Dr. Griffitts’ connection with the College and University continued during six sessions, and throughout this period his lectures are said to have “evinced great industry in the acquisition of useful materials, method and perspicuity in their arrangement, and zeal for the advancement of his class in solid information. But the situation of a public lecturer was not altogether congenial to his feelings, which were most gratified by an active discharge of the less conspicuous duties of life. Perhaps, too, the disinclination which he always manifested to hold any place of emolument may have exercised some influence in producing his resignation of a chair which was every year becoming more profitable, and even at that period conferred one of the highest honors within the reach of the profession.”[1]
In consequence of his early studies in connection with Materia Medica and Pharmacy, Dr. Griffitts was deeply interested in the formation of a National Pharmacopœia. In June, 1788, he was placed on a Committee of the College of Physicians to form a Pharmacopœia for the use of the College, but this undertaking was permitted to slumber until 1820, when the College united with other societies for the formation of our present national work. Dr. Griffitts served upon the Committee then appointed, and for this duty his former experience well qualified him.[2] He died in 1826.
Upon the resignation of Dr. Griffitts, Dr. Benjamin Smith Barton succeeded to the Professorship of Materia Medica, still retaining that of Natural History.
After twenty nine years of active service in the School of Medicine, Dr. Kuhn retired from the Chair of Practice in
- ↑ Memoir of Dr. Samuel Powell Griffitts, by Governeur Emerson, M. D. North American Medical and Surgical Journal, vol. iii. p. 151, 1827.
- ↑ In 1782 a small collection of receipts was published by Dr. William Brown, more particularly intended for the use of the Army. In 1788 the following action was taken by the College of Physicians: “On Motion, ordered that a Committee of eight, viz., Drs. Redman, Jones, Kuhn, Shippen, Rush, Griffitts, Wistar, and Hutchinson, be appointed to form a Pharmacopœia for the use of the College.” The U. S. Pharmacopœia was first issued in 1820. In the Life of Dr. Thos. T. Hewson by Dr. Franklin Bache, and in the Life of Dr. Bache by Dr. G. B. Wood, will be found an interesting account of this work.
