Missouri Medical College

Corporate body

Missouri Medical College

1840-1899

The Missouri Medical College originated as the Medical Department of Kemper College, an Episcopal institution founded in St. Louis in 1830. In 1840, Joseph Nash McDowell, M.D., organized a group of four other St. Louis physicians as a teaching faculty and thus established Kemper College's Medical Department. The lectures delivered by these physicians were the first medical courses taught west of the Mississippi River. The Medical Department was initially housed in a building at the corner of Ninth and Cerre Streets in St. Louis and was often referred to as McDowell's Medical College in tribute to its founder.

Kemper College closed in 1845 due to financial constraints and the Medical Department consequently transferred to the University of Missouri. At this time, the department constructed a new building in St. Louis, shaped like an octagonal fortress. The Medical Department remained affiliated with the University of Missouri for the next ten years, until it received an independent charter and officially became the Missouri Medical College.

The Missouri Medical College matriculated its first graduates in 1841 and continued to graduate students each year, except for the duration of the Civil War. Between 1862 and 1865, the institution's building in downtown St. Louis was converted into a military prison, named the Gratiot Street Prison. When the war ended, the building was returned to the college and medical courses resumed. The Missouri Medical College continued in operation until 1899, when it was absorbed into the Washington University School of Medicine.

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