The Story of our Health Message

Support Gradually Withdrawn

With the loyalty of the members of the denomination to the General Conference organization and to the Spirit of prophecy, it was inevitable that their patronage and support not only to the sanitarium in Battle Creek but to the American Medical Missionary College should be steadily withdrawn as the breach widened. This became most noticeable by 1907, when, after a graduation of twenty-two in the spring, only twenty-six of the fifty-seven undergraduates returned in the autumn, with eleven members of a freshman class. This decreased the total enrollment to thirty-seven. There was a further drop, with ten graduates and a total enrollment for the next term of only thirty-three in all classes. In 1909 there were but five graduates. SHM 330.4

Efforts were now made to enlarge the attendance by making the school popular with other denominations. On the advisory council were placed such names as Wilfred T. Grenfell, Robert Beebe, and George D. Dowkontt. A freshman class of thirty-six, representing eleven religious denominations, enrolled in 1908, and again the future of the school looked promising. In his commencement address before the class of 1909, Dr. Kellogg said: SHM 331.1

“The present prospect is that within two or three years, at least, the school will have an attendance of between one hundred and fifty and two hundred; and I presume this is about as large as the school ought to be, for forty or fifty students graduating each year is about as large a number as the missionary boards will be willing to find places for.”—The Medical Missionary, July, 1909. SHM 331.2

These high hopes, however, were not to be realized. A graduating class of ten members in the spring of 1910 was the last to receive diplomas from the American Medical Missionary College. During its life of fifteen years it had received over four hundred students and had graduated nearly two hundred, the larger part of whom were Seventh-day Adventist young men and women who have made possible the manning of many sanitariums, or who have served valiantly in home or foreign service in behalf of Christ. SHM 331.3

Strong pressure was beginning to be brought by the American Association of Medical Colleges to eliminate “unworthy schools from the land, and to limit the number of medical colleges to those great universities whose standing as great schools may be taken as a guaranty of the character of their work.” This pressure was felt by the American Medical Missionary College, and though it was still able to maintain its status, its leaders looked into the future with grave apprehension. They thought best to close voluntarily rather than later to be forced out of existence. Deeming it “expedient to yield at once what seemed to be an untenable position,” they announced that the school was to be merged with the Illinois state university. (Ibid., October, 1910.) SHM 331.4