In 1919 Nelson was appointed Assistant Professor of Pharmacology. He became Professor of Pharmacology in 1936. During a part of his career in Ann Arbor he acted as a consultant to the Food and Drug Administration at Washington. Nelson resigned from the University in 1937 to become professor of pharmacology at Tulane University Medical School.
Ralph Grafton Smith (Toronto '21, M.D. ibid. '25, Ph.D. Chicago '28) was appointed Instructor in Pharmacology in 1928 and advanced to a full professorship in 1937. Jacob Sacks (Chicago '22, Ph.D. Illinois '26, M.D. Northwestern '31) was appointed Instructor in Pharmacology in the department in 1932 and became Assistant Professor in 1937. John Howard Ferguson (Capetown '21, A.M. Oxford '31, M.D. Harvard '28) was appointed Assistant Professor in 1937.
In addition, the following taught in the department for short periods: Dr. Allan L. Richardson ('08, '10m), Demonstrator of Anesthesia, 1912; John G. Gage ('08m), 1916-17; Alvah R. McLaughlin ('09 Lafayette, M.A. Princeton '14), 1923-25; Albert G. Young (Ph.D. Wisconsin '24, M.D. Harvard '28), 1925-28; Helen Bourquin (Colorado '15, Ph.D. Chicago '21), 1928-31; and Dr. A. R. McIntyre, 1931-32. Also, as assistants and fellows many advanced medical students have been employed in the laboratory.
In 1912 the Department of Anesthesia in the University Hospital was placed, for convenience of administration, under the Department of Materia Medica and Therapeutics. Dr. Richardson was Demonstrator of Anesthesia for the first year. After his resignation, Mrs. Laura Davis-Dunstone (R.N. '08) was placed in charge and held the position first as Demonstrator and later as Instructor. About 1930 the Department of Anesthesia was transferred to the Department of Surgery.
In 1910 the course Practical Therapeutics was instituted for the senior students. Dr. Mark Marshall (Earlham '02, Michigan '05, '08m) was appointed Instructor in Therapeutics and retained the position from 1910 to 1920. During the years, the teaching hours have been changed somewhat to make them conform to the changing requirements of the medical curriculum. The lecture course was cut from five hours a week to four, and then, in order to lighten the students' load, to three hours a week for a year. This was made possible by the placing of a greater emphasis upon the laboratory course. The position of the lecture course within the medical curriculum was also changed, in that it was moved from the two semesters of the junior year to the second semester of the sophomore year and the first semester of the junior year. In 1940 the time allotted to pharmacology was ninety-six hours of lecture and ninety-six hours of laboratory work.
Research. — In addition to studies which have been made for the trustees of the United States Pharmacopoeia, "A Study of Strophanthins" and "The Potency of the U.S.P. Standard Digitalis Powder," two problems have been attacked in a comprehensive manner. The first of these is the study of drug addiction. In 1929 the National Research Council was given a sum of money to study the opium problem. The drug-addiction committee of the council decided to make a study of morphine and allied natural and synthetic alkaloids, patterning the work somewhat after the study which has led to the introduction of novocaine (procaine) as a nonhabit-forming substitute for cocaine. In accordance with this plan, a chemical laboratory for the synthesis of the compounds was organized at the University of Virginia, and
