Interview with Glen Edward Taul

CAROLYN CRABTREE: This is Carolyn Crabtree. I'm with Dr. Glen Taul at Campbellsville University. We're doing an interview for McDowell House project; the date is October 27th, 2009. Dr. Taul, tell me a little bit about yourself.

GLEN TAUL: I have a Ph.D. in history from the University of Kentucky. Its background is in American History and I have been an archivist for Georgetown College since between 1999 and 2008 and I'm presently archivist here at Campbellsville University.

CRABTREE: Now, how long have you been here?

TAUL: Since August.

C: Oh, really?

T: Yeah.

C: Ok. Now, do you live here in Campbellsville?

T: I rent part time here and part time in Georgetown.

C: Ok. So your position here is Archivist of the library? Is that where you do most of your work here?

T: Yeah.

C: Tell us a little bit about your work, what it involves?

T: Well, right now we're sort of in a transition phase because the present archivist is going into another position and I'm transitioning it to this position and there're a lot of projects going at Campbellsville. There's the normal processing of university-type documents. In fact, one of the things they're doing now is taking materials from the Public Relations office, like news releases from several years back and they're recopying them on acid-free paper and putting them in folders. The other one is we're digitizing photographs in the University archives, putting them on servers in TIF files, which is a 2:00higher resolution type file, and then we're beginning work on the papers of Congressman Ron Lewis, who just recently retired from Congress for the second district of Kentucky.

C: Will they be donated to the College?

T: They're already here.

C: They're donated to the college. I mean the university, I'm sorry.

T: Yeah.

C: When I attended here, it was the first year that it was a four year school.

T: Right.

C: So. That dates me.

T: Yeah. So, I was trying to think of the other projects that are involved in -- 3:00and we're getting some photographs, also donated from the public relations department. Campbellsville's a relatively young school in relation to Georgetown say, especially among Baptist schools in Kentucky and so therefore its history is not as lengthy and as a result a lot of its historic history documents relating to its history have, are sparse right now so we're always in a collecting phase of that.

C: Well, I know this has nothing to do with the McDowell House but I'm curious, so I'm going to ask the question anyway. Why did they decide to make Campbellsville a University instead of Georgetown?

T: It wasn't a collective decision on the part of the Kentucky Baptist Convention. It was Campbellsville's decision.

C: Oh, OK.

T: Each institution has control over that kind of decision, but it also requires 4:00them meeting certain standards by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. If you're going to declare yourself a university then you've got certain criteria to meet to really make that a fact because there is a distinction between a college and a university. I don't think the state or the state agency for secondary education has any real control over whether that, how that's done. But I think the controlling thing is with the accrediting association. If you're going to declare yourself a university then, of course, 5:00that's going to require you to add another level of education. In other words, a graduate level, more extensive, more broad than like Campbellsville College. They had had a graduate program in education but that would be the only graduate program they'd have, if it was just a college.

C: So what other graduate programs do they offer here?

T: They've got theology, social work, history, education, business, I think. I'm not familiar with all of them.

C: Do they offer one in music? I know music has been strong.

T: Yes, I think they do offer one in music.

C: Well, I'm going to start talking to you about McDowell House. I'm curious as to how you got interested in McDowell House.

T: Well, I lived in Danville for twenty years. So I was familiar with Ephraim McDowell from that standpoint and I had, when I was with Leadership Danville one year we took a tour; that was the first time I took a tour of McDowell House. And I knew Carol pretty well through other channels and so that's how I first got connected with that.

C: Now, you recently took a trip to Scotland to actually do research on Dr Ephraim McDowell. Why did you choose to do that?

T: Well, I wanted to do some historical writing and I was looking for subject matter, especially biography. It just occurred to me; I was thinking about subjects like Richard M. Johnson, who was the Vice President of the United States from Georgetown. A recent biography hadn't been done on him, yet. I was thinking -- there was another subject and I was looking, but I was looking for a 7:00subject that would require me not only to do research here in the United States but also overseas. I had friends in Great Britain that I wanted to go back for annual visits but it would've been great to use some of the resources at Oxford University for research. So Ephraim McDowell -- I don't think a good biography has been done on Ephraim McDowell at all, period; especially Schachner's volume. I think he probably did the best he could, but there's not a lot of detail. All of its focused just on that one initial operation that he did on Mrs. Crawford 8:00and I've seen some of the correspondence that he conducted in research for his book, and basically he did it from his own home and I don't think back in the '20s -- I think he even contacted the archivist at the University of Edinburgh at the time, but there just wasn't much depth to it so I wanted to try to do something. It's gonna be a hard biography to do, because it doesn't seem like any of the family saved any of his letters hardly at all. Now there's some, but not very many.

C: So you have found some personal documents?

T: Yeah.

C: Where did you find those?

T: The Filson Club and the Kentucky Historical Society. The University of Kentucky has a McDowell Archive but it's basically of the family related to McDowell; it's not really of him and his father. Well, they've got some 9:00photocopies of his father and some materials of his father Samuel, but not of him personally. But you do find some in the Filson Club and the Kentucky Historical Society.

C: Have you seen anything written on Samuel McDowell?

T: No, no I haven't; not anything lengthy.

C: He has always seemed such a fascinating person to me personally, strong in character and various things. I'm a little surprised something hasn't been done on him as well. Are you related to Dr. McDowell at all?

T: No.

C: It seems like everybody else in the world is.

T: Well, it's about like saying you're related to Daniel Boone.

C: Actually, my husband is, believe it or not.

T: I think I'm very distantly related because one branch of my family did marry into his family.

C: Dr. McDowell's or Daniel Boone's?

T: No, no, Daniel Boone's family. I think one part of my family married one of his brothers, or something like that.

C: Well, my husband's related through a sister, so he goes back to Squire.

T: I think mine's back to George.

C: Tell us about some of the research you did in Scotland while you were there and what you found.

T: Oh, one of the things, you go into the University of Edinburgh archives and basically what you find there is student registers of the classes they took. As I said in the talk, you did not apply to the University for formal admission.

C: Really?

T: No, you basically showed up for a class, and you paid the professor the fees that he charged for attending his class. So there was not an overall admission charge to the University for attending. But they did have a set curriculum if you wanted to get a medical degree from the University of Edinburgh; they did have a set curriculum that you had to complete. And then you had to be examined by written examination and by oral examination to get your degree. And what I was able to-- what I found out about McDowell, I found out the courses that he took; I found out who the professors that he took with. So I also had the dates 12:00that placed him there in Edinburgh. I went to the city archives of Edinburgh and I was lucky there because sometimes records -- they'll just throw away records. Now you have to realize that McDowell went there when England, just as England had entered into a war with France. This is related to the French Revolution. So, in the second year that McDowell was studying at Edinburgh, the British Parliament passed a law that all aliens in Great Britain had to be interviewed 13:00because they were looking for sympathizers and agents from the French government, the revolutionary government in France. I was able to find where McDowell had been interviewed by a constable in 1794, in March of 1794; and that's what I started my talk off with. And that's where I found out at least one of the places he lived in Edinburgh during his stay there, and also about approximately when he came to Edinburgh. He thought, his recollection that he had arrived in Edinburgh in January 1793; that's what he said in the interview. But the student records show that he attended his first class that he attended he showed up in December of 1792. So he had already arrived in Scotland in 1792. 14:00And of course he didn't stay long enough to get his degree.

C: Why do you think he chose Edinburgh, Scotland, for his education?

T: I think it's the prestige. At that time the medical school at the University of Edinburgh was one of the premier medical schools in the world. There were other places in Scotland that had medical schools and there was a medical school in Paris. There was, of course, an American medical school in Philadelphia at the University of Pennsylvania. And most of that faculty was trained at 15:00Edinburgh. Benjamin Rush, who was one of the best known physicians in American during the colonial and post revolutionary times, was trained there and got a degree there and his son went there. It's probably, and I would assume, that McDowell wanted to see some of the world as well.

C: Wasn't his family, in their past history, connected with Scotland?

T: Yes, exactly.

C: Now they came here from Ireland though.

T: I believe that's right. I haven't got that far into my research yet, but that's according to the published sources so far.

C: Well, I have done quite a bit of genealogical research on him but I can't necessarily trust; like you I don't know how much of it is accurate you know. 16:00Were any of the doctors here in the United States influential on persuading Dr. McDowell to go to Scotland for his education?

T: I don't know. Now it's always attributed that Alexander Humphreys, which he was doing an apprenticeship under in Virginia, supposedly influenced him to go to Edinburgh, because he himself had received a degree supposedly from Edinburgh. And I think, I've read the historical marker in, Staunton, Virginia where McDowell did his apprenticeship and it says that Humphreys got his medical degree from the University of Edinburgh. But I discovered that Humphreys was 17:00from Ireland, I believe, originally and if the dates on the markers are right about his birth and so forth, I tried to locate about the approximate time that he might have been in Edinburgh. But the important thing is that the University of Edinburgh does not have him listed as a graduate of a medical school at Edinburgh at all.

C: Could he have done like Dr. McDowell and just gotten his classes there?

T: Well, I thought about that.

C: Couldn't you find him in the student register?

T: Not anywhere. No. No, I didn't. And the people, I going back next year and 18:00I'm gonna double check, but uh yeah, he's not listed as taking any kind of classes.

C: Really?

T: Now there is the possibility that like McDowell he might've gone to Edinburgh and attended lectures of independent instructors. Now if you remember the talk where McDowell supposedly took anatomy and surgery lectures under John Bell, and John Bell as not connected with the University at all. He was an independent -- hello -- he was an independent lecturer in anatomy and surgery and so a lot of students who were not able to get into Monro -- Dr. Monro's class-- what is his 19:00first name? I can't think of it at the moment. It was the second Dr. Monro, because there's a succession of the first, the second, and the third who all taught anatomy at Edinburgh University Medical School. But John Bell was really connected with the Royal College of Surgeons in Edinburgh and it was under their agency that he taught anatomy. They even financed the building of a house in surgeon's square for him to teach anatomy and surgery. And there are no records about who attended those classes that I can find, and therefore you can't say 20:00for certain that Humphreys might have attended some of those classes.

C: Have you found any connection between this Dr. Bell over there and the ones who lived in the Danville area, just out of curiosity?

T: No, I've never heard that.

C: I believe there was a Dr. Bell in Danville in those early days.

T: Is that right?

C: But I'm not sure.

T: Well, I'm coming to find out that the Bell family name is quite common in Scotland at that time. There're several John Bells in Scotland at that time. That presents a conundrum in a way, because you know as in genealogy, if you've got several ancestors with the same name then you've got a headache on your hands.

C: Right. Especially if they're cousins.

T: Exactly.

C: If they were related to each other which a lot of them were.

T: Uh-huh.

C: Did you have any help with your research when you went over there? Did you 21:00have someone who had worked with you or did you just go?

T: Oh, I just went. Before I went I made inquiries at all the potential archives in Edinburgh about what they might have. That's really how I found out about the city archives source because I contacted them. You know, it's one of those things where you don't have any kind of prior knowledge about what might be an archive about somebody. It's basically a speculative inquiry, and the archivists at the city archives, they had just got through indexing these alien books, registers, and most of them had been destroyed from that time. He just had basically one book. Yeah, and he just happened to be into that one.

C: Well, I have found that's true with the research I do. Many times it's speculative; it's -- ok, this middle name sounds like a family name so we'll 22:00start in that direction.

T: Well, it's one of the things I've done in my genealogical research. One of my habits is I like, if I find out where ancestors lived, than I like to go into court cases to see if they've been involved in any court cases. Sometimes that gives you background about their life and I found in one case where they took a deposition and I found out exactly where this particular family where they came into Kentucky when they landed and settled and so forth.

C: Did you happen to do anything like that with Dr. McDowell?

T: I didn't have time to do that. Yeah. See I don't know, this is the other 23:00problem it's reputed that at one point he took a tour of sites in Scotland that were related to his ancestors, and I talked to -- now her name is slipping me, Alberta Moynahan, who says that they think they the estate Cambus-Kenneth is named after a place in Scotland where he visited that was connected with his ancestors but I don't know if that's the case. That's the commons story; it's accepted as fact, but there's no documentation yet that I have found that confirms it. If he did, now I've basically determined it's been all over the place about how long McDowell was in Scotland.

C: Oh, really?

T: Yeah, some people think -- like, if you saw the play, he probably came home 24:00in 1795, that Heather Henson did.

C: Yes, I know.

T: But I think I've come to the conclusion that he was there in Scotland from about either October or November of 1792 and he came home in the summer of, sometime in the summer of 1794.

C: What brought him home before he got his degree?

T: Well, you remember the play where it says that he got a letter, I guess from his mentor Alexander Humphreys, that he was in some kind of difficulty because they found a body in a cave of the skeletons and it was supposedly of an 25:00Englishman, I believe that's the story, and that somehow there was something with the body that connected Dr. Humphreys to it?

C: Now, is that a true story?

T: Well, it's a story; yes, I think it's true. I think he was. This is one of the things I'm going to confirm, but I found that story among Schachner's papers.

C: Oh, really?

T: Yeah, when he was corresponding with different sources about different stories. One thing if the records still survive, if there is such a court case then the records are gonna still be around. But supposedly McDowell came back to help him clear his name. Actually I found a letter in the Filson Club where Samuel McDowell, not really Samuel, -- well, it was Samuel McDowell, but he communicated to Ephraim through Ephraim's brother-in-law Reid, I can't remember 26:00his first name at the moment, who McDowell was living with in Rockbridge County Virginia, when he was over there doing his apprenticeship under Humphreys. He was instructed "You're going to have to come home in the summer of 1794 because your father cannot get all the money together he needs for you to continue. So, you need to make the best use of your time."

C: Now do you believe that is true?

T: Yeah.

C: Because it's in that letter.

T: It's in that letter, so McDowell was gonna have to make plans --course he didn't receive that letter -- it takes about 5 months for a letter to go here or 27:00from Virginia to reach him in Edinburgh. So he didn't receive that letter until about March of 1794.

C: Now, McDowell's mother was a McClung.

T: McDowell's mother?

C: Isn't that right? Samuel McDowell's wife was a McClung?

T: Yes, yeah.

C: And the Paxtons are related, the Reids, the Prestons -- all these prominent families in Virginia. It seems a little odd that Samuel McDowell would not have the money to send his child, to let him stay in Scotland, unless he had most of his funds tied up in land or something like that.

T: I think that's the problem right there, is that he had his money tied up in 28:00land, that he couldn't get the cash ready or available in time for him to continue on.

C: Did Dr. McDowell ever continue his education once he came home?

T: I haven't heard any stories about that. I think he probably got -- back then it wasn't really considered critical to have a degree to set up a medical practice. The medical school was definitely designed, the curriculum was designed to help someone set up a medical practice. So you went to lectures in chemistry, and anatomy and surgery and the practice of medicine and all those 29:00things and University of Edinburgh -- also, you did clinical work at the University of Edinburgh. I mean that was the only medical school in the world that had that kind of comprehensive program at the time.

C: Was there a hospital there?

T: Oh, yeah. There're a lot of hospitals in Edinburgh but the one that was connected with the University of Edinburgh was the Royal Infirmary. McDowell took two lectures related to clinical practice so they did visit patients. They had a ward set aside, two wards set aside, one for men and one for women that they did clinical studies on patients. And usually it wasn't the common, ordinary illnesses that they studied; it was the unusual, the complex ones.

C: Have you found any records that showed he may have had practice in doing the kind of surgery that he did on Jane Todd Crawford?

T: Oh, oh yes.

C: Before he came home?

T: Oh, yes, yes. Well, that's why -- right now I'm assuming that he did take instruction of Dr. John Bell. So we don't know exactly what year he took it; it could've been 1792-93 or it could've been 1793-94. More than likely it was the first year he was there, because he would've had more time. He only took one university course in chemistry in 1792-93. By the time he appeared for class in 31:001792 school really had already started. It started in October -- no wait, it started in November and they met every day of the week and they met for several hours of lectures. So what I mean by that is, if he took several classes he would have needed several hours for lectures because class, depending on the type of classes, it was at least one hour of class. So he took more classes his second year and he took classes in the summer, too, there. What they call the winter session lasted for six months basically from November to June or May. Then the summer session lasted three months.

C: Ok.

T: And then therefore you have a period of time between the end of the summer session until the beginning of winter session you had some free time. That's when I think he, if he took the tour of Scotland, that's when I think in the summer of '93 would have been the summer he took it.

C: I'm curious as to what may have happened to his lecture papers. He surely wrote out many, many pages of notes.

T: If he was like most students of that time, he took extensive notes. Yeah, I'm wondering about that myself. Where would they be; it would be great to have them. One of the things I'm gonna try to do is to look at the records of the Royal Infirmary to see, who was teaching the clinical classes at that time, at 33:00the times he was there and also, if he's listed, and if possible, find any kind of mention of his notes at all. But surely he would have brought them back home with him for reference afterwards. So if he took the anatomy course under John Bell the first year he arrived, then if he took another anatomy and surgery course under Dr. Alexander Monro, secundus, the second year he was there, the second winter session he was there. So that would have been two opportunities, 34:00but of course back then was the problem of getting cadavers or corpses, and that was during the period of grave robbing and selling corpses to these independent surgeons, and later on even to universities. There was a famous case in the 1830's I think, Burke and Hare. They were a pair in Edinburgh that was actually murdering people and then selling their corpses to Dr. Robert Knox at the University of Edinburgh. That was a big scandal.

C: We should be glad we didn't live there back then.

T: Well, they were really murdering the people that the society wouldn't have missed. They would lure them into their inn that they were operating and then 35:00murder them there.

C Well, there were several doctors who were interns with Dr. McDowell. Is it possible that some of those men might have those papers?

T: Yeah, I mean if they still survive, they could be anywhere. I mean, a relative could still have them and has not chosen to--. Or they could be -- I mean they could just be. If they still survive, they could be anywhere. But it would be just fascinating to find out where they were. But I have the suspicion that he kept up to date on medical techniques.

C: He also ran an apothecary shop. Did he learn that in Scotland as well?

T: Yes, he did. He took two courses in chemistry.

C: Ok.

T: Although, the chemistry courses he, as I said in my lecture, did not relate. It's funny, it did not relate to the medical side of chemistry or the formulation of medicines. I think, I can't remember, I've got my computer here if we need to look up notes but, I think he took another course in -- he did not take the course that would have really helped him in formulating medicines.

C: Could he have learned some of it through the folk medicines that were being used in Kentucky at the time?

T: That's a possibility, but I also think that he did a lot of reading. He took the chemistry courses, lectures. If he was as studious as we have an idea that 37:00he was, and he checked out. There're records -- I found out in a lecture given by Dr. Simpson in 1887, who had checked the archives of the University of Edinburgh. Back then they had the records of students, when students checked out books they kept them on ledgers back then and he was checking out a lot of books on chemistry.

C: Really?

T: Yeah.

C: Studying it on his own; which really wasn't unusual, probably.

T: No, if he was as intellectually curious and studious as he seems to be; although I think he was into mischief, too.

C: What type?

T: Well, his 1887 lecture also mentions him involved in a race with an Irishman 38:00-- I mean footraces with an Irishman he was visiting and he sort of "sucked" them. He was very confident in himself evidently, according to the story, and there was a bet on and he let the Irishman win a couple of times and then he beat him the second, the third time.

C: Oh, my. Where did you read that story?

T: It was in an article that I -- it was a lecture given by Dr. Alexander Simpson at the University of Edinburgh in 1887 and he was talking -- Well, this is where finally the British Medical Community acknowledged McDowell's contribution to the medical world back in 1809.

C: 1887?

T: Yes.

C: It took that long?

T: It took that long.

C: Well, I was going to ask you about that. Why did it take so long for people to acknowledge his contribution?

T: Well, one of the problems probably was that McDowell, when McDowell finally published his clinical findings, it was evidently in a very obscure American medical journal. And so he sent a copy of that journal article to his mentor John Bell, who happened to be in Italy at that time. He had left England really for good, because he was under ill health. John Bell was a very controversial figure in the medical world in Edinburgh. He was very confrontational. He was very talented but he was involved in these very passionate controversies in 40:00Edinburgh. He finally, the stress must have gotten to him, affected his health and he went to Italy. He's buried in Italy, in fact.

C: Really?

T: Yes. He's written some long used textbooks on anatomy and surgery and physiology and so forth that were used--

C: Did he write those in Italy?

T: No, no. He wrote them in Edinburgh. Yeah, and he was a good illustrator, too, so he drew all the illustrations related to the anatomy in those books. He and his brother Charles co-authored a couple of volumes of those. So where were we 41:00going with this?

C: You were talking about how long it took to get him recognized.

T: Yes, yes, so Dr. Bell's protégé, named Lizars, L-I-Z-A-R-S, happened to get the mail from Dr. McDowell, and tried to recreate the operation on some of his patients and he was finally able to do that. And so he published his own findings and giving credit to Dr. McDowell in a British or a Scottish medical 42:00journal. But it still wasn't believed because they couldn't believe a country doctor in the frontiers of America could perform such an operation. They just didn't believe it could be done. And finally, it was during a conference, a medical conference in Edinburgh that Dr. Simpson sort of said that we must recognize the contributions that Dr. McDowell had made in 1809.

C: Weren't there other doctors who claimed that they had done it first?

T: You know that's something I've still got to get into. Now the main thing he's claiming is that he did the first successful ovarian surgery. Now there had been other successful abdominal surgeries.

C: Ok.

T: But not the first ovarian cancer.

C: Well, his assistant was a relative, what was his name? James McDowell?

T: I think that's right.

C: There seems to be some kind of controversy about the two of them. Do you know what that was?

T: No. I haven't gotten into that yet. No, right now I started my research, into the story, basically on his medical education in Edinburgh.

C: Ok.

T: I've branched out a little bit but what I wanted to try to do -- When I read Schachner's account of his medical education in Edinburgh, it was just totally -- it didn't have any depth. There wasn't any flesh to the bones; you just didn't get a sense about what did he learn in Scotland. What was it like to be in Scotland at that time? There's no mention of the dangers he was under in 44:00Edinburgh, because there was a lot of political, social unrest in Scotland at the time that was being inspired by the French Revolution. And when McDowell went over by boat England was not at war; Great Britain was not at war with France yet, but there were those political tensions going on. The French Revolutions broke out in 1789 but France and England didn't get to war until 1793, so there's all this. And then there's all this turmoil about different kinds of reforms and so forth. I was just reading a book about the French Revolution in Scotland. There were just a lot of certain societies that were sympathetic to the French Revolution, so the authorities were nervous about 45:00foreigners there. I think the McDowells, from one letter, I got the hint that they were sort of sympathetic to the causes of the French Revolution.

C: Really?

T: Yeah, because I think especially if they were Jeffersonian Republicans, and of course Jefferson was a very Francophile. He identified a lot with what was going on in France during the Revolution. In fact, there's one letter from, I can't remember if it was from McDowell's brother or from his brother-in-law Reid, that cautioned him about expressing his political views in Scotland. Because of the political he could get into a lot of trouble probably. So, I'm 46:00thinking he must have done a pretty good job of keeping his views quiet about the French, on the French Revolution. The other problem is that that Schachner doesn't address is his journey home. I know there's no documentary evidence but what I'm trying to do is trying to recreate the world, that environment that Dr. McDowell is operating in when he was in Edinburgh. I want to find out who his professors were and what they were teaching him; how they were teaching him. Because also at this very same time, Scotland was being recognized as the leader in the Enlightenment, which was an intellectual, social, political movement going on all over Europe and America, really. In fact, they say that the 47:00American Revolution is a child of the Enlightenment.

C: Really?

T: Yeah. And what that means is that Scotland was the leader in ideas across the board. You had people like Adam Smith, who was the leading philosopher in economics and other things and you had Sir Walter Scott who was coming up through there. He hadn't begun to write his novels yet, but he didn't live too far from Ephraim McDowell.

C: Well, you mentioned him in your lecture. Was he attending school there atEdinburgh?

T: No, no, no. If he was attending Edinburgh University, it was not as a medical student.

C: No, but I mean was he there at the same time?

T: No, he was not. I mean he was there in Edinburgh at the same time. He lived not far away from where McDowell was staying as a student. He lived in the very new development of Edinburgh called George Square, although he was born in poor circumstances. But it was a new housing development in Edinburgh and McDowell was basically a block over from him. I mean, it's possible. You can just imagine that he might have run into him on his walks to and from the college buildings.

C: I was just wondering if you had found any other people other than medical students or medical teachers that may have influenced him in any way while he was there?

T: I haven't found any kind of -- that's what the difficulty is because I 49:00haven't been able to find any letters or anything like that that would, or diaries, that would sort of give me those hints. Now, I know the classmates that he had for each of the classes.

C: You do?

T: I do. I have a list of those. And what, I'm gonna try to do is figure out if -- I'm even having trouble finding personal papers of even some his most famous classmates. Charles Bell was one of his classmates; he was the brother of John Bell. Samuel Brown, who was mentioned in the play who was an American; they were friends anyway. They didn't live together as roommates but they were there in classes together in Edinburgh.

C: Was Samuel--

T: Brown.

C: Was he from Kentucky?

T: Yeah. Well, yes, but he's from Virginia first.

C: Right, most of them were.

T: Yeah. From Western Virginia.

C; But I know Danville for example had one of the earliest settlers there who had one of the Lottery Cabins, was a James Brown.

T: Ok.

C: We've had a very hard time finding very much information about his family.

T: Well, Brown was a pretty common name in Scotland, too.

C: But he apparently was a wealthy man and the people in Frankfort, John Y. Brown, the governor, his background connects with that family.

T: Oh, really? Interesting.

C: John Brown was in Frankfort in the very beginning.

T: Oh, that Brown family.

C; But also John Y. Brown is related to that family.

T; Ok.

C: So, I mean, it goes back quite a few generations really.

T: Well, and then there was, there was Alexander Munro, tertius, who was the third Doctor Monro that would succeed his father in teaching anatomy and surgery at the University of Edinburgh. He was a classmate of McDowell's. And there's other students from all over the world. There were some Virginians there. One of the things that that alien register book at the city archives, all of them seemed to be medical -- most of them seemed to be medical students, and they're all from all other parts. There's some from North America, so I can tell from where they were from and where they were living. I'm thinking about going, that's one of the things I want to go back and do is get that kind of 52:00information on those students and plot their locations around. Now most of them lived around a particular area of Edinburgh.

C: One of the things I vaguely remember your mentioning or maybe this was in Holly Henson's play, I'm not sure, but he was encouraged to bring some of the best books he could use back to Danville.

T; And that is true. I found that his father did encourage him. He gave him some money, I can't remember if it was 50 pounds or something like that, to buy the best medical books and equipment, some of the equipment that he would need to set up practice.

C: Do you know if any of those are still around where you could see what he had purchased?

T: I don't know; the only place I would know they'd be is at McDowell House.

C: Well, they have found books there and they have found journals there.

T: Oh, you mean medical journals?

C: Not medical journals, no. But they have found, well, I guess their guest books for the house after it was restored. But they're still finding things back in the closets, and things like that I understand.

T: Oh, they are?

C: So, you may go back there and look for some of the things you're looking for. It's pretty amazing.

T: I know they've got books from the period.

C: Yes, they do, and they also have a journal that was written by someone they don't know who wrote it, I believe.

T: Oh, really?

C: So--

T: What's the time period?

C: I cannot remember. But it's not medical.

T: Right.

C: It is not a medical journal or anything. But there may be things in the house. You know of course it's been used so many different ways --

T: Right.

C: --before it was restored that those things could be anywhere. I suspect probably family members, other doctors, there are so many doctors who came from that family.

T: Yeah.

C: And the Shelbys, as well. It's hard to know. Did you do any research about Dr. Alban Goldsmith while you were there? Did you look for his name anywhere in Scotland, in Edinburgh?

T: Goldsmith--

C: He was the doctor who lived across the street from Dr. McDowell.

T: Oh, really?

C: At the same time period.

T: Well, turn that off for a second and we can look it up and see. Cause I have all these class sources.

C: Ok, let's see if we can ask that again.

T: Ok.

C: Did you look for Dr. Alban Goldsmith while you were there in Edinburgh?

T: Not while I was there, no.

C: This may be something that might help. I'm gonna go in a little bit of a little bit of a different direction here for just a minute.

T: Alright.

C: What type of pre-planning did you do before you went to Scotland to do your research?

T: I read Schachner's account of his time in Edinburgh to find out as many details as I could. I think I read some other sources. I can't remember if I 56:00went to the Kentucky Historical Society; I think I went to the Kentucky Historical Society before and looked at some of the letters there before I went. I didn't go to the Filson Club at that time, and then that's when I started looking up on the websites the different possible archives. Of course, the natural first stop was the University of Edinburgh archives, so I was in extensive correspondence with them. And then, I thought, "Well, I wonder if there's anything in the city archives, you know. They've got their own archives." Then there's the Library of Scotland that I wanted to check. Mainly that case would be maps of Edinburgh at the time and also any photographs or 57:00illustrations of Edinburgh at the time, because I'm thinking that if I anticipate this getting into a book that I want some -- to give people a sense of what it was like to live in Edinburgh in the 1790s. So that -- , I started corresponding with the Royal College of Surgeons where John Bell was a fellow and that would have been where McDowell, since he supposedly took lectures under Bell at Edinburgh, that would have been, he would have had some kind of 58:00familiarity with that. Now I didn't find anything -- the Royal College Archives did not have anything related to McDowell himself, but they had resources related to John Bell and all the books that he had written and Alexander Monro, secundus, one of his teachers. It was that kind of information and then they've got a great museum of specimens, anatomical specimens that go back 200 years. So that was a great source, and they've got a plate -- I'll show you the plate that they have; it's a saucer, this is a McDowell saucer. Someone gave them that. This saucer was one of the, part of the china set that McDowell brought back home with him.

C: And they have it there?

T: Yeah, they have it there.

C: Who donated it to that? Do they know?

T: They do know.

C: I mean, was it a family member?

T: No, it was, let me see. I can tell you better once -- because I took a picture. This person also gave a big framed picture of the first day issue of the McDowell stamp, U.S. stamp back in the 1950s; '59 I think it was. Let's see, oh why is that -- I don't know why that happen? It looks like I just wiped out all my pictures.

C: Oh, no.

T: That is wild -- I've been --I did some crazy things. There's the medical review; well it's there but it's not showing up. That's funny.

C: Maybe you're battery is low or something.

T: No, no, it's not that. When I was trying to copy something to a disk drive -- alright, let's see. It's down now -- McDowell's Edinburgh. This is what I want, here we go, it was this guy, Joe U. Meggs, M.D., fellow College of Surgeons Edinburgh, Boston, U.S.A., January 1961.

C: Ok. He must have bought it somewhere.

T: Uh-huh. So you see he's got the house. This is the stamp, first day issue, and then the McDowell Coat of Arms.

C: So it looks like he bought it as a set already framed.

T: Yes, of course when he bought this.

C: He also sent the saucer.

T: Exactly.

C: Well, did you go to Transylvania University at all to see if they had any papers on McDowell?

T: No.

C: Are there any papers there, or do you know?

T: I don't know yet. Supposedly--

C: Cause several of the doctors who assisted him, I think, ended up at Transylvania.

T: Yeah, that's the best way I'm gonna be able to get at McDowell. Since he didn't leave any personal papers is to try to find reference to him in people he had relationships with if they left it. Hopefully they left it any correspondence. I'm having that difficulty; I'm finding it difficult right now to find especially with his English counterparts that he had as classmates. It 62:00doesn't look like I'm going to be able to find any under Dr. Lizars, who eventually published the article of him.

C: This Dr. Goldsmith went to the University of Louisville eventually. Have you don't any research to see if anything's there?

T: No, but that is a good suggestion. I imagine I will eventually discover that trail and I'll look at the University of Louisville archives for that.

C: What recommendations do you make for other people who may be doing research overseas as to what they should do to prepare to do that?

T: Well the cardinal rule of anything, especially if you're going to an archives anywhere, is to contact the archives and you ask a series of questions. When are your hours of operation? You ask preliminary questions about, if you know, especially if you know the types of materials you want to look at to see. That's one of the things I asked the University of Edinburgh is what kind of student records from that time period do they have in existence? Then you try to tell them if you've got a schedule about when you plan to show up to do the research. Now some archives like to know ahead of time, but some you can just show up on the doorstep. If you know when they're open and you know the materials ahead of 64:00time then that saves a lot of time on your part as far as getting work done.

C: I know I went up to Georgetown and asked if, since I was up there could I see the archives section on the female seminary that had been in Georgetown, they would not let me in so I have to make an appointment to go back up there now to see that. Is that customary really for a lot of archives to that?

T; Well, if Georgetown had a full-time archivist it wouldn't be any problem.

C: Ok, that's the problem then. How do you feel about doing research on the Internet? Has that been helpful to you in anyway whatsoever?

T: It has somewhat, I mean especially if an archivist has a way of finding aid on-line. Of course if they've got any documents -- if they've digitized the actual document and downloaded it and put in on-line. Well, that's basically, the University of Edinburgh, I'll show you this example if we've got time. I should've kicked this up. They have the first -- I can't remember the name of it, it's the matriculation, not the matriculation book, but their graduation book, the earliest graduation book. In other words, after students have passed their orals and passed all the tests and they've certified that they're able to receive the degree, I can't remember reading about any kind of ceremony, but they signed a book that they are a graduate.

C: How old is that book there?

T: I am trying to think; I think it goes back to the 1720s. No, no, no, I'm trying to think of when the university medical school, when the medical school started, because the University itself is very old. I think it's in the 1600s when it--.

C: The school itself?

T: The medical school.

C: The medical school?

T; The medical school, yeah. But I was gonna show you what I -- I've already book marked this thing on my website, this graduate, and that's what I was doing when I was looking for was Alexander Humphreys. I'm getting into the wire.

C: Is that the only one they have on line?

T: Yeah, it's the only one, cause it's the most easiest object that they can --. Alright, let's see here, oh Lauriations and Degrees, that's what they call it, 1587-1890.

C: It covers that whole period?

T: Yeah, so that's the very beginning in 1587. Now this is all the degrees, but you can go to the page; you have to turn the pages this way, see.

C: Right.

T: And this is where all -- if they've been certified to receive a degree they just sign the book.

C: And the years are given, so you can go to the years that you need?

T: Well, yeah they've started right here. Let me see, they uh, that's--

C: Well, I noticed in scanning old books, so many of the universities are scanning their older books now on-line. They'll scan all the pages, blank ones as well.

T: Well, it's not doing anything for me at the moment; I don't know what's going on. Well, let's go backwards. See, that's the explanation. Let's go -- I've gone to the end there, that's 1848. See you've got Edinburgh, looks like March 13th, 1759 and you've got all these, this is when they sign the book, and you've got 69:00the dates that they signed the book here so all these guys, graduate in 1759 or so. But you can search that and that's what I was when I was trying to figure out if Alexander Humphries had received a degree from Edinburgh I was going to this book.

C: Well, that's interesting. Do you have any cautions that you would like to give people who are doing that kind of research overseas? 'Cause I know even in the United States you can waste so much time sitting in a library trying to find information.

T: Of course you don't want to get on the bad side of the --. Oh, I could have 70:00showed you that map. That map that I have as a screen saver is about a 1784 map of Edinburgh.

C: Really? That was a fascinating part of your lecture were the maps that you had.

T: Well I'm always -- since I was walking, one of the things that you do, it's interesting to me as a historical researcher, is if you're, even if it's an event like the Boston Massacre or something or just the fact that Ephraim McDowell lived in Edinburgh at a certain particular time, I wanted to find out where he lived and then where he was taking his classes, and so forth, and get just sort of the physical feel about his world, his environment there. And you 71:00do get that sense, and that he didn't really have to walk but about a half a mile to classes from where he lived, but at the same time he didn't have paved streets or sidewalks. I don't know, I guess they probably did have sidewalks back then, but it was just a different atmosphere because people were always constantly out in the streets, the streets were muddy, nasty, and you can imagine that the weather back in those days was pretty cold. And it was always wet, constantly wet, and they didn't have sanitation standards like we did back in those days and it was just, I assume, we haven't heard anything about if he 72:00was ever sick over there. But you know that kind of atmosphere would have been ripe for illness and so forth, but Edinburgh I found out was a big city in those days, a big city, and it was changing rapidly then, at that time. Well, and just to give you an example, I should keep this thing on, I'll show you on this map, --.

C: Did Dr. McDowell's Presbyterian religion, did he practice it over there as well?

T: Well he mentions in a letter to his brother that he is attending church regularly, but you can take that with a grain of salt in some cases, because you know a student away from home, that far away from home, can do whatever he wants but he knows the expectations of his family. Maybe he can lie to his father without any worry of recriminations or anything of that nature.

C: Well, he seemed to be a man of faith ..

T: Yeah,

C: --just from what he did during the surgery you know the prayers and things that they talk about.

T: Well, he does mention in a letter that he does attend church regularly.

C: Was there a church close by?

T: Oh, there were churches all over the place.

C: A Presbyterian Church?

T: Oh, yeah, yeah; there's churches all over the place.

C: Close by to where he was staying?

T: Yeah, he was; from his letters now I found out this is the first -- he lived on this street the first place.

C: What is the name of that street?

T: Charles Street.

C: Alright.

T: Then the second place he went to, which I think was probably done in late 1793, was Potter Row Street, which was this street here, and he lived in this area right here. It was near Allison Square. This is Allison Square, right here.

C: Now, where is the University there?

T: The University would be here. This is what's interesting.

C: At the end of Potter's Street there?

T: Yeah exactly. This is called High College, that's Low College but at the very time he was there a cornerstone had already be laid to replace this, these buildings, but they had to stop in 17-, construction in 1792, because of the French Revolution and the cost. The college ran out of money basically.

C: Really?

T: Yeah. From the pictures I could show you what the present building is there now.

C: Was it a private university?

T: No, it was a municipal university.

C: Ok.

T: And the town council controlled it.

C: Ok.

T: But he walked, he walked from here, I mean you can just imagine it, walked across here and up here to go to --. But Surgeons' Square was over here; this is where John Bell's house was built.

C: So how far do you believe that was?

T: About half a mile.

C: To the Surgeon's Square?

T: Uh-huh.

C: Ok. So then to actual university would be--

T: Even shorter.

C: Even closer.

T: This was the Royal Infirmary at that time and I think that some of it was here too; so he would have operated in here too for his clinical classes. Now, Walter Scott lived in this area.

C: Which is what part?

T: That's George's Square.

C: Ok.

T: And the University now, I can't show it on this map, on this particular map, is below -- is over here someways.

C: South?

T: So the library would have been over there and he would've -- there's an open area that's called the meadows that's still part of the university and a lot of recreational activities among the students go on there, walking and--

C: How much of that area on that screen would be University now? The housing, would it still be there? Is it still there the housing and things like that?

T: Well, there's buildings there. The area of Potter Row is completely changed in character. It's just completely changed and the university does own that up there and they own this part here, and they own this part here, they own 77:00George's Square.

C: That is west of where he lived.

T: Yeah, of course he lived right there, but this was not university at the point, at that time. These Mews, it's the stables for the residents of George's Square.

C: Did he have a horse or carriage or anything like that?

T: I doubt it. I doubt it. I just really, really doubt it. See here's a Presbyterian Church, this is a Grayfriars Church. There's a hospital there.

C: Have you looked at any of the church records at all to see if he attended?

T: Well, I tried.

C: Would they have that kind of thing there?

T; I'm not really confident that I'm going to find his name on a list in the church record anywhere.

C: Unless you're a member or baptized or anything; that's usually the type of records they would keep.

T: Yes, and I don't think churches back then really kept detailed membership lists in England during that time, or in Scotland either. Now see this Nicholson Street -- this was 1784 when this map was done -- all this has changed completely. The character is reconfigured and laid out. But this is the old Edinburgh up in here, the Royal Mile and everything, the medieval part of Edinburgh. And then you go further.

C: There is a castle still there, right?

T: Oh yeah, and it's over in this direction.

C: Northeast -- northwest of where the University was.

T: Yes, yes, exactly.

C: Ok. Is there anything else you would like to tell us about on this tape that 79:00we haven't touched on?

T: No, I think we've exhausted it. 'Cause I'm still really fascinated, I mean I haven't really gotten into the other areas of his life at this point. I've read the journal articles that he published in the American publication and in the Scottish publication, so I'm familiar with all the particular cases he cited. They're fascinating reads, but I haven't got much I'm still developing this story about his time in Edinburgh, because this is really the critical time. Those two years are critical for him since if he's going to successfully perform 80:00that operation that way that he did. That's where he learned his skills, his technique, his surgical skills.

C: I did forget to ask you -- how many other times did he do this same type of surgery?

T: I think -- let's see if I can bring that article up, I don't know if it's, well it might be in the-- I took digital pictures of it so, that's one thing about digital cameras -- the publication they had over at the University of Kentucky was so fragile. Oh, that makes me so mad. No that's my grandmother, no that's Alexander, secundus. Well, no. I've really screwed myself up.

C: Well, that's alright; I was just curious. It seems like you mentioned it in your lecture.

T: I think there's nine.

C: And those were not all successful, were they? I think there were two that were not.

T: I think there was one that was not successful.

C: Just one. Do you have any kind of indication how many other doctors came and studied with him?

T: No, I haven't gotten into that far yet. I'll be interested to -- Now his 82:00granddaughter's biography of him, it's interesting that she publishes some letters that are not either in the archives or the Filson Club or the Kentucky Historical Society.

C: What is the name of that one?

T: Her name was Valentine. Oh, that's notes, that's not what I want. Yeah. Here it is. I got it off Google of all things. And this particular reproduction was gotten from the Harvard University Library. They didn't do it. It is Mary T. Valentine.

C: Now she was a granddaughter of theirs, right?

T: Yeah, of Ephraim McDowell's.

C: Of Dr. McDowell's.

T: Yeah, and her real, her maiden name was Mary Young Ridenbaugh, R-I-D-E-N-B-A-U-G-H.

C: Well, I really appreciate you doing this for me today, taking your time.

T: You're welcome,

C:, Thank you for your patience.

T: Well I was wondering what had happened.

C: Oh, I was just sure that I was supposed to be in Georgetown. I had it in my head so I apologize to you for that.

T: No, that's fine.

C: And thank you very much, I appreciate you doing this for them, for me.

T: You're welcome.