212 HUMAN DISSECTION. ITS DRAMA AND STRUGGLE 



package arriving at the depot, it having been shipped by train, 

 via express. Arriving late, he was reprimanded by the station 

 manager. The parcel, in a coffin, was put on the cart and he 

 started toward the University of Vermont. He was met by the 

 local mailman and interrogated; although he feared that the police 

 might be informed, the parcel was delivered safely to the in- 

 stitution. Bowker wondered how the physician, who served as a 

 teacher in a girl's Sunday School class, in a Methodist Church, 

 could get mixed up in such a business. 



The same author tells of another incident where he was 

 told to get a barrel of onions arriving by train. It was taken to the 

 school, where he with the help of other students, knocked in the 

 top of the container. When this was done and the subject re- 

 vealed, it was obvious that it had died of smallpox. As a pre- 

 caution, all of the students were vaccinated the next day. 



A few years later, 1882, the bodies were described as being 

 in very poor condition at the University of Vermont Medical 

 School, making it difficult to perform presentable dissections. It 

 has been reported that by 1894, each student was required to 

 purchase his own cadaver (Chapin, '51). 



Even after the turn of the century, secrecy prevailed in the 

 handling of subjects. In 1903, the old medical college caught fire. 

 The day before this catastrophy, dissection had been started in 

 the rear room of the upper floor. The students rushed in and 

 carried the cadavers down the stairs and outside. There they were 

 placed in mattings, carpets or anything serving as a covering and 

 transferred to a barn nearby. Extreme care was taken to prevent 

 observation by the crowd watching the conflagration in front 

 who probably would have been more interested in what was 

 going on behind the building. 



To give an idea of the value placed on laboratory assistance, 

 it can be mentioned that a student, at Vermont was paid 50 cents 

 each for taking care of cadavers, that is, injecting them and put- 

 ting them into tanks for preservation. When needed for anato- 

 mizing, they were hoisted up by means of a block and tackle 

 through a shaft connecting the tank room with the dissection 

 chamber. 



