Edward Bright Vedder, M.D.
Edward Bright Vedder, M.D.
Biography
Edward Bright Vedder (1878-1952) was a career military physician, noted researcher on deficiency diseases, and medical educator. His most important contribution to medical science was his research and publications on beriberi as a deficiency disease affecting the peripheral nerves. The Papers of Edward Bright Vedder span the period 1902-1943. They were donated to the Edward G. Miner Library in 1997 by Martha Vedder Cullinane, the widow of Edward Bright Vedder's son, Henry C. Vedder, who followed in his father's footsteps as a military physician. The Vedder papers were processed in July 2000. They are contained in eight document boxes occupying 3.5 linear feet.
Edward Bright Vedder was born in New York City to Henry Clay Vedder, a Baptist clergyman, and Minnie Lingham Vedder. He received his Ph.B. from the University of Rochester in 1898, and his medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1902. Continuing his studies at Penn, Vedder received an M.S. in 1903 while doing research with Simon Flexner on dysentery. Soon afterward, he was commissioned an officer in the U.S. Army Medical Corps, and continued his studies at the Army Medical School in Washington, D.C.
Following graduation in 1904, Vedder served in the Philippines, where he studied and observed tropical diseases. His work on beriberi and scurvy was of particular importance. Vedder discovered that beriberi is a deficiency disease; and his research on scurvy helped lead the way for others to the discovery that ascorbic acid is a vitamin. In 1913 Vedder published Beriberi, his best known monograph. That same year he returned to the United States where he was appointed assistant professor of pathology at the Army Medical School. In 1919 he became director of the Southern Department Laboratory at Fort Sam Houston, Texas; and from 1922 to 1925 was chief of medical research at the Edgewood Arsenal (Md). During this period Vedder conducted research on chemical warfare that resulted in publication of The medical aspects of chemical warfare in 1925.
Vedder returned to Manila in 1925 as senior member of the Army Board for Medical Research. He returned to Washington in 1929, and in the following year assumed command of the Army Medical School. Vedder retired from the Army in 1933 to become professor of experimental medicine at George Washington University. In 1942 he was appointed director of medical education at the Alameda County Hospital (California) and laboratory director of the Highland County Hospital (Oakland), posts that he retained until his retirement in 1947.
The Papers
Although fragmentary in content, the papers of Edward Bright Vedder nonetheless include valuable materials for historical research. Boxes 1-2 contain an incomplete yet extensive collection of reprints of articles published by Vedder between 1902 and the mid-1940s. Certainly the most interesting portion of the collection are the several typescript versions of his unpublished autobiography in Box 3, Folders 1-14. Entitled Fifty years of medicine, Vedder devotes separate chapters to each aspect of his military and medical careers, as well as essays on topics such as public health, state medicine and his (very un-Baptist) views on religion. Box four contains notes, hand- and typewritten abstracts from his reading, and other materials used in his lectures at the Army Medical School. The lectures are arranged alphabetically by topic, and pertain largely to tropical and other communicable diseases. Boxes 5-7 include an incomplete yet nonetheless interesting collection of laboratory notebooks, as well as manuals on military hygiene and laboratory procedure that Vedder apparently compiled for personal use circa 1916.
Box One
Folder 1: Bibliography of E.B. Vedder's publications (1902-1931)
Folder 2: EBV reprints, 1902-1909
Folder 3: EBV reprints, 1910-1911
Folder 4: EBV reprints, 1912-1913
Folder 5: EBV reprints, 1914-1915
Folder 6: EBV reprints, 1916-1920
Folder 7: EBV reprints, 1921-1929
Box Two
Folder 1: EBV reprints, 1930-1938
Folder 2: EBV reprints, 1940-
Folder 3: Notes on clinical microscopy (1937)
Folder 4: Influence of experimental medicine on the origin and development of
scientific medicine (1938)
Box Three
Folder 1: Fifty years of medicine - Introduction
Folder 2: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. I. Medical school
Folder 3: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. II. Early medical experiences
Folder 4: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. III. The vitamins
Folder 5: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. IV. The Army Medical School
Folder 6: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. V. Laboratory problems
Folder 7: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. VI. The Chemical Warfare Service
Folder 8: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. VII. The Medical Research Board
Folder 9: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. VIII. The Army Medical School
Folder 10: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. IX. Experimental medicine
Folder 11: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. X. Director of education.
Folder 12: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. XI. Public health
Folder 13: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. XII. State medicine
Folder 14: Fifty years of medicine - Chap. XIII. Religio medici, new style
Folder 15: Correspondence regarding publications (with manuscripts)
Folder 16: Vitamin deficiency diseases manuscript (ca. 1941)
Folder 17: Outlines for a popular book on preventive medicine (ca. 1947)
Folder 18: "State medicine" (undated typescript different in content frm c. xii of
autobiography)
Folder 19: Remarks at the opening of the University of Rochester School of Medicine
& Dentistry, June 14, 1924
Folder 20: Report of trip to India" (1927)
Folder 21: "Observations on a visit to Porto Rico" (undated)
Folder 22: Miscellaneous talks (on such topics as "Intestinal equipment" (a
euphemism for "balls" ), "Lessons of history," "How to prepare for service
in the tropics," "Science or religion," etc.
Box Four
Folder 1: Army Medical School (1912-13)
Folder 2: Chemical warfare
Folder 3: Anemia, pernicious
Folder 4: Berberi
Folder 5: Carotin
Folder 6: Cholera
Folder 7: Dysentery, amoebic
Folder 8: Dysentery, bacillary
Folder 9: Gossypol
Folder 10: History of medicine
Folder 11: Hygiene
Folder 12: Jaundice
Folder 13: Leishmaniasis
Folder 14: Leprosy
Folder 15: Malaria
Folder 16: Oroya fever
Folder 17: Pellagra
Folder 18: Plague
Folder 19: Scurvy
Folder 20: Sprue
Folder 21: Syphilis
Folder 22: Tropical medicine, introduction
Folder 23: Trypanosomiasis
Folder 24: Vitamins
Folder 25: Wasserman reaction
Folder 26: Yaws
Folder 27: Yellow fever
Box Five
Three-ring black leatherette notebook (23 cm.): "Transmissible Diseases" (compiled ca.
1916). Handwritten and typescript notes on a variety of communicable diseases and
related topics arranged alphabetically.
Three-ring black leatherette notebook (23 cm.): "Field sanitation" (compiled ca. 1916).
Alphabetically arranged handwritten and typescript notes with charts and tables from
printed sources on such topics as "battlefield, hygiene of," diet, "garbage crematories,"
lice, "sanitary orders," etc.
Three-ring black leatherette notebook (18 cm.) describing the preparation and
administration of salvarsan, Wasserman reaction test, preparation of heart-cholesterin
antigen, and various standard laboratory procedures (ca. 1916).
Cloth bound laboratory notebook (21 cm.): antigen, gossypol, carotene experiments
(1929).
Cloth bound laboratory notebook (21 cm.): "Animal book" containing salvarsan, emetin,
scurvy experiments (undated).
Box Six
Folder 1: Salt solution and oedema surgical problem
Folder 2: "Investigations"
Folder 3: Miscellaneous laboratory notes
Folder 4: Laboratory notes on liver extract
Folder 5: Laboratory notes on antigens
Folder 6: Three-ring leatherette notebook (29 cm.) containing scurvy experiments
and some notes on leprosy (192-?)
Box Seven
Two three-ring binders containing laboratory notes on vitamin deficiency experiments
(late 1930s).
Three-ring binder containing laboratory notes on aging in humans
Box Eight
Folder 1: American Academy of Tropical Medicine
Folder 2: Southern Medical Association
Folder 3: E.B.V. military orders
Folder 4: Miscellaneous correspondence
Folder 5: Photographs of the Department Laboratory, Nogales, Arizona
Folder 6: Miscellanea