essay has been kept mercifully concise.
Prologue
The world was a uniquely different, exciting, often worried and worrisome place in the 1940s and 1950s when what became the Albert Einstein College of Medicine (AECOM) of Yeshiva University was conceived, planned and implemented. Those decades witnessed:
...the first clinical trials of penicillin, the first clinical use of oral anticoagulants, and the organization of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, the forerunner of major commitments by the United States government to fundamental biological, medical and physical science research (1941).
...the dawning of the "atomic age" when Enrico Fermi and his team, under the West Stands of Stagg Field at the University of Chicago, recorded the first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction, releasing enough neutrons to keep going forever (3:45 p.m., December 2, 1942). This monumental accomplishment arose from intensive atomic research, the Manhattan Project, started by the United States government on Albert Einstein's advice.
...the beginning and end of United States formal involvement in World War II (December 7, 1941September 2, 1945), after 3 years, 8 months, and 22 days, and the Korean War (June 25, 1950July 27, 1953).
...the election of Franklin Delano Roosevelt to an unprecedented fourth term as President (November 7, 1944), but followed by his death only 83 days later on April 12, 1945, and the succession by Harry S Truman.
...Sir Winston Churchill stating in early 1945, "America stands at this moment at the summit of the world."
...the successful use of streptomycin for the treatment of human tuberculosis (1945).
...the dropping of "Little Boy" and "Fat Man" atomic bombs, respectively, on Hiroshima (August 6, 1945) and Nagasaki (August 9, 1945).
...the holding of the first United Nations 51-member General Assembly session in London (January 10, 1946).
...the assembly of an all-electronic brain (ENIAC) at the University of Pennsylvania to begin the computer age (1946).
...establishment of the State of Israel (May 14, 1948).
...detonation of a nuclear bomb by the Russians (September 23, 1949).
...the description of the first molecular disease, sickle cell anemia, by Pauling, Itano, Singer and Wells (Science 110:543, 1949).
...Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy beginning his "witch hunt" with "a list of 205...names known to the Secretary of State to be Communist Party members" (February 22, 1950) and ending with his condemnation by the Senate (December 2, 1954) and his death (May 2, 1957).
...implementation of a new draft to increase the size of the military, and appointment by President Truman of General Douglas MacArthur to head the United Nations command in Korea (July 7, 1950).
...the release of the first thermonuclear device, the H-bomb, on Eniwetok island (May 12, 1951).
...the execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg after their conviction for selling atomic secrets to the Soviet government (June 16, 1953).
...the publication by Watson and Crick of the "double helix" configuration of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)...and the isolation of adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) by Abraham White and his colleagues (1953).
...the licensing of Jonas Salk's vaccine against poliomyelitis (April 12, 1954).
...the Supreme Court striking down "separate but equal" education in Brown v. Board of Education (May 17, 1954).
...the United States sending a small force of military advisers to Vietnam (February 23, 1955).
...the United States Supreme Court ordering school integration "with all deliberate speed" (May 31, 1955)...and Rosa Parks taking a front seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, (December 5, 1955).
...the minimum hourly wage increasing to $1 (August 12, 1955).
(Bordley and Harvey, 1976; Knauer, 1993)
Where Did the College of Medicine Come From?
Background
In the 1940s, after the experiences of the Second World War, a clear perception developed that more physicians and, therefore, more medical schools were needed in the United States. The Flexner report of 1910 that had so severely criticized medical education in this country led to the demise of many proprietary and inferior medical schools so that the production of physicians failed to keep pace with the rate of population growth. In the century from 1810 to 1910, 457 medical schools were established in the United States and Canada (Schofield, 1984), but only 155 had survived for Flexner's Carnegie Foundation-sponsored visitations. The number of schools decreased to reach a new low plateau of 77 between 1929 and 1943 with an average of 5,000 graduates per year (Schofield, 1984). The impressive advances in medicine, especially the treatment of trauma and of infections with antibiotics associated with the experiences of World War II, provided another stimulus for the expansion of medical personnel. The war had even led to the first accelerated (three year) medical curriculum with two graduating classes in 1944. Despite the now more clearly recognized difficulty in predicting the number of "health care providers" needed, a definite feeling existed that there should be many more doctors. In 1952, a special Commission on Building America's Health reported to President Harry S Truman that it had found insistent indication of the shortage of doctors and noted that medical schools had unfilled faculty positions. Two years later, a Presidential Commission on the Health Needs of the Nation expressed concern that American hospitals had 12,000 internships available and only about 6,000 new graduates to fill them. (Ten Brave Years, 1965).
The number of medical schools had risen modestly to 80 with 6,861 graduates annually by 1954 when there were about 725 people per physician in this country. International medical graduates represented 21% of the interns and residents. When AECOM opened in 1955, it was only the fifteenth entirely new American medical school to have been established since 1910. No new medical school had been established in New York City since 1897.
By 1965, there were again 88 medical schools with 7,574 graduates annually; in 1975, there were 114 schools and 12,716 graduates; in 1985, there were 126 schools producing 16,318 new physicians, the peak, and in 1995, there were 15,888 graduates from 124 schools (Jolly and Hudley, 1996). In the current year, 1996, the pendulum has already swung back to a policy of limitation of the number of physicians. The Institute of Medicine has proposed that no new medical schools be opened, that medical school class sizes be frozen, that the federal government reduce the number of medical residencies that it funds, and that the limited positions remaining be offered first to physicians graduating from U.S. institutions. Hospitals that depend heavily on graduates of foreign medical schools for rendering of patient care should be provided with replacement funding. An even more drastic recommendation was advanced by the Pew Health Professions Commission: reduce total U.S. medical school enrollment by 20 to 25 percent through the outright closure of medical schools! The Association of American Medical Colleges, on the other hand, proposed that reducing the physician workforce be accomplished by a reduction of the number of international medical graduates (AAMC Reporter, 1996).
In 1965 the population-to-physician ratio in this country was 700, by 1975 it was 582, in 1985 it was 472, and in 1990 it was 420. In 1991-1992, the United States ranked 18th in terms of life expectancy and spent $2,932 per person, or 13.3% of its gross domestic product (GDP), on health care. By contrast, the United Kingdom ranked 14th in life expectancy, spent $1,003 per person 6.6% of its GDP on health care, and had 710 people per physician. Japan ranked first in life expectancy, had 610 people per physician, and spent $1,771 per person or 6.8% of its GDP (Failure by the Number, NY Times 1994). The issues implicit in those statistics are at the center of the controversies over the future of this country's health care system.
Planting the Seed
Against this background, on November 16, 1945, under the inspired leadership of its second President, Dr. Samuel Belkin, in the second year of his 32 year tenure, Yeshiva University proposed to establish a medical school. Dr. Belkin had to overcome the negative views from the "religious right" and the University's contemporary leadership, but had support from outside educators (Hartstein, 1994).
In the light of the age-old Jewish tradition and dedication to teaching and healing, it was not surprising that even as early as the 1930s, a distinguished New York attorney, Max D. Steuer, approached the University's first President, Dr. Bernard Revel, with a proposition for a medical school. However, it was premature for an institution trying valiantly to stay afloat. (Hartstein, 1995)
President Belkin, in 1948, already viewed the dream of creating a Jewish-sponsored medical school as a practical possibility. He warned the University's Trustees of the awesome responsibility involved in such an ambitious undertaking. He estimated that at least 6 million dollars would be needed before such a venture could be considered seriously. On November 16, 1949, however, the Trustees approved unanimously the initiation of negotiations with the New York State Board of Regents for an amendment to the University's charter to include the granting of the degree of Doctor of Medicine.
As is so often the case, it is really impossible to identify exactly who first had the idea to initiate a medical school under such trying conditions. The College's conception was, in fact, multifactorial. One source has indicated that Elihu Katz, M.D. (Columbia, 1914), a gastroenterologist and one of the first Clinical Professors of Medicine at the College of Medicine, was the "activist" (Hartstein, 1994). Dr. Shelley R. Saphine, a biologist and the first Dean of Yeshiva College, brought Dr. Katz to the University. As President of the Society for the Advancement of Pre-Medical Sciences at Yeshiva College, Dr. Katz proposed the establishment of a medical school at the University at the Society's annual dinner at the Astor Hotel in 1948. He was reported to have said, "A Jewish sponsored medical school is a powerful force that will go a long way towards destroying racial and religious bigotry," and that the establishment of the first non-sectarian medical school in the United States would alleviate the "estimated nationwide shortage of physicians and combat existing quota systems so prevalent in many medical schools." In the 1940s the sciences were certainly prime areas of interest for college students. Many Yeshiva College students had wanted to become physicians, but faced the nearly insurmountable difficulty of gaining admission to medical schools; it should be noted the schools restricted the acceptance of other non-majority students as well. In 1949, pre-medical studies at Yeshiva College were expanded and enriched!
Another story has it that Dr. Belkin, while attending a meeting of university presidents, noted that many of the prestigious institutions represented at the conference had originated from religious organizations and that several had medical schools (Newman, 1994). He felt, and often stated, that Jewish stu-dents had for so long been guests in other medical schools that it was time for Yeshiva University to become a host.
There can be no question that it was President Belkin, resisting a proposal to start a law school, who really took on the challenge (Hartstein, 1994) and made this "Miracle on Morris Park Avenue" come to pass seven years later, in 1955. Dr. Belkin once observed to a skeptical man of wealth, "If the school (Yeshiva University) does nothing else except give an opportunity to one student to fulfill his dreams, our work will not have been in vain. If we should succeed in giving one scientist the opportunity to do his research and thus enable him to convey his information and knowledge to future physicians, then our work will be of lasting importance. If we properly train one man and thus are instrumental in saving one human life, we shall then have reason to be proud of our work as if we had been able to save the entire world" (The Four Dimensions, 1968). He was encouraged, with reservations, by Bernard Baruch, Dr. Alan Gregg of the Rockefeller Institute, and other influential leaders from the world of politics, business and finance, many of whom subsequently became members of the Board of Overseers and major financial contributors (Jaffe, 1980). On December 11, 1949, at the 21st annual Scholarship Fund Dinner at the Astor Hotel, Charles H. Silver, long-time President of Beth Israel Hospital and a member of Yeshiva University's Board of Trustees, announced more formally the University's plans for a medical school.
By 1950, Dr. Belkin's dream of a medical school had become a commitment (The Four Dimensions, 1968). On December 15, 1950, the New York State Board of Regents unanimously approved an amendment to the University's charter granting it the power to award the degrees of Doctor of Medicine and Doctor of Dental Surgery. Dr. Hillis Miller, Associate Commissioner of Education of the State of New York, was reported to have said, "Next to the Constitution of the United States, the Yeshiva University charter is the most amended charter in the country" (Ten Brave Years, 1965). Creation of a dental school was never implemented, probably because no prac-tical reason existed to do so since Jewish students had no difficulty in obtaining admission to dental schools, and there was no strong leadership for such an effort. Considering the present unfavorable climate for basic dental education, that decision was prescient.
On June 17, 1951, at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, Roger W. Straus, a Regent of the University of the State of New York, presented President Belkin with the charter amendment. Mr. Straus said, "Today, there is a dearth of opportunity for young men and women to become doctors and dentists...The Regents welcome the news that a private institution will open new opportunities for medical education" (Straus, 1951).
On April 17, 1951, an Advisory Council on Medical Education, comprised of eminent physicians and educators from around the country, was established. The roster was developed by Dr. Belkin with Dr. Harry M. Zimmerman, Chief Pathologist and Head of the Laboratory Division at the Montefiore Hos-pital and Professor of Pathology at Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons. The membership in-cluded: Bernard J. Alpers, M.D., Professor of Neurology, Jefferson Medical College; William Dameshek, M.D., Professor of Clinical Medicine, Tufts College Medical School, Director, Blood Research Laboratories, New England Medical Center Hospital; Leo M. Davidoff, M.D., Director of Neuro-surgery, Beth Israel Hospital, Chief Neurosurgeon, Mount Sinai Hospital, Clinical Professor of Neurosurgery, New York University School of Medicine; Dayton J. Edwards, M.D., Professor Emeritus of Physiology, Cornell University Medical School, Associate Dean, Cornell Medical School; Harry Gordon, M.D., Chief Pediatrician, Sinai Hospital, Baltimore; Horace Hodes, M.D., Chief Pediatrician, Mount Sinai Hospital, Clinical Professor of Pediatrics, College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University; Marcus D. Kogel, M.D., Commissioner of Hospitals, New York City; Louis H. Nahum, M.D., Assistant Professor of Physiology, Yale University School of Medicine, Executive Committee Chairman, New Haven Medical Association; Isador Snapper, M.D., Chief of Medicine and Director of Medical Education, Mount Sinai Hospital; Abraham White, Ph.D., Vice-President and Director of Research, Chemical Specialties Company, Inc., New York; Maxwell M. Wintrobe, M.D., Physician-in-Chief, Salt Lake City General Hospital, Professor of Medicine, University of Utah School of Medicine. Donald G. Anderson, M.D., Secretary of the American Medical Association's Council on Medical Education and Hospitals, was Consultant.
Dean Dayton Edwards of Cornell was not sympathetic to the idea of another medical school, and it is interesting to note that Dr. Maxwell Wintrobe did not mention this episode in his autobiographical book, Hematology: The Blossoming of a Science. A goal of 25 million dollars was set for fund raising: 4.25 million for the College of Medicine, 5.6 million for 19 academic departments, including legal medicine and medical ethics, 2.55 million for a library, auditorium, and related services, 2.425 million for a residence hall and students' lounge, 175,000 for an Administration Hall, and 10 million dollars for colleges of dentistry, nursing, public health, and post-graduate units.
Dr. Belkin persuaded Samuel Levy, Chairman of the Univers-ity's Board of Trustees, to give $100,000. This seed was used to obtain like-matching gifts from the Etra family, Max Stern, and the Abraham Mazer family, $50,000 from the Rosen and Bernstein families, and $25,000 each from other Trustees and friends. A fund of $1,000,000 was collected, but it was pointed out that at least $30,000,000 would be required and much more, if a hospital facility were also to be built (Ten Brave Years, 1965). The Development Office, first under the direction of Robert Halpern, then lead by Michael M. Nissel-son and subsequently by Abraham Zeitz, with Marchy Schwartz, Jack Greenbaum and others, was directed to raise the funds (Zeitz, 1979). Their accomplishments were truly heroic and made the dream a reality. No small part was played by the National Women's Division which had its first membership luncheon on January 13, 1953, and which has raised over 70 million dollars in the last four decades, and the Young Men's Division which has provided over 30 million over 20 years to the cause.
The Advisory Council held its first meeting on Sunday, May 6, 1951, at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel. Except for Drs. Leo Davidoff, Harry Gordon, and Isador Snapper, all were present. Harry M. Zimmerman, M.D. (Yale, 1927) was named interim chairman. President Belkin stated that only two demands would be made of the medical school: all food served at the school would be kosher and no classes would be held on the Sabbath or designated Jewish holidays. The Council noted that the University was not concerned with the private lives of its faculty or student body, and that the work of individuals would not be interfered with.
Before taking up the major items on the agenda, the Council recommended that the
sole criterion for admission to the College of Medicine would be the scholarship
and character of the applicant. Prior to adjournment of the four-hour meeting, the
Council unanimously elected Dr. Zimmerman chairman. Shortly thereafter, an Executive
Committee consisting of Drs. Harry Zimmerman, Marcus Kogel, Abraham White, Horace
Hodes and Louis Nahum was named. Because rapid progress in achieving its primary
objective of developing a medical school was expected, and in view of the busy schedules
of its members, this gathering of the Advisory Council may have been not only its
first, but also its last. The detailed work was accomplished by an Administrative
Council consisting of Dr. Kogel, Abraham Zeitz, Sidney Schutz (University General
Counsel), and Sam Hartstein (Director of Public Relations, Yeshiva University) that
served as a bridge between the University and the embryonic AECOM.
Selecting a Site
Even without a name and money in the bank, consideration of a site was undertaken at the first meeting of the Medical Advisory Council. Because of the huge costs of building and operating a hospital, it was quickly agreed that it would be better to affiliate with an existing hospital, even if building one's own might be ideal. Manhattan was considered an unlikely borough because it was already the location of several well-established medical schools and large teaching hospitals. Association with the prestigious Mount Sinai Hospital, also under Jewish auspices, was considered, but was rejected as too distant from the University, geographically, philosophically, and in religious orientation. The crowded neighborhood near the University's Amsterdam Avenue cam-pus was viewed as being in the "turf" of Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons. Dr. Kogel, as Commissioner of Hospitals and a member of the Advisory Council, observed that the City of New York, badly in need of new medical facilities, was building the Elmhurst Hospital in the Borough of Queens which already had the Queens Medical Center, and the comprehensive East Bronx Hospital (original designation of the Bronx Municipal Hospital Center). No suitable property was available near the former, but Dr. Kogel noted that land around the latter could readily be purchased by the University. He also stated that for an affiliation to occur between a medical school and a municipal hospital, the Commissioner had complete jurisdiction. The Council then concluded that a sub-committee should explore the availability of ground near a new hospital, and that Queens and the Bronx be investigated most thoroughly. This sub-committee was apparently never needed as decisions were made very quickly.
To the text of a speech by Mayor Vincent R. Impellitteri delivered on June 17, 1951, at a Founder's Dinner at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, Dr. Kogel added the offer of an affiliation of the Bronx Municipal Hospital Center with the proposed medical school. That medical facilities complex was to consist of a 500-bed tuberculosis hospital and a 750-bed general hospital, and was already under construction in the Bronx. A rapid-fire exchange of letters between the Mayor, President Belkin and Commissioner Kogel followed, culminating in the acceptance of this offer by the University's Board of Trustees on June 18, 1951. The Mayor confirmed the offer in writing on June 22, 1951. Before this deal was formally consummated, however, a visit by James J. Lyons, Bronx Borough President for 28 years and a powerful Democratic politician, to see Dr. Belkin in the latter's office was orchestrated by Sam Hartstein and Donald D'Arcy from Mr. Lyons' staff. Mr. Lyons formally invited the medical school to locate in the Bronx. Mr. D'Arcy subsequently became the President of the Dollar Savings Bank and was active in raising funds for the College (Hartstein, 1995).
Later, in a memorandum for the record, dated June 6, 1961, and sent to Dr. Zimmerman, Dr. Kogel wrote, "The offer of the hospital center as the prime affiliant of the proposed medical school should not be construed as an act of great generosity or sacrifice on the part of the Mayor, the Commissioner of Hospitals or the Department of Hospitals. Indeed it solved a staffing problem and it insured the indigent sick a high level of care." The affiliation meant that the professional care of the patients would be under the jurisdiction of the College's faculty, and that the students at AECOM would have full access to the wealth of clinical material on the inpatient and outpatient services. Similar to the arrangement between Bellevue Hospital and the New York University School of Medicine, in existence since the 1850s, the University's Board of Trustees would nominate the medical staff who would also be part of the faculty of the medical school. In effect, the Bronx Municipal Hospital Center (BMHC) would be the College's hospital! The University and the embryonic College then had to proceed, full speed ahead, to recruit staff because at least one of the hospital units was scheduled to open in early 1954 (Kogel, 1971).
History of the College's Neighborhood
The early history of the Bronx is of relevance and should be of some interest to those who have studied and worked here over the last four decades.
When it was decided to locate AECOM in the 42-square mile Bronx, home to 1.2 million people, the area had not acquired its later reputation as a crime-infested and devastated borough. It was an heterogeneous region with many ethnic neighborhoods, and served as a large social laboratory. Its reputation had not been tainted by Hollywood with movies like Fort Apache, the Bronx or Bonfires of the Vanities. The Pel-ham Parkway area was, and still is, a pleasant, grassy-green middle class neighborhood inhabited by Italian, Jewish, Irish, Russian, Indian, Vietnamese, Hispanic, Afro-American, and other persons of diverse origins. It was home to the Bronx Zoological Park, the Bronx Botanical Gardens and the Yankees. It also had City Island, that oasis that looks, smells, and feels like coastal New England to which candidates being recruited for positions at the College could be taken to see country, Long Island Sound, Manhattan, beaches, and the Police Depart-ment's bomb disposal site. The geography of the Bronx made it possible for faculty, students, and staff not only to live in the Bronx (including the prestigious Riverdale section), but in Manhattan, Westchester, Long Island, New Jersey, and Southern Connecticutall with a commute of less than an hour.
The area now known as the Bronx was first settled in 1639. In 1874, the land west of the Bronx River was annexed to New York City, while the area east of the river remained a part of Westchester County until 1895 when it, too, became part of the growing city. The newly combined region was called the Annexed District or the North Side until 1898 when it was officially designated as the Borough of the Bronx, after the river that ran through it. Despite pride in becoming part of this most dynamic city, "Bronxites continued to lead everyday lives that were almost provincial. When asked where he lived, a Bronx resident would invariably reply Mott Haven, or Westchester, or Kingsbridge, or Morrisania, or whatever small village happened to be his home" (Ultan and Hermalyn, 1985).
In July, 1888, John A. Morris acquired 307 acres bounded by Pelham Parkway South on the north, Williamsbridge Road on the West, the New Haven-Penn Central (now Amtrak) tracks on the east, and what is now known as Bronxdale Avenue on the south. The land, purchased for $300,000, was to be used for the development of the Morris Park Racecourse to replace the Jerome Park Racetrack acquired by the City of New York for a water reservoir. Construction of the racetrack took about one year. The club house was located on the present-day corner of Van Nest and Fowler Avenues, and the grandstand extended across what is now Morris Park Avenue. The New Haven Railroad built a two-track spur from its main line for private and public railroad coaches to a station on Bronxdale Avenue from where customers walked through a tunnel now sealed to walkways leading to the club house and grandstand. The railroad charged an extra thirty cents for the short trip. Luxurious horse-drawn carriages and coaches also transported fans from Manhattan for $2.50 with $1.00 more for box seats. On August 20, 1889, the Morris Park Racecourse was officially opened. The next day, The New York Times reported, "A great crowd was there to enjoy the sport,and to see the most beautiful racetrack in the world, and to enjoy the liberal management and its advantages, such as free music and programs." Except for entry into the grandstand and paddock, admission was free.
Despite its auspicious beginnings, the racetrack soon ran into fiscal and legal troubles. The Westchester Racing Association attempted to resurrect the race track. The Woodmanston Inn was developed in the area bounded by Lurting Avenue on the west, Rhinelander Avenue on the north, Williamsbridge on the east, and Van Nest on the south to provide food and sleeping accommodations. In the vicinity were boarding houses and small hotels, such as the Laconia Hotel at 1571-1583 Bronxdale Avenue. Sadly, the New York State Racing Commission's Chairman, August Belmont, and members of the Westchester Racing Association agreed on November 24, 1902, that the 1904 season would be the last. A 680 acre plot on Long Island was purchased to take its place; today, that site is Belmont Park. After being abandoned, the track in the Bronx was used for automobile racing and for aeronautical shows. Much of the grandstand's wood was vandalized, and parcels of land were gradually sold off.
In 1907-1908, the City of New York took over the remaining property to build today's streets. Morris Park Avenue was the first road built. Trolley tracks were extended from Bronxdale Avenue to Williamsbridge Road and service was opened on May 23, 1910, even though not a house was to be seen along the route. Two weeks earlier, fire had destroyed what was left of the racetrack. The land remaining was auctioned off on May 31, 1913, with the proviso that no building costing less than $3,000 could be built on a lot. Certain "offensive" manufacturing and slaughter house activities were prohibited, but there were no restrictions on liquor stores, stables, inns or hotels. Some 1,500 owners purchased the 307 acres for prices ranging from $1,000 to $5,000 for prime corner lots.
Because the owners had violated the Volstead (Prohibition) Act at another site, the Woodmanston Inn was ordered closed on July 24, 1929, by Federal authorities. On April 2, 1930, after attempts to reopen the Inn were followed by threats, the Inn was burned to the ground and never rebuilt. As of 1977, all that remained was the tunnel portal at Bronxdale Avenue and Morris Park Avenue (DiBrino, 1977).
Naming the College
Selecting the name for the new medical school unexpectedly became a rather contentious matter. It was a subject of discussion at the meeting of the Medical Advisory Council on Sunday, May 6, 1951. Saying, "We wanted to make it clear that this school is not a yeshiva, that it is a scientific institution," Dr. Belkin rejected the idea of simply calling it the Medical School of Yeshiva University because by so doing it would be "typed" (Kolatch, 1960). "We also wanted it to bear a name which signified the highest scientific achievement." Maimonides' name was submitted and rejected. Despite objections from some members of the Advisory Council, the name of Albert Einstein was ultimately accepted. One should recall that Einstein had been accused of Communist leanings and of being too liberal in the then current "McCarthy era." On October 8, 1934, however, he had been awarded an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from Yeshiva's precursor, the Rabbi Isaac Eichanan Theological Seminary and Yeshiva College. He had written to President Belkin on March 23, 1951, that, "I have learned to my great satisfaction that Yeshiva University is planning to establish a medical school...The Yeshiva University Medical School will be unique, in that, while it will bear the imprint of a Jewish University devoted to the Arts and Sciences and will represent a collective effort by our people to make its contribution to medical science, it will welcome students of all creeds and races. I hope that you will find full understanding and support for this worthy cause."
Then came the delicate and difficult task of persuading the extremely modest and shy Professor Einstein to agree to having his name used for this purpose. By that time, Dr. Harry Zimmerman had been recruited by President Belkin to assume the Directorship of the unnamed medical school; he accepted the task in January, 1952, at the same time he took a leave-of-absence from his position as Chief Pathologist and Head of the Laboratory Division of Montefiore Hospital. Through the good offices of Dr. Thomas Bucky, a student of Dr. Zimmerman's at Yale, a meeting at 112 Mercer Street, Princeton, New Jersey, was arranged for January 4, 1953. This gathering was the culmination of two previous sessions with Professor Einstein in the summer of 1952. Present were Dr. Bucky's parents, Dr. and Mrs. Gustave Bucky, close friends of Professor Einstein, Dr. Belkin, Dr. Abraham White, Dr. Leo Davidoff, Abraham Allen, Director of Public Information, and Dr. Zimmerman. Finally, with President Belkin's personal and private intercession, Professor Einstein agreed. Less than two weeks later, on January 15, 1953, the Trustees unanimously confirmed the name (Zimmerman, 1976). On March 15, 1953, in a driving rain, more than 100 prominent community leaders from the United States and Canada went to see Professor Einstein on his 74th birthday to extend their best wishes and to take part in the official naming of the College (Ten Brave Years, 1965). It was his single public appearance in his 22 years in Princeton (Mackin, 1989). He still felt that birthday celebrations were only for children. One year later, on his 75th birthday, he hosted a small reception at his home where he was shown an architectural model of the College. He said, "I feel impelled to repeat to you, now that construction is under way for the College of Medicine, that, in my opinion, this enterprise is the greatest contribution the Jewish community has undertaken for the commonweal of the American people" (Ten Brave Years, 1965).
On March 15, 1973, at a ceremony to mark the twentieth anniversary of the College's naming, President Belkin reminisced, "Whatever he (Einstein) is, that's his privilege, but I say to you, here is a mortal that became immortal during his lifetime...Albert Einstein lives forever. That was my recommendation at that time and the new school was named Albert Einstein College of Medicine" (Belkin, 1973).
In the epilogue to his State of the College address on October 11, 1994, Survival is Not Enough (Einstein, 1994), Dean Dominick Purpura wrote: "Albert Einstein used to say that he wanted to know God's thoughts...Then God said, 'You know what else I'm thinking, Al?' 'I can't wait to hear,' chuckled Albert. 'I'm thinking you should give your name to some of my poor people who are trying to build a cinder-block medical school in an old cow pasture in the Bronx.' 'What,' Al screamed. 'Give my precious name? I should gamble away my name on such a long shot as a medical-shtetl in the sticks built by Rabbis? You can't be serious.' 'Trust me Al.' replied the Lord. 'Give them your name. It's not a gamble...they're a sure bet.' And so it came to pass that Albert Einstein learned a lot of God's thoughts and convinced himself that God knows a sure thing and doesn't play dice with the Universe."
On March 14, 1979, the 100th anniversary of Einstein's birth, Mayor Edward I. Koch proclaimed it ALBERT EINSTEIN DAY in tribute to the memory of one of the greatest men of all time and in recognition of the prestigious institution bearing his name.
The First Building: Forchheimer
Properties were gradually and quietly acquired by Trustee Chairman Samuel Levy and Sidney L. Schutz, the University's General Counsel, until 16.5 acres, across the street from the 64 acres for the Bronx Municipal Hospital Center, be-longed to the University. The price was about $500,000. A sign was erected that announced, "On this site will arise the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University, the first unit of a $25,000,000 Medical Center affiliated with New York City's $40,000,000 Bronx Municipal Hospital Center. To serve the people of the city, state and nation; to further the advancement of medical science; to provide additional facili-ties for training, care and research...Send your contributions now to...270 Park Avenue, New York 12" (The First 20 Years, 1975). The sign was erected with the help of an individual who did not insist on payment.
An administrative command post was established, after Dr. Marcus Kogel was named Dean, in a private house at 1710 Newport Avenue, affectionately called "the little green shack," which stood where the Ullmann Research Center was later to be built.
From among plans submitted by six prominent architectural firms, plans by Kelly and Gruzen were selected because their overall answer to the building problems were considered the most acceptable. Their fee was set at 5%, rather than the usual 8%, and payment was deferred until there was money in the bank.
The original cost estimate for the basic science building was $6 million. With expanding plans, the projection rose to $9 million, and construction of a library, auditorium, and student-faculty lounge was tabled. The initial goal of raising $10 million was then raised to a more realistic $25 million. Under Michael M. Nisselsen and Abraham Zeitz, a national development campaign was started in the summer of 1952.
On October 25, 1953, ground was broken for what is now known as the Leo Forchheimer Medical Science Building. Governor Thomas E. Dewey, President Belkin, and Board of Overseers Chairman Nathaniel L. Goldstein turned over symbolic shovelfuls of earth. The weather was so bad with pouring rain that the ceremony was actually held in the garage and service building of the BMHC (The First 20 Years, 1975; Hartstein, 1994). On Sunday, June 13, 1954, the cornerstone was laid. Noting the inscription, 1954-5714, one wag was heard to comment that the institution's founding parents were so wise they knew how long it would last!
Despite valiant efforts, only the bare essentials of the building and the sixth floor laboratories for anatomy were functional when the first class arrived on Monday, September 12, 1955.
Need for a Hospital
Medical education is unique in that it involves students in the direct, hands-on care of patients, often as members of a health care team. Law students do not try real cases, archi-tecture students do not design actual buildings, engineering students do not build bridges. Medical training, despite exhaustive volumes of written material, elaborate audio-visual aids, and computer-assisted instruction, is still an apprenticeand journeyman-type of experience reminiscent of the guild system of the middle ages. Thus, hospitals and other health care agencies and facilities are absolutely essential components of any program of medical education.
The order in which the priorities of medical schools and hospitals are addressed, however, differ. Medical schools are concerned primarily with the education and training of students and postdoctoral trainees, the discovery of new information, and the development of new concepts. Patient care is a very necessary component, but with a lower precedence. Hospitals' primary concerns are the care of their patients with education and research next in line. These contrasting priorities are often in conflict and require careful diplomacy to achieve the goals of both types of institutions. The Albert Einstein College of Medicine has been very fortunate in that it has been able to develop mutually beneficial, usually harmonious, affiliations with public and private hospitals, without for the most part owning or operating a patient care facility. Exceptions were the period from 1966 to 1969 and a short while in the 1970s when it was responsible for what is now the Jack D. Weiler Hospital of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University, a Division of Montefiore Medical Center. With periodic ambivalence, AECOM has been a guest and active participant in these clinical facilities since the beginning.
The Bronx Municipal Hospital Center
During the first third of the 20th century, the City of New York's extensive municipal hospital system enjoyed great success in the care of countless patients, many of them indigent, through the unpaid services of physicians who felt it a privilege to do so. Many doctors received their post-graduate clinical training in such well-known facilities as Bellevue, King's County and Lincoln Hospitals. Positions on their house staffs were eagerly sought by medical school graduates who were even willing to endure special competitive examinations. The attendings and the trainees learned about or tried out carefully supervised new diagnostic and therapeutic methods. Some were even able to use these experiences as a source of private patient referrals. After two World Wars and a depression, however, the facilities had deteriorated seriously because of neglect. Their attractiveness for both patients and physicians had declined. In 1941, Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia asked the Department of Hospitals and the Department of Public Works to prepare a comprehensive city-wide plan for future hospital facilities (Mueller, 1979). At that time, tuberculosis was a major public health concern, streptomycin and isoniazid not having been introduced. The average occupancy of tuberculosis hospitals was 102.3%. One item in the plan called for new general and tuberculosis hospitals to be situated in the East Bronx, On December 15, 1949, with Mayor William O'Dwyer's blessing, and the availability of $200 million, Commissioner of Hospitals Edward M. Bernecker, M.D., and a small committee of senior staff, including Dr. Marcus D. Kogel who had been the General Medical Superintendent since 1946, began to make plans (Kogel, 1971).
Because the Mayor had directed that no public works were to be built in existing residential areas, the area along Pelham Parkway, still quite rural farm land, appeared an attractive site. Other municipal hospitals were plagued by incessant street traffic noise, persistent noxious fumes and poor access. As noted before, the Pelham Parkway-Morris Park Avenue areas had in the late 1800s been home to a famous race track and recreational area for the citizens of the Bronx and Manhattan (Arsonson, 1974). After its abandonment as a recreational site in the 1930s, this poorly drained marsh area remained underdeveloped until its purchase by the City of New York in 1949.
Several other factors besides prior ownership by the City favored this location. Commissioner Bernecker was a close friend of the President of Fordham University on Fordham Road. That institution still held a dormant charter for a medical school which could have been reactivated to provide faculty physicians as staff. The hospital center's architects, Pomerance and Breines, felt that the 64 acres of wooded but swampy land would be most satisfactory for two hospital buildings and auxiliary units that could become the nucleus of a medical center in an idyllic campus-like setting. One hospital, for patients with tuberculosis, would be far removed from other patients and the population at large. Finally, with Cold War fears and tensions building, the site as a war-time evacuation center would provide ready access to highways, railroads, navigable streams, waterways, and airports. The hospitals were, therefore, designed with lobbies easily convertible for triage and with day rooms that could accommodate additional patients. These plans were based on the fear of an atomic bomb attack by the Russians, and on Dr. Kogel's extensive World War II experiences and his assignment as the Chief Medical Officer for Civil Defense for New York City.
The project's planning group consisted of Dr. Kogel, two other Department of Hospitals' General Medical superintendents and two project architects from the Department of Public Works (Aronson, 1974). Their conceptions were prescient. They proposed facilities for rehabilitation with an anticipated aging population, extensive out-patient clinics, psychiatric services in general hospitals, a modest communicable diseases unit with the decreasing need due to the introduction of antibiotics, and the hope eventually to make general use of a tuberculosis hospital with the probable advent of effective chemotherapy. With wise insight and realistic apprehension, they anticipated the possibility that the City might wish to use some of the available space for a prison or a garbage disposal plant. Therefore, the plans for the two hospitals, which would be able to share a house staff and general services, scattered the staff quarters building and the service facilities around the land to frustrate any such efforts. A 1,000 bed chronic disease hospital was also projected for the space between Jacobi and Van Etten where the Rose F. Kennedy Center and the Nursing Residence were built later.
The original designation of the hospital center was the East Bronx General Hospital, but in those days it was customary to use the manor of famous deceased physicians. It fell to Commissioner Kogel to pick the hospitals' names from a list prepared by the New York Academy of Medicine and the Bronx County Medical Society. For the tuberculosis hospital, an exception was made when Dr. Kogel selected the name of Nathan Bristol Van Etten, M.D., a graduate of the Bellevue Medical College. He had been a Bronx practitioner since 1891 with deep concern for the poor. He had served as Di-rector of Medicine (1931-1936) and President of the Medical Board (1933-1940) at Morrisania Hospital. He served the Bronx for 62 years, attended the hospital's dedication, and died at age 88 just a few months before it opened on Sep-tember 15, 1954. Official ceremonies for the opening were held on October 5th. The general hospital was given the name of Abraham Jacobi, M.D., a German-trained physician born in 1830 who has been credited with being the father of pediatrics in the United States. He was said to have recommended the boiling of milk, and the feeding of fresh fruit juices to children to prevent scurvy. He served as the first President of the American Pediatric Society. He also founded the Pediatric Section of the American Medical Association of which he later became President. In 1918, he proposed creating a national Cabinet-level Department of Health. Although he had passed away, Dr. Jacobi's daughter was at the dedication.
On December 12, 1950, one year after funds were made available and the site's title was vested, construction of Van Etten Hospital was begun first because of the grave concern about tuberculosis and the overcrowding in other municipal hospitals that had resulted from the influx of large numbers of patients. Building was complicated by the need for extensive rock excavation, diversion of Westchester Creek, and drainage of the marsh, but it was essentially completed in 1953. Construction of Jacobi Hospital began on August 1, 1952, but was not completed until 1955. The final cost for both hospitals was $39,345,163, twice the original estimate!
Hospital Commissioner Kogel now had two big hospitals under construction, but no staff. He needed qualified physicians to minister to the sick poor. A medical school affiliation would be a perfect solution! He had previously convinced the Dean of New York Medical College, then located at Fifth Avenue and 100th Street in Manhattan, that the newly com-pleted Bird S. Coler Hospital on Welfare (now Roosevelt) Island would be an excellent place where fourth year medical students could learn and take care of patients. He knew that faculty would then have to be recruited and assigned to teach and supervise the students. He knew nothing about President Belkin's plans for a medical school of Yeshiva University until he was invited to join the latter's Advisory Council on Medical Education. Suddenly, his problem was solved! He promptly sent Dr. Belkin a letter offering an affiliation. Coincidentally, the Bronx Board of Trade, which had previously campaigned with New York State to locate its medical school in the Bronx, had met with Yeshiva University officials to persuade them to locate the medical school there.
Thus, as noted before, the Bronx Municipal Hospital Center and the College of Medicine were conceived very independently, but were born almost simultaneously and grew up in an intimate, but not always totally peaceful, relationship.
The College's timetable, with a gradual, year-by-year phasing in of the four year curriculum, lagged behind the City's. With Van Etten Hospital to be ready for patients on September 15, 1954, the recruitment of doctors became very urgent. Dr. Kogel approached Eli Rubin, Ph.D., M.D., (Yale, 1921, 1925), who became the first Professor of Clinical Medicine on the faculty, to organize and operate a medical service until a full-time chairman of the College's Department of Medicine could be appointed. Dr. Rubin enlisted a group of equally devoted physicians, the majority from Montefiore Hospital, to staff the general medical wards.
In those days the City had no contracts with medical schools, except the one for New York University's and Columbia University's services at Bellevue Hospital and Goldwater Memorial Hospital. Dr. Kogel felt that the professional services could be provided by the faculty of a medical school for the privilege of using the hospital for student teaching, but that laboratory and other ancillary services without compensation would soon bankrupt the institution. An affiliation agreement between the City of New York and Yeshiva University was, therefore, signed on October 15, 1953, by Mayor Vincent R. Impellitteri and Commissioner of Hospitals Marcus D. Kogel for the City and Dr. Samuel Belkin for Yeshiva University with the approval of Louis Levine as Treasurer of the University.
The agreement provided for the Faculty of Medicine of the University to have exclusive responsibility for nominating the members of the clinical and other professional staff of the hospital center, except for individuals whose appointments came under the rules of the City's Municipal Civil Service Commission. Similarly, the professional care of all of the patients was to be under the jurisdiction and responsibility of the Faculty of Medicine. Because of the affiliation, "unique opportunities would exist for making available for the residents of New York City excellent medical care, as well as the advancement of knowledge regarding the mechanisms, meth-ods of treatment, diagnosis and prevention of disease, thus giving to the people of the City of New York widespread benefit from such advanced methods and, of additional impor-tance, the highest type of professional care." The agreement also provided for the University to furnish complete clinical laboratory, autopsy and surgical pathology, radiology and anesthesiology services. Under the supervision of the Faculty of Medicine, it was to conduct "investigations into the causes, methods of diagnosis and treatment and prevention of diseases." The City was to provide and maintain necessary equipment and furnish the requisite supplies. For these services, the City was to pay $531,000 for the year July 1, 1954 to June 30, 1955, and then $750,000 each year for the next nine years. If Van Etten Hospital did not open by July 1, 1954, and Jacobi Hospital by January 1, 1955, the payments were to be reduced by $36,500 per month. Thus, the urgency to get things going was obvious. Surprisingly, the University was not to be constrained from obtaining support for its professional services and scientific activities conducted in conjunction with similar work done elsewhere in the College, the University, or other institutions.
The association of the BMHC with AECOM was quite special. It brought together a brand new municipal hospital and a brand new medical school without previous pressing commitments of most of the attending physicians to private patients or voluntary hospitals. All BMHC staff members would be AECOM faculty, and that hospital would be their first and foremost concern (Aronson, 1970). It was truly "our hospital." Early stationery, produced locally, read Albert Einstein College of MedicineBronx Municipal Hospital Center. This designation continued until 1972 when Joseph T. English, M.D., the first of twelve Health and Hospitals Corporation Presidents (1970-1973) exercised his proprietary rights and had the stationery changed to read "Bronx Municipal Hospital Center, affiliated with Albert Einstein College of Medicine."
Patient care and postgraduate medical training began in Van Etten Hospital on September 15, 1954. A freshly recruited team of attending physicians and house officers under Dr. Eli Rubin's guidance worked without formal faculty designations in an uncertain, nebulous arrangement. On July 1, 1955 the new medical school's faculty came to the Bronx to begin in earnest their teaching, research, and patient care activities. The original cadre of voluntary physicians was now augmented with full-time AECOM faculty.
With the transfer of 200 medical, surgical, and pediatric patients from Van Etten, Jacobi Hospital opened on November 1, 1955. Medical care was provided by the freshly recruited team of attendings and the house officers who had begun their work in Van Etten under the temporary arrangements initiated during the preceding September.
The move from Van Etten to Jacobi was not without troubles: electrical plugs adapted for the outlets in Van Etten would not fit into those installed in Jacobi, so electrocardiograph machines and other movable equipment could not be transferred without modifications. An apocryphal story made the rounds that the one-way glass in the newborn nursery had been put in backwards so that the babies could see their parents, but the parents saw only their reflections. No hand-operated fire extinguishers were installed in Jacobi until a fire in a paraffin oven in the Surgical Pathology Laboratory on the sixth floor brought a large contingent of firemen and much equipment, along with an irate Fire Marshal who loudly berated the Executive Director, Emanuel Lifshutz, M.D. (St. Louis, 1930).
The Bronx Municipal Hospital CenterFirst House Staff
As noted, the hospital center opened before the medical school was ready. A house staff to provide careful and continuous care of the patients, therefore, had been recruited quickly from among recent graduates of foreign medical schools and from other hospitals such as Montefiore, Mount Sinai, and Maimonides in the New York area.
Murray A. Rosenberg, M.D. (Lausanne, Switzerland, 1954), now Visiting Associate Professor of Radiology at the College and Associate Professor of Radiology at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, New Jersey Medical School, has recalled vividly his arrival at the BMHC. "I headed from Brooklyn to the Bronx in December, 1954, in search of Montefiore Hospital seeking a possible place on the house staff (as a newly graduated physician). The toll taker at the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge gave me directions not to Montefiore, but to that new hospital on Pelham Parkway. I walked into the lobby of Van Etten Hospital and was greeted by Dr. Henry Hoberman who personally escorted me to the Medical Staff Office when he heard that I was looking for a job. Within one hour, I was interviewed by Drs. Leo Davidoff, Emanuel Feiring and Charles Ripstein, and taken on board right off. I don't believe I ever received a formal letter of acceptance. And so I left the Bronx that morning with a new job and a new career in a brand new hospital and medical school that I never knew existed when I left Brooklyn that morning. It was quite an experience. I am proud to have been part of it from the very beginning. And belated thanks to the toll taker" (Rosenberg, 1981, 1994).
Dr. Rosenberg also provided the following recollections. Although he was scheduled to begin his internship on January 1, 1955, the first Chief Resident in Medicine, Norbert Schalet, M.D. (Charles University, 1947), persuaded him to start on Christmas Eve, 1954. The very small number of house officers (4 interns, 2 junior residents) were lodged in the ward rooms on 4A-4B of Van Etten Hospital where a charming group of gray-haired Irish ladies from Throggs Neck served as housekeepers. They tidied up the rooms and delivered the mail each morning to the living quarters. Freshly starched uniforms and white shirts were mandatory. The tennis courts were reserved for house officers. Invitations to "properly qualified" social functions in the Bronx and Manhattan were posted on the bulletin board every Saturday morning. Meals were provided by the cafeteria in Van Etten where the house staff met for breakfast and lunch in a separate room. They were later often joined by new faculty members from across the street. The cost of meals, most certainly subsidisized by the City of New York, was minimal: a hot lunch could be purchased for about 35 cents!
Anthony L. Danza, M.D. (Vermont, 1949), acted as Chief Resident in Surgery while doing a Fellowship in Thoracic Surgery. Because he had his specialty board certification in General Surgery, he was able to serve as an Attending and operated in a supervisory capacity with the residents, thereby gaining extensive surgical experience. He did the more difficult cases himself, and scrubbed with all of the chiefs of the subspecialties. He had known Charles Ripstein, M.D. (McGill 1940), Director of Surgery at the BMHC, when he was a medical student at the University of Vermont, and so was convinced that any program that he ran would certainly be approved. Dr. Danza recalled needing boots to walk from the Staff House to Van Etten when it rained because there were no sidewalks on the BMHC grounds. When Jacobi Hospital finally opened, the first meal in the dining room was marred by a leaky roof that ended its use for the next three weeks. "After months of dry sandwiches brought over from other hospitals, our dream of a sit-down dinner of cooked food died aborning" (Danza, 1994).
In March, 1955, the staff house across from Jacobi Hospital finally became available, but without telephone service. Messengers from Van Etten, therefore, had to trudge through the snow on unplowed roadways to summon urgent care. A tastefully furnished hi-fi and television lounge on the second floor and a large party and game room in the basement were made available for rest and recreation.
This initial cadre of house officers came without assurance that their training during the six months before the College of Medicine became operational would be recognized and accepted. They were, therefore, most gratified when Joseph Hirsh, Ed.D. (New York University, 1949), Assistant to the Dean, was able to get the training from January 1, to June 30, 1955, approved by the American Medical Association.
Starting Up
With an initial projected starting date in 1953 that had to be pushed further and further into the future, the University faced the awesome task of recruiting departmental chairmen and faculty, as well as support and technical personnel. Dr. Zimmerman, after a two year paid leave of absence from Montefiore Hospital to serve as Director of the medical school, had become discouraged. Despite his vigorous efforts at fund raising, there was too little money in the bank. He knew that pledges and promises could not pay the bills, and Montefiore Hospital's administration told him that he either had to return to head the pathology laboratories or resign to take on the full-time post at the College of Medicine. He opted for the former (Zimmerman, 1978).
Fortuitously, Marcus D. Kogel, M.D. (New York Medical College, 1927) was familiar with the developing medical school through his service on the University's Advisory Council on Medical Education. He had become somewhat disenchanted with his work as New York City Commissioner of Hospitals. Endlessly energetic and with unlimited enthusiasm and a penchant for insomnia, Dr. Kogel liked the challenge of creating a new medical school, especially one under Jewish auspices. Thus, it was said (Hartstein, 1994) that he offered himself to President Belkin as a candidate for the permanent Deanship. This nomination was also advanced by Dr. Zimmerman (Zimmerman, 1978) who persuaded Dr. Belkin of the wisdom of Dr. Kogel's candidacy during a weekend at the Zimmerman farm. The proposal was accepted and effected on November 1, 1953, just one week after ground was broken for the first building! The appointment was announced on October 14, 1953. Always meticulous in all matters of human conduct, Dr. Kogel resigned as Commissioner, effective December 31, 1953, but wrote Mayor Impellitteri that he would work for the Department until the end of the year to help with budget preparations and other matters (NY Times, 1953).
Dr. Kogel's twenty-six years of in-depth experience in municipal health and hospitals service, the military, and public health training did not equip him well to deal with the issues confronting an academic medical institution, or provide him with information about who should be the teachers and investigators (Jaffe, 1990). He had become familiar with some of the leaders of American medical education through his interactions with Dr. Zimmerman and other members of the Advisory Council on Medical Education. He wisely picked two outstanding leaders to join him in his efforts.
Abraham White, Ph.D. (Michigan, 1931), with broad knowledge of the basic sciences, especially biochemistry, and experience in medical education through his faculty appointments at Yale and the University of California at Los Angeles, was seminal in recruiting basic science chairmen and faculty, in setting the tone for research, and in guiding the educational philosophy. He had already worked closely with Dr. Zimmerman in the planning process, his faculty appointment having been effected on September 1, 1952.
For expertise in the arena of clinical medicine, Dr. Kogel turned to Leo M. Davidoff, M.D. (Harvard, 1922), master neurosurgeon, gifted medical teacher, and consummate administrator, who was neurosurgeon at both Beth Israel Hospital and Mount Sinai Hospital, and on the faculty of New York University's Post-Graduate School (Jaffe, 1994).
This troika, with Dr. Joseph Hirsh, who had met Dr. Kogel in 1940 while the latter was Chief of Preventive Medicine at the Carlisle Barracks shortly before the United States' involvement in World War II, worked earnestly and hard to get everything in place in less than two years.
In the days before search committees and extensive faculty involvement in decision making, recruitment of chairmen and faculty was primarily via the "old boys' network" of who knew and liked whom. Overlapping membership between Yeshiva's Advisory Council on Medical Education and the Medical Advisory Board of the Hebrew University-Hadassah Medical School facilitated information exchange about potential candidates. Attention was, therefore, directed to mid-career medical academicians with solid research and/or clinical backgrounds, some of whom might be locked into second level positions in prestigious departments or institutions. Important, as well, was who could be persuaded to take a chance on a brave but uncertain, not yet clearly viable, institution. With the plan for a rather traditional four-year curriculum, the basic sciences demanded immediate attention. As noted previously, the clinical services had been taken care of temporarily by the recruitment of voluntary physicians to supervise patient care and training at the Bronx Municipal Hospital Center. Dr. White, therefore, did double duty as Associate Dean and as Professor and Chairman of Biochemistry.
The first non-chairman appointment was that of Henry D. Hoberman, Ph.D., M.D. (Columbia, 1943, Harvard, 1947), as Associate Professor of Biochemistry, effective January 1, 1953. In addition to teaching responsibilities, he was expected to learn about the clinical use of radioactive isotopes and to supervise the clinical chemistry laboratory at the Bronx Municipal Hospital Center. This arrangement also set the stage for the division of responsibility for the clinical laboratories in the Bronx Municipal Hospital Center among the medical school's departments: Biochemistry responsible for clinical chemistry, Microbiology and Immunology directing the clinical bacteriology laboratory, and Medicine guiding clinical pathology and hematology, except for the Blood Bank which remained under the aegis of Pathology. This division of labor contrasted with what some would have preferred, a division of Pathology in charge of all clinical laboratories or a separate Department of Laboratory Medicine. The latter structure was ultimately adopted with the creation in 1973, after much debate, of a Department of Laboratory Medicine.
With the first class due to begin its studies in the Fall of 1955, it was urgent that teachers of anatomy be recruited. Dr. White's sister, on the faculty of the University of Denver, knew Ernst and Berta Scharrer and felt that they could take the risk of coming to an unknown, nonexistent medical school. Drs. Kogel and White called them in the Summer of 1954 while they were working at the Woods Hole Marine Bio-logical Laboratories, offered the chairmanship to Ernst Scharrer, Ph.D., M.D. (Munich, 1927, 1933), and invited both to come to New York for interviews. A hurricane prevented the visit but, after returning to Denver, they were reinvited. They enjoyed a pleasant meeting in the "little green house" on Newport Avenue at which Dr. Kogel offered Berta Scharrer, Ph.D. (Munich, 1930) a full professorship in any department that she elected (Scharrer, 1994). Their appointments set two important precedents: non-Jewish faculty on a faculty of a Jewish-sponsored medical school, and refusal to adopt an anti-nepotism rule. The former principal was in keeping with the statement of the medical school's credo. The latter probably reflected Dr. Kogel's experiences in the New York City bureaucracy. His wife, Fannie Irene Tompson, M.D., was employed in the Department of Health, so they were subject to this rule. They would arrive at official functions separately, but would leave together, prompting much gossip and speculation.
At 9:00 am, on Monday, September 12, 1955, Dean Marcus D. Kogel stepped to a podium in a barely completed lecture hall, in what is now known as the Leo Forchheimer Medical Science Building, to welcome the fifty-three men and three women to the first day of the rest of their lives in medicine. He said, "For each of us here today the occasion is a memorable one. For you it is the beginning of the most exciting chapter in your educational career...For the men and women who have labored for years to establish this school it is the hour of fulfillment...We have chosen each of you with great care...You are not only investing four of the most critical years of your lives, but also a significant sum of money." Robert M. Simon, M.D. (Class of 1959 and Historian) wrote in the first yearbook under the date March 16, 1959: "...we were fifty-six from twenty-three different colleges and sixteen different cities, three different religions, two different races, and several different bank statements...fifty-six fellow passengers for parts unknown on a ship not yet launched in an ocean not yet charted; each muttering welcome to the others and surreptitiously counting the lifeboats. Why did we come? Another lifetime required for answers. The important thing was, we came and it made no difference why."
Why did these students, as well as the initial cadre of faculty and trainees elect to come to AECOM? There were many reasons. The first unadorned typewritten Bulletin of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University, 1955-56, states, "The curriculum of the College is based on the philosophy of an integrated and correlated program of medical education with emphasis on the relationships existing among the subjects comprising the study of medicine. The curriculum is based on the fact that medicine is a social, as well as a natural, science." The building for education was designed to facilitate small group instruction with the faculty, rather than the students, moving from laboratory to laboratory and between lecture and seminar rooms. This concept intrigued many who had attended colleges and universities with classes of several hundred and laboratories filled with dozens of students. Attractive, too, was the chance to exercise a pioneer spirit and share in an adventure in a brand new geographic setting. The opportunity for a satisfying career in biomedical research and teaching with some patient care in a large municipal hospital setting appealed to others. The unspoken promise of a reasonably secure faculty position in an institution not already populated by life-time tenured people with limited opportunity for academic advancement persuaded mid-career faculty to come. Even the fact that the medical school was not in the heart of a large metropolitan area, but was readily accessible to open country and the cultural diversity of New York City was a plus (Elkin, 1994). One woman member of the first class recalled that the pilot of the airplane in which she was flying to Europe in 1954 pointed out the site of the new medical school under construction in the Bronx. She was intrigued, and applied on her return home (Rumberg, 1994). There were those who "hitched their academic wagons to the rising stars" recruited to head the basic science and clinical departments. Many, of course, were attracted by the religious philosophy and protocol of an institution under Jewish auspices.
The first Bulletin listed, as of September 1, 1955, the initial cadre of 212 faculty with 14 chairmen. They came to the Bronx, for the experience of their lives! Forty years later, there were 4,056 full-time, part-time, and voluntary faculty in eleven basic science and twenty-two clinical departments. Thus, with vigorous growth and expansion, and multiple hospital affiliations in the Bronx, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and Long Island, the faculty had increased 19-fold, the basic science departments doubled in number, and the clinical departments increased almost 2.5 times. In 1955, tuition and fees were $1,050, and hospitalization insurance was $19.20 for the year. In 1995, tuition was $24,550, a 23- fold increase, but it included the student health insurance cost.
Initially, there were five basic science departments. Anatomy was headed by Ernst Scharrer, working closely with Berta Scharrer; Salome Waelsch, Ph.D. (Freiberg, 1931) was the lone Associate Professor and Friedrich Wasserman, M.D. (Munich, 1910) the Visiting Professor. Dr. Abraham White chaired Biochemistry. he was assisted by Sam Seifter, Ph.D. (Western Reserve, 1944), Visiting Associate Professor from Long Island Jewish Hospital, and Dr. Henry Hoberman. The chair in Microbiology and Immunology was unfilled until Edward J. Hehre, M.D. (Cornell, 1937) was recruited the following year. Alfred A. Angrist, M.D. (Long Island, 1926), a close friend and long-time associate of Dr. Kogel's, was Professor and Chairman of Pathology. Only Alfred Gilman, Ph.D. (Yale, 1931) represented Pharmacology. Henry D. Lauson, Ph.D., M.D. (Wisconsin, 1939, 1940) headed Physiology.
There were nine clinical departments. Louis R. Orkin, M.D. (NYU, 1941) was Professor and Chairman of Anesthesiology, with Gertie Marx, M.D. (Berne, 1937) as Assistant Professor, and Maria Henke, M.D. (Innsbruck, 1937) listed as Assistant Instructor and serving as Chief Resident. The Department of Medicine had forty members and was headed by Irving M. London, M.D. (Harvard, 1943) with Saul R. Korey, M.D. (Western Ontario, 1941) directing neurology before it became an independent department. Milford Fulop, M.D. (Columbia, 1949) was an Assistant Instructor and Chief Resident, and Victor Herbert, M.D. (Columbia, 1952) and Ernst R. Jaffe, M.D. (Chicago, 1946) were Post Doctoral Fellows. Morris Glass, M.D. (Long Island, 1925) was Professor and Chairman of Obstetrics and Gynecology. Henry L. Barnett, M.D. (Washington, 1938) was Professor and Chairman of Pediatrics with Bela Schick, M.D. (Karl. Franz U., 1900) as Visiting Professor and Julian B. Schorr, M.D. (Columbia, 1951) as Chief Resident and Assistant Instructor. Dr. Kogel, in addition to being Dean, chaired the Department of Preventive and Environmental Medicine which also included Henry B. Makover, M.D. (Johns Hopkins, 1933) as Professor and Dr. Joseph Hirsh as Associate Professor. Psychiatry with nineteen members was chaired by Milton Rosenbaum, M.D. (Cincinnati, 1934). The Department of Radiology had five members with Milton Elkin, M.D. (Harvard, 1941) as chairman. Arthur S. Abramson, M.D. (McGill, 1937) was head of Rehabilitation medicine. Dr. Leo Davidoff was Professor and Chairman of Surgery with Charles Ripstein, M.D. (McGill, 1940) as Executive Officer and Director of Surgery at the BMHC. Seventy-one members were listed. Plastic Surgery, Otolaryngology, Neurosurgery, Ophthalmology, Urology, Orthopedics, Proctology, Thoracic Surgery, and Dental Surgery were components of this department before several of these disciplines were elevated to independent departmental status. Anthony Danza, M.D. (Vermont, 1949) was Assistant Instructor in Surgery, Chief Resident, and Fellow in Thoracic Surgery.
The College's administrative structure was quite simple. There was an Executive Faculty that comprised the chairmen of the departments and one or two senior faculty. Its first meeting was held on the evening of Monday, March 7, 1955, in the Van Etten Hospital conference room because the College's own home was not ready. Dr. Kogel chaired the meeting with Dr. Hirsh as recorder. Topics considered were the status of the science building's construction, the organization of teaching and service aspects of Clinical Pathology, a report from a committee on faculty appointment titles, and a request to the University's President for favorable action on a faculty retirement plan.
On Sunday, October 23, 1955, the College of Medicine was dedicated in a ceremony presided over by Dr. Belkin and conducted on the lawn in front of the science building. A member of the first class presented Dr. Hans Albert Einstein, a son of Professor Einstein and a world-famous physicist in his own right, with a scroll that read, in part, "To carry on in the spirit of warm humanity and scientific integrity exemplified by Albert Einstein, justifying his hopes for the College as an invaluable instrument for advancing medical science and national welfare."
On March 10, 1959, exactly three months before the first class of fifty graduates
received their Doctor of Medicine degrees on June 10th, the Liaison Committee on
Medical Education of the American Medical Association and the Association of American
Medical Colleges gave full accreditation to the College's curriculum! The graduation
ceremony was held outdoors under a tent set up just west and behind the Forchheimer
Building and was presided over by Dr. Belkin with Dr. Kogel handing out the diplomas.
It was a festive and historic occasion. On June 1, 1994, at the thirty-seventh commencement
(there were two in 1974) the total number of M.D. granted reached 5,123. Equal to
all of her classmates, but alphabetically more correct, Laura Anne Girandola became
number 5,000.
Citations and Interviews
Interviews by Abe Allen, on Tapes
Zeitz, Abraham November 11, 1975
Zimmerman, Harry 1978
Interviews by ERJ, on tapes and with notes:
Barnett, Henry L. November 10, 1994
Davidoff, Ida F. October 12, 1994
Elkin, Milton May 6, 1994
Hartstein, Sam May 12, 1994
Hirsh, Joseph September 12, 1994
Hoberman, Henry September 26, 1994
London, Irving M. November 2, 1994
Miller, israel February 23, 1995
Newman, Harry September 8, 1994
Orkin, Louis R. October 20, 1994
Rosenberg, Murray A. June 20, 1994
Sandson, John I. November 3, 1994
Scharrer, Berta V. September 29, 1994
Seifter, Sam October 4, 1994
References:
AAMC Reporter Vol. 5, No. 6, p. 5, February, 1996.
Aronson, P. (1974) Bronx Municipal Hospital Center, A History through 1970. On the occasion of the 35th anniversary of the Bronx Municipal Hospital Center, May, 1990.
Belkin, S. (1973) Address at College of Medicine to mark 20th anniversary of its naming.
Bordley, J., and Harvey, A.MC. (1976) Two Centuries of American Medicine, 1776-1976. W.B.Saunders Company, Philadelphia pp. 783-796.
Danza, A. (1994) Letter to ERJ September 20, 1994.
Di Brino, N. (1977) The History of the Morris Park Racecourse and the Morris Family. In the History of the Morris Park Racecourse of Westchester County, Now Bronx County, State of New York. Di Brino, New York.
Elkin, M. (1994) Interview, May 6, 1994.
Failure by the Numbers. Op Ed Page. The New York Times. Saturday. September 24,
1994.
The First 20 Years/1955-1975, A Pictorial History: The Albert Einstein College of
Medicine of Yeshiva University. Office of Public Information, Abraham Allen, Director.
Hartstein, S., Notes April 6, 1995, and Interview May 12, 1994.
Jaffe, E.R. (1980) The early days: A personal remembrance. AECOM News 11:2-3.
Jaffe, E.R. (1990) Marcus David Kogel, M.D. JAMA 264:445.
Recalling Marcus Kogel, Einstein, Winter, 1990.
Jaffe, E.R. (1994) Davidoff, Leo Max. Dictionary of American Biography, Supplement Nine, 1971-1975. Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, pp. 220-221.
Jolly, P., and Hudley, D.M. (eds) (1996) AAMC Data Book. Statistical Information Related to Medical Education. Association of American Medical Colleges, Washington, D.C. Table B1.
Knauer, K. (ed.) TIME 70th Anniversary Celebration. (1993) Time Inc., New York 1941-1955.
Kogel, M.D. (1957) The Albert Einstein College of Medicine. J. Med. Education 32:675-681.
Kogel, M.D. (1971) Address to annual meeting of the Bronx Municipal Hospital Medical Board, December 15, 1971.
Kolatch, M. (1960) The Yeshiva and the medical school. Commentary 29:387-398.
Mackin, T. (1989) The day Einstein went public. The New York Times, New Jersey Opinion, March 12, 1969. p. 24.
Mueller, S. We're 25! (1979) BMHC News 1:1.
Newman, H. Interview, September 8, 1994.
The New York Times, October 14, 15, 16, 1953.
The Four Dimensions, The Philosophy of an Educator/An Appreciation of Dr. Samuel Belkin on his 25th anniversary as President of Yeshiva University, 1968. pp. 20, and 40.
Purpura, D.P. (1994) Survival is not enough. Epilogue. Einstein, Fall, 1994.
Rosenberg, M.A. Letter to Editor, AECOM News, June 1, 1981, and Letter to ERJ August 11, 1994.
Rumberg, J. (1994) Letter to ERJ March 3, 1994.
Scharrer, B. (1994) Taped interview, notes with E.R.Jaffe.
Schofield, J.R. (1984) New and Expanded Medical Schools, Mid-Century to the 1980's. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco. pp.5 and 10.
Straus, R.W., Regent, University of the State of New York, Sunday, June 17, 1951.
Ten Brave Years. Albert Einstein College of Medicine, 1955-1965. pp. 8-9, pp. 14, 15, 32, 34.
Ultan, L. and Hermalyn, G. (1985) The Bronx in the Innocent Years, 1890-1925. Harper & Row, New York pp. xi-xxviii.
Zeitz, A. (1979). Taped interview with Abraham Allen.
Zimmerman, H.M. (1976) The naming of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Surg. Neurol. 6:92.
Zimmerman, H.M. (1978) Taped interview with Abraham Allen.
