526  Cultivation  of  Medicinal  Plants.  {XvimberfmT' 
THE  CULTIVATION  OF  MEDICINAL  PLANTS  AT  THE 
COLLEGE  OF  PHARMACY  OF  THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  MINNESOTA.^ 
By  Edwin  L.  Newcomb,  in  Charge  Department  of  Pharmacognosy. 
The  Medicinal  Plant  Garden  of  the  College  of  Pharmacy  of 
the  University  of  Minnesota  was  designed  primarily  to  facilitate 
and  make  more  comprehensive  the  instruction  in  Pharmaceutical 
Botany  and  Pharmacognosy.  It  furnishes  one  of  the  essential 
means  of  giving  instruction  pertaining  to  the  vegetable  drugs  or 
their  preparations.  The  proper  development  of  such  a  garden  gives 
the  student  an  excellent  idea  of  the  origin  of  vegetable  drugs  and 
not  infrequently  is  the  cause  of  the  production  of  botanical  enthusi- 
asts, which  all  pharmacists  should  in  reality  be.  The  teaching  of 
pharmaceutical  botany  and  pharmacognosy  without  a  medicinal 
plant  garden  is  not  comparable  in  efficiency  with  that  supported  by 
an  adequate  drug  garden.  With  such  an  accessory  the  students 
are  soon  impressed  with  the  distinguishing  characters  of  such 
families  of  plants  as  the  Compositge,  Solanacese,  Umbelliferge,  etc., 
and  they  are  quickly  able  to  identify  such  plants  as  Digitalis  pur- 
purea, Verbascum  thapsus.  Inula  helenium,  Hyoscyamus  niger, 
Atropa  Belladonna,  etc. 
While  it  is  true  that  the  growing  plant  which  ultimately  yields 
the  drug  usually  presents  an  entirely  different  appearance  from 
the  drug  itself,  this  need  not  mitigate  against  or  complicate  the 
instruction.  It  rather  facilitates  it,  for  a  thorough  knowledge  of 
the  characters  of  the  plant  will  insure  a  quick  eye  to  identify  the 
cured  product  or  to  detect  inferiority  in  it,  and  the  familiarity  with 
the  plants  soon  removes  most  trouble  with  nomenclature. 
With  the  decided  advantages  which  such  facilities  afford  in 
giving  instruction  in  pharmacy  courses,  it  seems  strange  that  so 
few  colleges  in  this  country  have  up  to  this  time  established  in- 
dependent medicinal  plant  gardens.  A  number  of  institutions  are 
so  situated  that  they  have  access  to  botanic  gardens  where  many 
medicinal  plants  may  be  found  growing.  This  association,  good  as 
it  may  be,  does  not  meet  the  urgent  need  of  a  medicinal  plant  garden 
^  Read  at  the  fifty-ninth  annual  meeting  of  the  American  Pharmaceutical 
Association,  Boston,  August  17,  191 1. 
