served for a time as tutor in his alma mater. In 1785 he published A New Introduction to the Latin Language, and later an Interleaved Virgil. He also served as chaplain in the War of 1812. He built up the academy which he founded to a position of high standing, according to J. A. Spalding. By 1809, clinical and medical lectures were added. The courses in chemistry were given by Dr. Joseph Noyes (1776–1853), a graduate of Dartmouth. A course in anatomy was also given by a Dr. Jacob to between thirty and forty students. The medical school thus had its inception. Dr. Jacob was a practitioner at Canandaigua, New York. It was proposed to enhance the prestige of the school by establishing a regular chair of anatomy. In October, 1810, Dr. Lyman Spalding, afterward noted as the originator of the United States Pharmacopeia, was invited to this professorship.
Dr. Spalding had already been associated with the well known Dr. Nathan Smith in founding the Dartmouth Medical School in 1797. Here he had lectured on chemistry and materia medica from 1797 to 1799. He subsequently practiced at Walpole and at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, continuing his lectures part of each year at Dartmouth. He spent some time in Philadelphia studying anatomy with Dr. Caspar Wistar. Through his early use of vaccination in 1800, and other ways, he had become well known, although practicing in a relatively small community. He accepted the professorship, and later became president of the school also.[1]
A small laboratory had been added to the rear of the Fairfield Academy building to accommodate the early students of medicine. With the better organization of the medical department, students came in such numbers that larger quarters soon became necessary. A three story stone building, 62 feet by 33 feet, was erected in 1810, and was called the "Laboratory Building" (figure 2). It was, without doubt, in this building that Whitman, H. H. Spalding, Gray and McKay pursued their studies during their respective periods of attendance at Fairfield.
Dr. Josiah Noyes (1776–1853), as already stated, was instructor in chemistry at Fairfield in 1809, at the time plans were
- ↑ J. A. Spalding, already cited.
