The organization of the Medical Faculty of 1819, already described, remained unchanged until 1823, when Doctor Daniel Drake was recalled to the chair of Materia Medica and Medical Botany, Doctor Caldwell retaining that of the Institutes of Medicine. The chair of Chemistry was also strengthened by the appointment of Doctor Robert Best[33] as adjunct professor, who resigned, however, at the end of two years. Doctor Drake was transferred in 1825 to the chair of Theory and Practice on the resignation of Doctor Samuel Brown, and Doctor Charles Wilkins Short was called to that vacated by Doctor Drake. Doctor Drake resigned finally in 1826, to be replaced by Doctor John Esten Cooke. We will not in this place note all the changes which occurred in the Faculty up to the time of its dissolution, but will append them in the form of a schedule. (See Schedule A.)
Daniel Drake, M. D.
DANIEL DRAKE, M. D.
Born at Plainfield, New Jersey, October 20, 1785, and brought to Mason County, Kentucky, in 1788, was, in 1800, the first medical student in Cincinnati. He began to practice in 1804, when he was only nineteen years old. He spent the winter of 1805–6 as a student in Philadelphia, and the succeeding year in practice at his old home in Mayslick, removing for life to Cincinnati in 1807.
He was made Professor of Materia Medica and Medical Botany in Transylvania University in 1817, but returned to Cincinnati to found the Medical College of Ohio in 1818, from which, however, his connection was suddenly severed, after a bitter controversy, May, 1822. He resumed a professorship at Lexington 1823–27, being Dean of the Faculty, and declined a chair in the University of Virginia in 1830. He accepted one in the Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, 1830–31, and again in the Medical College of Ohio in 1831–32. He founded a new school as a department of Cincinnati College and taught in it 1835–39; was professor in the Louisville Medical Institute 1839–49, and afterward accepted a chair in the Medical College again in 1849–50. In 1827 he was editor of the Western Medical and Physical Journal, etc., but his chief work is his Treatise on the Principal Diseases of the Interior Valley of America, published in 1850—a wonderful tribute to American medical science. His contributions to scientific journals were numerous, and many of his medical lectures and scientific and historical addresses have been published.[34] He died at Cincinnati November 5, 1852, aged sixty-seven years.[35]
Doctor David W. Yandell says: "As a lecturer Doctor Drake had few equals. He was never dull. His was an alert and masculine mind. His words are full of vitality. His manner was earnest and impressive. His eloquence was fervid." Soon after Doctor Yandell had entered the practice of medicine Doctor Drake told him: "I have never seen a great and permanent practice the foundations of which were not laid in the hearts of the poor. Therefore cultivate the poor. If you need another though sordid reason, the poor of to-day are the rich of to-morrow in this country. The poor will be the most grateful of all your patients. Lend a willing ear to all their calls."