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American Medical College of St. Louis
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American Medical College publications and photographs, 1875-1912.

American Medical College was organized in 1873.  Its backers were promoters of “eclecticism,” which was an approach to therapeutics that emphasized herbal remedies.  The first class graduated in 1874, when instruction was offered at 7th and Olive Streets.  The college admitted two classes each subsequent year up to 1883, thereafter a single class annually but with a longer term of instruction.  From 1878 until 1890 the institution was located at 310 North 11th Street in St. Louis, and then moved to 407 S. Jefferson Avenue.  Some time around 1900 the faculty staffed what was billed as “the only eclectic hospital in the west,” Metropolitan Hospital, but this facility evidently did not remain open long.  Flexner graded American along with several other Missouri medical schools as “utterly wretched” following his visit in 1909.  In 1910 the college abandoned eclecticism and formally embraced “regular” medicine.  The college purchased a new building and also opened a second hospital and a dispensary on Pine Street at Theresa Avenue.  Again the clinical facilities were short-lived.  In 1911 American merged with nearby Barnes University.  The combined institution was renamed National University in 1912.

American Medical College of St. Louis