Eugene Opie Papers, American Philosophical Society

Eugene Opie spent most of his career as a pathologist at the Rockefeller Institute engaged in research on the influenza, tuberculosis, blood diseases, poliomyelitis, and viruses. His work at Washington University, St. Louis, is documented, as are his efforts to alleviate tuberculosis in Jamaica, among Philadelphia schoolchildren, and in New York City. The Opie collection contains correspondence, notebooks, lab notes from his days at Rockefeller, articles, reprints, and photographs. Opie's long interest in China is reflected in material on the American Bureau for Medical Aid to China, the United China Relief, and Chinese medicine in general There is also significant documentation on the International Health Division of the Rockefeller Foundation, the Henry Phipps Institute of the University of Pennsylvania, the Milbank Memorial Fund, and other institutions. There are also reports of approximately 300 clinical autopsies performed at the Base Hospital, Camp Pike, Ark., of soldiers who died in the flu epidemic of 1918. Also there are notes of Opie's course in pathology at the University of Pennsylvania.

Background note

The pathologist Eugene Lindsay Opie specialized in the pathologic physiology of viral and bacterial diseases, including tuberculosis, influenza, and poliomyelitis. His career can conveniently be divided into roughly ten year increments. From 1894-1904 he was a graduate student and faculty member at Johns Hopkins; from 1904 to 1910, he was at Rockefeller Institute; from 1910 to 1923 at the medical school of Washington University; from 1923 to 1932 at the Henry Phipps Institute and University of Pennsylvania; and from 1932-1938 at Cornell.

A graduate of the first class of Johns Hopkins' medical school in 1897, Opie developed an interest in medical research while still a student. Under the wing of William Henry Welch, Opie began to investigate sections of pancreatic tissue, discovering that the Islands of Langerhans were absent in diabetics, thus opening the door for an understanding of the origins of the disease. After graduation, he served with the army during the Spanish American War, but returned to Hopkins to take up a faculty appointment as assistant in bacteriology under Welch and pursued his promising work in diabetes. Growing out of his brief military experience, he conducted research into the life cycle of malarial parasites in birds. He married Gertrude Lovat Simpson (d. 1909) in 1902, with whom he had four children. Following her death, he married her sister, Margaret Elizabeth.

Opie's stint at the fledgling Rockefeller Institute (1904-1910) saw his research in tuberculosis begin to gel, and when he moved to the medical school at Washington University (1910-1923), he was actively engaged in studying the pathological physiology of tuberculosis. His career was once again diverted by war, when Opie volunteered for medical duty in France, but as he had during the Spanish American War, Opie made extensive use of his exposure to the extreme disease environment of warfare. In addition to his continuing studies on tuberculosis, Opie worked on largely epidemiological studies of pneumonia and trench foot, and while at Camp Pike, Ark., he performed autopsies on hundreds of soldiers who had died in the flu epidemic of 1918.

In 1923, Opie assumed the directorship of the Henry Phipps Institute in Philadelphia and began teaching at the University of Pennsylvania Medical School, continuing work on the epidemiology of tuberculosis. He is particularly noted for his study of tuberculosis in Jamaica, determining that Jamaicans of African descent were more susceptible to the disease than African Americans. During this period, too, he developed a close working relationship with the Peking Union Medical School in Peking, China, and

Opie left Philadelphia for New York City to assume the chair of pathology at Cornell Medical School and to be come chief pathologist at New York Hospital. He "retired" in 1938, but attached himself to the Rockefeller Institute where he continued working until 1970. His research in immunology and carcinogenesis continued well into his nineties. He received the laurels of his profession, including the Weber-Parkes Prize from the Royal College of Physicians (1945), the Banting Medal from the American Diabetes Association (1946), and the Gold Headed Cane from the Association of Pathologists and Bacteriologists (1960).

Scope and content

The Eugene Opie Papers contain correspondence, lab notes, publications, and photographs stemming from Opie's profession life as a research pathologist, educator, and medical school administrator. The collection is strongest for documenting Opie's laboratory work and his work with professional organizations and institutions. There is very little personal correspondence and even the professional correspondence is sparse.

For the forty years beginning shortly after the turn of the century, tuberculosis was one of Opie's major areas of research interest. The collection contains approximately 1.5 linear feet of laboratory notes and reports on tuberculosis, and tuberculosis appears as in folders such as "United China Relief" and "Jamaica."

Materials related to the Rockefeller Institute and Rockefeller University from the late 1930s to 1960s are concerned primarily with administrative and educational matters. The same can be said for the 2 boxes of items on the University of Pennsylvania. Of greater interest are: 1) an 11 page letter from Opie to Theodore Ingalis on Opie's recollections of Phipps Institute, 1923-1932; and 2) Opie's remarks (2 pp.) on eugenics.

Although biographical articles and obituaries of Opie have paid little attention to his work in China, the collection contains 2.5 linear feet of materials on United China Relief and 0.5 linear feet on the American Bureau for Medical Aid for China. While these consist primarily of printed matter such as minutes of meetings, procedure, newsletters, and documents concerned with accounting and administration, there are some items of special interest, including the large manuscript charts providing details on the mode of infection of tuberculosis patients who died.

Other subjects and individuals represented by significant holdings include Jamaica, Cornell University, W. Ekhart, H. Howard, A. Kohlberg, National Tuberculosis Association, P. Putnam, Washington University, and the U.S. Army Autopsies.

Finally, the collection includes approximately 100 typescripts of Opie's articles, plus bibliographic card files for studies related to encephalitis, viruses, and polio.

Administrative information

Restrictions

None.

Provenance

Gift of Dr. Opie, 1965, and Mrs. Joseph Hughes, 1972.

Preferred citation

Cite as: Eugene Opie Papers, American Philosophical Society.

Additional information

Separated material

Photographs have been removed to photographic storage. Biopsy specimens from Opie's Lab, ca.1920s, are stored separately in the subbasement stairwell.

Related material

Johns Hopkins University also contains a collection of papers for Eugene Opie.