Murphy Hall celebrates 100 years
KU Medical Center faculty and staff commemorate a century for their flagship building with 1920s music and a fascinating lesson in university history.
On the afternoon of Sept. 12, the lobby of Murphy Hall was filled with ragtime music and historical photos from 1920s Kansas. Faculty, students and staff were invited to attend a guest lecture and pay heed to the first building of what ultimately would become the University of Kansas Medical Center in Kansas City.
Just down the hall at the Clendening History of Medicine Museum, a new exhibit, “Murphy 100: Celebrating a Century of Life and Legacy,” opened. Artifacts will remain on display through next summer, with blueprints, photos and other items that help tell the story of how the new Eleanor Taylor Bell Memorial Hospital was built in 1924, transforming the university, the city and the state.
To launch the celebration, Jennifer Gunn, Ph.D., a historian of science, technology and medicine at the University of Minnesota, delivered the Don Carlos and Alice V. Peete Lecture in the History of Medicine. Gunn is currently working on a book about the history of rural health and medicine in the Midwest from the 1920s through the 1950s. She described the nation’s debate about how to provide quality health care to people in rural areas, and how the University of Kansas ultimately played a part.
The origin story
The exhibit in Clendening offers an opportunity to explore the origins of not only Murphy Hall — but of the University of Kansas medical school and hospital, too. Jamie Rees, M.A., Clendening Museum curator and assistant librarian, said, “In this exhibit, we were able to delve into a period in the medical center’s history that is usually glossed over in a single sentence: ‘In 1924, the campus moved from Goat Hill to 39th and Rainbow.’ But there is so much drama behind the scenes — and a story of the campus and Rosedale community coming together to save the school. If they hadn’t been so passionate a century ago, there would be no medical center on this spot today.”
The previous building housing the KU School of Medicine, the first Eleanor Taylor Bell Memorial Hospital, opened in 1907 on Goat Hill in the Rosedale neighborhood of Kansas City, Kansas. The teaching and research laboratory was located at College and Broad Street, on four acres of land.
In 1919, the Kansas Medical Society urged the state to expand the university to meet the high demand for physicians. They wrote, “That the War and the Influenza epidemic have emphasized the necessity of the State’s maintaining and supporting adequately its hospital, its Schools of Medicine, a Training School for Nurses (including public health nurses) and its Laboratory for the diagnosis of venereal diseases.”
That year, the state considered appropriating $200,000 to expand the hospital in Rosedale. The Kansas State Medical Society suggested they name the new building the Fitzsimons Memorial Hospital in tribute to William T. Fitzsimons, M.D., the first American officer killed in World War I and a graduate of the University of Kansas School of Medicine. Eventually they kept the Bell name for the new building.
There was significant opposition to expanding at the Rosedale site, as some called it inadequate for teaching purposes and “nothing but a shack.” Goat Hill was near busy train tracks, and the staff had to clean their medical equipment daily to remove the grime that had settled on it. Obviously, it wasn’t the right spot to grow a top-tier medical school.
Failure to acquire state funds for the Rosedale expansion nearly ended the KU School of Medicine. Missouri offered to build one to meet the needs of the community. Faced with that potential loss, a delegation of 250 officials and businessmen from Kansas City, Kansas, appeared in Topeka before the Senate Ways and Means Committee to plead that the state medical school and hospital be relocated in Kansas City.
In November 1920, a site about a mile south of Goat Hill called “the Kern tract” was chosen. Located at what is now 39th Street and Rainbow Boulevard, the Kern tract was covered in corn fields and a vineyard. Ralph B. Seem, M.D., a well-known Chicago expert in hospital administration, and Ray L. Gamble, an architect for the state of Kansas, developed a plan for the laboratories, hospitals and dispensaries at the site.
Gamble based the building design on the Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit and Mt. Sinai hospitals throughout the country. He also designed Strong Hall, Corbin Residence Hall, Watson Library and the power plant on the Lawrence campus of the university.
On June 26, 1924, the new Bell Memorial Hospital building, power plant, patient wards, kitchens, operating rooms and the morgue opened. Though it was originally envisioned as an administration building, it had to house all the functions of a hospital. Bed capacity increased from 65 in the Rosedale location to 120 at the new site. Over time, more buildings were constructed, including a hospital building. The campus was confusing to navigate, as buildings were known by letters of the alphabet.
Center while housing offices for several university services and
administration.
On Sept. 21, 1979, at a special meeting of the Kansas Board of Regents, several medical center buildings were renamed to honor physicians who had dedicated their time and talent to enrich the university and community. At the ceremony, the A Building was renamed the Franklin D. Murphy Administration Building after the former dean of the School of Medicine and chancellor of the University of Kansas. The name Bell Hospital switched over to the true hospital building, which still serves as a hospital, now for The University of Kansas Health System.
Today, the University of Kansas Medical Center includes the schools of Health Professions, Medicine and Nursing, while The University of Kansas Health System is the clinical partner for the schools. Murphy houses the offices of KU Medical Center’s executive vice chancellor and general counsel, as well as the departments of communication and community engagement and the leadership of KU School of Medicine. There are now 46 buildings on 41 acres of land.
Who was Franklin Murphy?
and rural physicians during his tenure as dean of the School of
Medicine from 1948 to 1951.
Franklin Murphy, M.D., grew up near where his namesake building is today. He earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Kansas in 1936 and his medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1941. During World War II, he was assigned to the National Research Council in Memphis and became a pioneer in the use of penicillin and the study of malaria.
In 1951, at age 32, he moved from research into administration, serving as dean of KU School of Medicine and in 1960 became chancellor of the University of Kansas. His legacy is writing the Rural Health Bill, signed by the Governor of Kansas. This was an effort to upgrade and expand the medical center, addressing physician shortages, convincing rural communities to attract young doctors by building medical facilities and persuading older physicians to partner with those new doctors and to exchange their knowledge and understanding of newer technology and methods.
National media and politicians considered his Kansas Rural Health Program as the answer to President Truman’s proposal for national health insurance. Murphy lobbied for and received funding to turn KU School of Medicine into an exemplary medical school.
He eventually moved to California to serve as chancellor at the University of California, Los Angeles, then moved out of hospital administration to become chairman and CEO of the Times Mirror Company in Los Angeles. It is believed he was considered as a running mate for Richard Nixon.
In 1991, Murphy received the Andrew W. Mellon medal, for having served 27 years as one of the National Gallery of Art’s five trustees and as chairman of its board since 1985. He lived with his wife, Judith, in Beverly Hills, and had four children.
After a lifetime of research, leadership and a fight for equitable access to health care, Murphy died of lung cancer in 1994.