AOS 2026

I recently returned from the Annual American Osler Society meeting in Toronto where I presented a paper on Sir William Osler's support of the writing of the Medical Annals of Maryland, 1799-1899. 

I thought I'd share the paper with you, along with my slides.

Eugene Fauntleroy Cordell, MD:
Dr. William Osler’s Other, Other, Other Librarian

There are two librarians, well-known to Oslerians, who played important roles in Dr. Osler’s life. He hired Marcia Crocker Noyes to be librarian at the Medical & Chirurgical Faculty (the Faculty) in Baltimore in 1896. Much later, he hired his second cousin, William Willoughby Francis, who curated his medical library and wrote the Bibliotheca Osleriana. Dr. Osler played a significant role in both of their lives, and Dr. Francis and Miss Noyes remained life-long friends.

Miss Noyes was one of the founders of the Medical Library Association, she edited their Bulletin and subsequent publications, and worked at the Faculty until her death in 1946. Dr. Francis was born in Montreal in 1878, and earned his medical degree from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore in 1902. After interning at Montreal's Royal Victoria Hospital and spending some time in Europe to pursue postgraduate studies, Dr. Francis returned to Montreal where he opened a practice in 1906.

However, there was a less well-known third librarian, Dr. Eugene Fauntleroy Cordell, who was, among other roles and most importantly, the author of The Medical Annals of Maryland, 1799-1899, published in 1903.

Dr. Cordell was born 1843, in Charlestown, which was then in the state of Virginia, He was the son of Dr. L.C. Cordell. He received his M.D. in 1865 from the University of Maryland.

He was a clinical reporter at the University Hospital, then Attending Physician at the Baltimore General Dispensary. Dr. Cordell was one of the founders and a Professor of Materia Medica and Therapeutics at the Baltimore Women’s Medical College, beginning in 1882. His interest in medical education helped extend the course of study from two to three years and led to the standardization of medical schools and the organization of the Association of American Medical Colleges in 1876.

Dr. Cordell twice became Librarian of the Medical and Chirurgical Faculty, and also served the standard one-year term as President. Along with Dr. Thomas A. Ashby, Dr. Cordell was the co-editor of the Maryland Medical Journal and frequently submitted articles on a wide range of topics.

When Dr. Cordell arrived as the librarian of the Faculty in 1870, he found a collection of old books and pamphlets in great disorder and of little value. The Faculty had gone dormant during the Civil War, Maryland being a border state, and no work had been done there for nearly a decade. Dr. Cordell began to reorganize the library and increase its usefulness to the Faculty’s membership.

After a significant move into a larger building in 1895, Miss Noyes found that in the intervening decade since Dr. Cordell had moved on, the library had returned to its former state of disorganization.

Even though he was no longer the librarian, Dr. Cordell understood there was that a significant amount of the Faculty’s history tucked away in the library and the archives. Old membership applications, and membership rolls from the early decades, letters to and from the secretary of the Faculty, and so much more.

The idea of a centennial volume first arose during Dr. Osler’s Presidential speech at the April 1897 annual meeting. A large and influential committee was assembled and preliminary work began.

At the Annual Meeting in April of 1898, the centennial committee suggested that the “Medical Annals of Baltimore,” which was edited by the late Dr. John R. Quinan in 1884, be revised by Dr. Eugene Cordell, who had been appointed by the Faculty’s Executive Committee to bring the work up to date and issue it as a centennial volume of the Faculty in 1899. Dr. Quinan’s work contained a large amount of material which was a great help to Dr. Cordell and to the committee.

To manage the Annals, a sub-Committee of the Centennial was appointed, with Dr. Osler as chair and Drs. Thomas Ashby, Harry Friedenwald, Henry Hurd, and George Preston as members. An invitation was sent to membership requesting they subscribe to the Centennial Volume for $2.00. Quickly, more than 200 members responded positively, even before the work was written or published.

Throughout the centennial year of 1899, Dr. Cordell presented snippets from his Annals, which would eventually run to “a portly 889 pages.” The Annals included:

• ·     year-by-year history of the Faculty dating from Maryland’s settlement in the early 1600s;
• ·        biographies, some brief and some quite detailed, of every physician who practiced medicine in Maryland between 1799 and 1899; and
• ·        longer biographical sketches of distinguished members of the Faculty.

The work was beyond extensive. We have more than ten card file boxes, each with hundreds of postcards sent to thousands of physicians, who filled out their details and then returned the cards by mail. Some are handwritten and some typed, with information about each physician. It’s extraordinary to realize that all of this work was done without the help of Google, Newspapers.com or any digital source!

The short biographies included the physician’s name, date and place of birth, year they joined the Faculty, educational and professional accomplishments, various publications, and other relevant biographical details. If the physician was deceased, as the earliest ones were most likely to be, the date and place of the death was included.

The cards needed to be ordered, either alphabetically or chronologically, and then transcribed onto a master list, which was then put into the final manuscript. It is suspected that Miss Noyes and her staff provided a great deal of help with this, and that the work was actually completed at the Faculty’s building on Hamilton Terrace.

Dr. Cordell later said it included, “a vast body of information collected from thousands of sources and extensive correspondence.” It is, as the author intended it to be, "a volume which will be regarded as authoritative in all matters relating to the medical history of the State."

One of Dr. Cordell’s biggest regrets with the Annals was the complete and utter lack of documentation about the Faculty’s first meetings at the State House in Annapolis, Maryland. Dr. Cordell elegantly surmised how the Founders arrived at the first meeting in June of 1799.

“We may fancy the founders preparing to sit in council, grave and reverend, deliberate in act and speech, still clad in the antique style, wig, cue, frilled shirt, high-necked coat with large brass buttons, knee breeches, stockings, shoe buckles, and not least, gold-headed canes. Having alighted from coach and stage, having disembarked from vessels which lay moored in the Severn River, and having dismounted from their horses, we can imagine them assembling for the business before them.”

Dr. Cordell suggested that the Centennial Committee write something to be left in the archives to be opened at the 200th anniversary of the founding.

“To feel that we were in some degree in touch with them, and that through the long vista of years we were thinking of them and their times, would certainly have been proven an inspiring circumstance.”

Unfortunately, as far as I’ve ever seen or understood, there was no such document left by the Centennial Committee, except for the special centennial souvenir program, which includes a “brief sketch of the Faculty’s first 100 years” which runs more than 25 pages.

In Harvey Cushing’s book on Sir William Osler, several letters mention Osler’s frustration with the low number of subscriptions to the Annals. Meanwhile the book continued to grow in scale. The cost of the printing was significantly more than anticipated, and in the end, Osler made up the entire deficit of two or three thousand dollars. While there are no written records of this, and we do not have copies of the accounts from that time, Osler settling the debt is mentioned in Cushing’s book.

In 1903-04, Dr. Cordell assumed the office of President of the Faculty. In a note in 1903, Dr. Osler says that the Committee should host a reception at the Faculty Hall for Dr. Cordell as an appreciation for his centennial volume, “which by now had appeared, a somewhat overgrown and expensive child for the committee of five who had fostered it.” A reception and supper were held at the Faculty’s building.

A contemporary article about the book and the reception in the Baltimore Sun states “The work is handsomely bound. As evidence of the appreciation in which the faculty holds the work of Dr. Cordell, he was presented with a certified check.” It is not stated who the check was from. Possibly Osler?

Around the same time, Dr. Cordell was appointed as the first ever professor of the History of Medicine at the University of Maryland’s School of Medicine and got busy creating an endowment for the medical school.

Dr. Osler was one of the first to make a donation, although most other contributors were faculty or alumni of the University. During his Presidency of the Faculty and his time in Baltimore, Dr. Osler worked to alleviate the animosity between the two largest medical schools in the city.

It was Dr. Osler’s intention that Dr. Cordell would profit from the sales and royalties of the book, and he did what he could to support Dr. Cordell in myriad ways. It was always a source of great regret that the low sales of the book deprived Dr. Cordell of an adequate income for his long-time work on the volume. The book was and continues to be a monument to Dr. Cordell’s dedication to the medical profession and his unselfish devotion to historical work.

As an additional gesture of his gratitude, Dr. Osler commissioned a portrait of Dr. Cordell in 1911. The portrait was painted by Baltimore artist, Waldemar Franklin Dieterich, a second-generation portrait painter. It portrays Dr. Cordell in his academic robes with his hand on the Annals, his magnum opus. The portrait was presented at the Faculty’s annual meeting in April of 1912.

For the University of Maryland’s Centennial, Dr. Cordell researched, wrote, and published a two-volume history of the University’s School of Medicine, which was founded by members of the Medical & Chirurgical Faculty, hence, the Faculty. One volume focuses on the University’s history, influence, equipment and characteristics, and the other is solely biographical sketches of the University’s founders, benefactors, regents, faculty, and alumni.

A second and similar portrait of Dr. Cordell was commissioned by the University of Maryland School of Medicine on the occasion of their centennial in 1907, and was painted by the Baltimore artist, Irving Ward. The book in Cordell’s hand is possibly a copy of the University’s Centennial Volume.

Dr. Cordell continued to research and teach at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. After a brief illness, he died unexpectedly in August of 1913. The following year, the University, the Faculty, and friends put together a memorial fund in his name.

My sources are listed here.

One Plus One Equals...

I am working on my lecture for this years American Osler Society's Annual Meeting to be held in Toronto in early May. As I was searching through the Medical Annals of Maryland, I realized that there is an image of the portrait of Tristram Thomas that we acquired from the University of Maryland's Medical Alumni Association a few years ago. You can read about it here. 

I decided to play around with Photoshop and combine the two images. The 1909 image from the Annals is much more detailed than the actual painting, which desperately needs to be cleaned!

Here's the 1909 image:

Here is the original painting, which is lacking a lot of the detail in the above photograph.

and here is the combination of the two.

I still need to refine it a little by making it a mosaic, but you can get a better idea of what the portrait will look like when it is finally cleaned!

Five Minute History: Christ's Institution Hospital

Our good friend, Johns Hopkins (the person, not the institution), who is the Executive Director of Baltimore Heritage, recently presented one of his amazing "Five Minute History" segments on the Christ's Institution Hospital. This was a combination medical school, nursing school, clinic and church for Baltimore's Black population in the early 1900s.

You can see the full five-minute video here. 

Thanks, Johns!

Save the Date: First Annual President's Brunch

At the suggestion of MedChi President, Eric Wargotz, MD, we are initiating the First Annual President's Brunch to Benefit the MedChi Museum of Maryland Medical History. 

We hope that you can join us!

The Graveyard of Dr. William Beanes

Saturday was the first warm and sunny day in months, and so I decided to take a spin down to Southern-ish Maryland and visit the graves of Dr. William Beanes, and his wife. 

As I followed the GPS directions and entered the town of Upper Marlboro, I had to hunt a bit for the grave-site. It was up a hill with no path or steps, adjacent to the abandoned Upper Marlboro High School. 

I made my way around to the back of the school where there was a path to the grave-site. It is now a small lot, on the site of the home he had shared with his wife. The house was known as Academy Hill, said to be one of the finest houses in the town. It overlooked the aptly named Schoolhouse Pond. Dr. and Mrs. Beanes lived in the house from 1779 to 1828.

Although the original house burned in 1855, it was re-built and opened as Upper Marlboro Academy. In 1836 the president of the Upper Marlboro Academy's Board of Trustees was authorized to purchase the Beanes’ property from a Mr. Roderick McGregor, for $1,360. 

A Mr. Henry M. McGregor contracted to alter and add to the old William Beanes dwelling for use as an Academy. The building was completed and ready for pupils on January 1, 1837. The school building used prior to that date was sold to the Vestry of the Trinity Church. 

A representative of the Academy Board of Trustees reported to the State General Assembly annually,3 and the State provided an annual fund to the Academy, enabling it to provide free education to some indigent students. 

Tuition for most students was $20 per year in 1835, and $10 more for a mathematical education. The Academy admitted both boys and girls and in 1844 had 60 pupils, including some from Washington, D.C. and Baltimore.

There are four brick pillars around the graveyard, topped ironically with cannon balls, with two additional pillars at the entrance, all of which are connected with an ironwork fence. 

The pillars have plaques on them, one dedicated by the Daughters of the War of 1812,

and the other by the Medical & Chirurgical Faculty of Maryland in 1914. 

Additionally, there is the William Beanes Elementary School and the adjacent William Beanes Community Center. 

Dr. William Beanes, The Movie... Sort Of

I am working on a lecture about Dr. William Beanes, the man behind the story of our national anthem, The Star-Spangled Banner. I've written a lot about him before, but in this most recent search, I found something new!

Apparently, in 1936, a short film, "The Song of a Nation," was made about the writing of the National Anthem. 

The Song of a Nation (1936) is a Warner Bros. Technicolor short film dramatizing Francis Scott Key writing "The Star-Spangled Banner" in 1814. The film depicts the American lawyer witnessing the British bombardment of Fort McHenry, leading to the creation of the national anthem, played with a mix of historical drama and, at times, dramatic recitation rather than singing of the lyrics.

Key Details of "The Song of a Nation" (1936)

• Plot: The short film dramatizes the events of September 1814, showing Francis Scott Key (played by Donald Wood) being detained on a British ship and feeling inspired to write the lyrics after witnessing the U.S. flag still flying over Fort McHenry after a massive bombardment.
• Production: It is a 1930s Technicolor short produced by Warner Brothers, designed to showcase the beauty of 1930s color film.
• Legacy: While the film is a dramatized account, it highlights the real-life inspiration of the song, which was officially adopted as the U.S. national anthem in 1931.

Real-Life Story vs. The Film

• The Poem: Francis Scott Key actually wrote the poem, initially titled "The Defence [sic] of Fort M'Henry," after seeing the American flag survive the night of September 13–14, 1814.
• The Tune: The lyrics were set to the tune of "To Anacreon in Heaven," a popular 18th-century British song by John Stafford Smith.
• Official Status: While the song gained immediate popularity, it was not officially recognized as the national anthem until 117 years later, when President Herbert Hoover signed the act in 1931.

Here is the movie.

Justice Stephenson Archer

I have written and lectured about Dr. John Archer a number of times. In 1767, he was the first person to receive a medical degree in America, which had not yet become the United States. He taught medicine at his home, Medical Hall in Bel Air, Harford County. He was father to six sons, five of whom became physicians like their father. 

However, one became at attorney/politician. From Wikipedia:

Stevenson Archer (October 11, 1786 – June 26, 1848) was a judge and United States Representative from Maryland, representing the sixth district from 1811 to 1817 and from 1819 to 1821. His son Stevenson Archer and father John Archer were also U.S. Congressmen from Maryland. 

Archer was born at Medical Hall, near Churchville, Harford County, Maryland, on October 11, 1786, to Catherine and John Archer. He attended Nottingham Academy of Maryland, later graduating from Princeton College in 1805. He studied law, was admitted to the bar of Harford County, Maryland, in 1808, and commenced practice the same year. 

From 1809 to 1810, Archer served as a member of the Maryland House of Delegates and was later elected as a Democrat-Republican to the Twelfth United States Congress to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of John Montgomery. He was reelected to the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Congresses and served from October 26, 1811, until March 3, 1817. 

Having reached the Constitutional age of service in the House (25 years of age) less than one month prior to taking his seat, Archer was the youngest member of the Twelfth Congress, which was defined at least in part by the injection of youth into the government. Archer was one of the firmest supporters of the War Hawk agenda in Congress, consistently voting for military preparation and the War of 1812.

In Congress, Archer served as chairman of the Committee on Claims (Thirteenth Congress), and as a member of the Committee on Expenditures in the Department of the Navy (Fourteenth Congress). During the War of 1812, he was paymaster to the Fortieth Maryland Militia, and was appointed on March 5, 1817, by President James Madison as United States judge for the Territory of Mississippi, with powers of Governor, holding court at St. Stephens.

Archer resigned within a year and returned to Maryland to continue his law practice. He was elected to the Sixteenth Congress, serving from March 4, 1819, until March 3, 1821, and, in Congress, served as chairman of the Committee on Expenditures in the Department of the Navy. In 1823, Archer was appointed chief judge of the judicial circuit court of Baltimore and Harford Counties and Baltimore City. In 1844, Archer was appointed by Governor Thomas Pratt as chief justice of the Maryland Court of Appeals and served until his death in June of 1848.

All of this is in light of an auction purchase over the weekend. I was at a country auction in rural Pennsylvania and spotted an old silhouette in a frame. As I moved in to look at it, I was shocked to see it was Stevenson Archer, who was the Chief Justice of the Maryland Court of Appeals.

He was a judge in both Baltimore City, where a portrait of him hangs in the Baltimore City Law Library, and in Harford County. 

The picture is simply framed in what looks like a very early frame with wavy glass.

There were two notes attached to the glass, one saying who Justice Archer was and the other indicating some relationship with the Liriodendron Foundation. Liriodendron was Dr. Howard Kelly's summer home outside of Bel Air, Harford County. 

Like Marcia, I love finding things for the office at old country auctions!