drugs ni various kinds and origins, their collection 

 and mode of administration for tin- treatment of dis- 

 eases, and the medicinal utilization oi animal prod- 

 ucts) held an increasingly important plao among 

 the medical sciences. In the I nited States, asinother 

 civilized countries, this topic was greatly emphasized 

 in the curriculum of almosl every school teaching the 

 health professions, foday, the subject matter con- 

 tained in tliis branch oi science is taught under the 

 heading of several specialized fields, such as pharma- 

 cology, pharmacognosy, and drug analysis of various 

 t\ pes. I Eowever, when the decision was made in 1NK1 

 to promote greater knowledge and interest in the 

 healing arts by creating .1 section devoted to such pur- 

 suit-, in the U.S. National Museum, the title ol Section 

 ..1 Materia Medica was adopted. Added to this, was 

 the fact that the hulk of the first collections received 

 in the Section was .1 great variety of crude 1 

 which constituted much of the material then taught 

 in the academi< courses of materia medica. 



The new Section was included ill the Department 

 ol \'ts .Hid Industries, then under the curatorship of 

 Assistant Director G. Brown Goode. From its begin- 

 ning and for two decades, however, the Section of 

 Materia Medica was sponsored and supervised l>> the 

 l ,S Navy in cooperation with the Smithsonian Insti- 

 tution. For this reason, the Navy decided nol to 

 establish a similar bureau for a health museum as did 

 the Army in starting the Medical Museum (of the 

 Armed Forces Institute ol Pathology I in 1862 through 

 the efforts of Or. William Alexander I lammond. The 

 Smithsonian did. however, provide a clerk to relieve 

 tin- curator of much of the routine work. The Sec- 

 tion's early vigorous activities were the result of the 

 ingenuity of the first honorary curator. Dr. Janus 

 Milton Mint (1838 1919), an Assist. mi Surgeon of 

 the U.S. Navy. From the establishment ol the Sec- 

 tion, in 1881, to 1912, Dr. Flint was curator during 

 separate periods lor a total of nearly 25 years. For 

 three of his tenures (1881 1884; 1887 1891; 1895 



1' I, he was detailed to tin- Smithsonian Institution 



liv the Surgeon (iencral 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 volun- 

 teered to continue his services to the National Mu- 

 seum. The proposal was gladly accepted and he 

 continued as a curator until his retirement from the 

 Smithsonian Institution in 1912. 



The Section commenced with a wealth of material. 



Figure 3. — Rear Admirai James M. Flint, U.S. Navy 

 surgeon and Brsi honorary curatoi oi tl"' Section of 

 Materia Medica. {Photo courtesy qj tht Library of Congress.) 



\li< 1 the close of the 1876 centennial exhibition, 

 its materia medica collection had been stored with the 

 other collections in a warehouse, awaiting an appro- 

 priation by Congress for transfer and installation. 

 This collection was gradually brought into the new 

 National Museum after that building's completion in 

 1881. Manx- other materia medi a spe< imens were trans- 

 ferred from the Department, of Agriculture. In addi- 

 tion to these large collections of crude drugs, generous 

 contributions came from several prominent pharma- 

 ceutical linns such as l'arke. Davis & Company ol 

 Detroit, Michigan; Wallace Brothers ol Statesville, 



North Carolina: and Schiellelin and ( lompany ol New- 

 York City. These manufacturing houses are men- 

 tioned here because they and their agents abroad were 

 the lust to take interest and donate to the Section, com- 

 plete assoiniK ins of contemporary remedial agents 

 then in common use throughout the I nited States and 



PAPER 43: HISTORY Or 1HI DIVISION ol MEDICA! Si tENCES 



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