A SCHOOL OF MEDICINE TOO?
Loma Linda Sanitarium was scarcely operational when Mrs. Ellen G. White dispatched another letter to Southern California. Now, for the first time, she mentioned her desire that Loma Linda should not only train nurses but physicians as well. "Brother and Sister Burden, . . .In regard to the school, I would say, Make it all you possibly can in the education of nurses and physicians.”
Six months later, she repeated her instructions. Loma Linda was to be "not only a sanitarium, but also an educational center. . . . With the possession of this place comes the weighty responsibility of making the work of the institution educational in character.”
Identifying itself as a Prospectus, the institution’s first bulletin declared the College’s affiliation with the Loma Linda Sanitarium. Then it described the kind of students Loma Linda wished to attract: “Those who voluntarily and conscientiously commit themselves to the principles of trustworthiness and faithfulness when no human eye is upon them, and who are willing to act in harmony with a common standard of right and expedience adopted by the school, even when it involves individual inconvenience. The effort will be, not to rule students, but to encourage and teach self-government…. Frivolous, sentimental, or undisciplined young people would not feel at home here, and would divert the energies of the school from its appointed work.”
The publication listed jewelry, showy ornaments, corsets, useless or hurtful reading, and bad habits under the heading, “What to Leave at Home,” The bulletin advised new students to send all “express matter” by Wells-Fargo, via Redlands Junction (now Bryn Mawr), California.
At 10 a.m., September 20, 1906, a portion of the faculty met for morning devotions and declared school in session. They made no lesson assignments because there were no students. By October 4, however, the remainder of the faculty and approximately 35 students had arrived and instruction began.
Confused by the situation before him, Burden wrote Mrs. White (October 23) and asked for her counsel regarding the future curriculum of the college. Should the institution seek legal recognition as a school of medicine? Or should it seek legal recognition for a class of healer, such as the homeopath, the chiropractor, or the osteopath? Or some eclectic blend of what seemed the best in various healing methodologies? Or should it simply provide instruction for "medical evangelists," even though graduates would have no legal recognition and could not legally practice medicine?
Mrs. White delayed answering. She personally desired that Loma Linda should train physicians. At the time, however, “The Battle Creek Syndrome” still haunted the Church. Perhaps the faith of the believers needed to be strengthened even more. As they observed God's providential guidance in the months ahead, they would sacrifice unitedly to establish a well-equipped, properly staffed school of medicine. A year later, when Burden again asked whether the school was "simply to qualify nurses" or whether it should "embrace also the qualification for physicians."
She replied, "Physicians are to receive their education here."
In 1907, a nationwide depression further impacted the financial stability of the Loma Linda Sanitarium. Because the institution could not pay even modest wages and salaries it compensated the personnel (called "helpers") and medical staff with aluminum tokens. Only the store, the dairy, and the employees' dining room accepted these tokens.
During this time, teams of volunteer physicians, nurses, and students conducted "schools of health" in private homes. There they taught basic rules of healthful living, hygiene, and nutrition to groups of up to 20 people. With the blessings of local public school authorities, these teams delivered health lectures in San Bernardino elementary schools and high schools. They also distributed a special health-and-temperance issue of the denomination’s magazine, The Youth’s Instructor.
In February 1908, seventeen months after the College opened, a local committee met in Loma Linda to study relationships among the denomination’s educational institutions in Southern California. Obviously, some young people should be educated as fully accredited physicians. The committee, however, estimated that laboratories and other needed facilities for a medical school would cost $40,000 to $50,000¾more than the original cost of the Sanitarium. When asked whether the needed facilities should be provided, Mrs. White cautioned against premature action: “The plans you suggest seem to be essential, but you need to assure yourselves that they can be safely carried. . . .”
Mrs. White cautioned that establishing a large medical school would depend on the church members' united effort. A month later she wrote: “We should not at this time seek to compete with worldly medical schools [because] our chances of success would be small. We are not now prepared to carry out successfully the work of establishing large medical institutions of learning.”
By 1909, the College offered a three-year course. The faculty could only encourage those who wanted to become physicians to hope that their education would be accepted as equivalent to the first two years at public schools of medicine or that it would count toward graduation at Loma Linda, should it eventually become an accredited school of medicine.
In September of that year, John Burden interviewed Mrs. White and brought up questions that concerned faculty and students. She replied that it would not be a violation of principle to obtain a charter. Five weeks later, she enlarged the concept in a letter to John Burden. “Wise laws have been framed in order to safeguard our people against the imposition of unqualified physicians. These laws we should respect, for we are ourselves by them protected from presumptuous pretenders.”
To be continued…