and

Surgical Reporter

VOL. XVII

January, 1908

No. 1

ERIE ST. MEDICAL COLLEGE SIXTY YEARS AGO.*

DAVID H. BECKWITH, M. D., CLEVELANE, OHIO.

Gentlemen and Members of the Cleveland Medical Library Association:

I had the pleasure of being a dinner guest at the house of your President on December sixth. At the table were six childrenhealthy, robust, red-cheeked, and with good manners, ready for the late products of the Painesville farm. This sight told me that your President had not lived in vain. Later he invited me into his beautiful library, a cozy room containing a large selection of books. Ensconced in an easy chair, an elegant Havana cigar was offered me. Having resolved when a student of medicine, never to use tobacco, this courtesy was declined.

The conversation soon turned to medical topics and particularly to the medical library in which we both are so deeply interested. With a wise look, he said, "I invited you here not only to dine with me but also to discuss the best methods of conducting the library and how we might reduce expenses. He well knew that I am opposed to expenditures which involve any indebtedness being left at the close of the year. I suggested that we might increase the dues for membership, increase the number of members, admit to membership business men outside the profession, take fewer journals, but above all, conduct the business of the association in the most economical manner. A wise look and a gentle puff of smoke ascended heavenward. "Do you think it wise," he said, "to pay sixty dollars, as we did last year, for a man to give us an annual address?" I told him that we had more than a score of men in the city who could fill the place. He said, "I have a man in mind and THOU ART THE MAN!"

* Being an address delivered by Dr. Beckwith before the Cleveland Medical Library Association, Dec., '08. A resolution was passed by the Association that the address be published in both the Cleveland Medical Journals, that reprints be made and sent to all library members, and that the address be placed in the archives of the Library.