Peyton Rous Papers, American Philosophical Society

Table of contents

Abstract

For his pioneering research on the link between viruses and cancer, the pathologist Francis Peyton Rous was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1966. Working primarily at the mainly at the Rockefeller Institute after 1909, Rous first came to notice for his theoretical construction of the first blood bank for use in France during World War I, a plan ultimately implemented by his assistant, Oswald H. Robertson. Subsequently, he left an important imprint on the development of experimental medicine, partly through his own research on the origins of cancer and his administrative activities at the Rockefeller, but also as editor of the Journal of Experimental Medicine from 1921-1970.

The Rous Papers include correspondence, lectures, articles, reports, laboratory records, reprints, and photographs that document all aspects of the life and work of Peyton Rous. Reflecting his work at the Institute are letters of colleagues, information on assistants, and reports to the directors (1909-1959). Additional material relates to Rous' diverse organizational interests, including the American Cancer Society, Century Association, Jane Coffin Childs Memorial Fund for Medical Research (at Yale University), Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology, Johns Hopkins University, National Academy of Sciences, National Research Council, New York Academy of Medicine, Royal Society of Medicine Foundation, and Sloan-Kettering Institute for Cancer Research.

Background note
Scope & content
- Arrangement
Administrative information
Additional information
Added entries
Contact information
Collection overview
- Series I. Correspondence, ca.1917-1970
- Series II. Oswald H. Robertson Material, 1917-1960
- Series III. Card files and Miscellaneous, 1909-1950s
Collection inventory
- Series I. Correspondence, ca.1917-1970
- Series II. Oswald H. Robertson Material, 1917-1960
- Series III. Card files and Miscellaneous, 1909-ca.1950s

Background note

Peyton Rous

A pathologist, Francis Peyton Rous, was co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine in 1966 for his discovery of carcinogenic viruses. Born in Texas in 1879 and raised in Baltimore, Rous received his professional indoctrination entirely at Johns Hopkins, where he received both his bachelors (1900) and medical degrees (1905). After beginning his internship -- again at Hopkins -- he was quickly confirmed in his preference for research over clinical work, and therefore decided to accept a lower-paying position at the University of Michigan, rather than continue down the clinical path. Relegated to a position that had him working essentially as a technician, Rous found compensation in Ann Arbor through his department head, Alfred Warthin, who encouraged him to apply for and accept a fellowship in 1907 to study morbid anatomy at Dresden, where he honed his skills as a researcher.

Rous returned from Europe to take up a grant from the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research to pursue research on lymphocytes, during the course of which, he caught the eye of Simon Flexner, and earned a call to the staff at Rockefeller. From the time of his remove to New York, Rous' research gained enormous momentum. In 1909, his most important series of experiments examined the transmission of spontaneous cancerous tumors in chickens. Preparing a cell-free filtrate from a malignant sarcoma isolated from a chicken leg and injecting it into healthy hens, Rous discovered that the recipients developed precisely the same tumors as the donors, and that the tumors could be transmitted either by direct injection or through injection into fertilized eggs, hypothesizing that a virus was the agent responsible for transmission. Other tumors, too, turned out to be similarly transmissible, with similar fidelity in producing cancers of the donors in the recipients.

Using mice, however, Rous' initial efforts to assess whether tumors could be transmitted in mammals were unavailing until in 1932, his friend and Rockefeller colleague, Richard Shope, asked Rous to investigate the benign papillomas commonly found in wild rabbits which were shown to be transmissible by cell-free extracts. Despite mounting evidence for Rous' viral theory of cancer, there was considerable resistance among medical researchers to its acceptance, who argued that Rous had discovered a condition peculiar to birds and benign tumors, rather than malignant cancers. It was not until the 1950s that subsequent research in virology changed the situation and led to its inculcation as a central element in the theory of cancer origins.

Several other projects in which Rous participated resulted in important medical advances. During the First World War, he and Oswald Robertson were instrumental in developing a citrate-dextrose solution that, when added to preserved blood, provided nourishment and prevented clotting, extending its shelf life for up to four weeks. The practical result was the establishment of the first blood banks in 1918. Rous also exerted an influence over medical research through his position as long-time co-editor of the Journal of Experimental Medicine and from the administrative heights of his perch at the Rockefeller.

Rous retired from the Institute at age 65 and accepted emeritus status. An innovative and remarkably productive researcher in a high-profile area in medical research, he was recipient of the laurels of his profession. A foreign member of the Royal Society and the Royal Society of Medicine in England, he was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society (1939), the National Academy of Sciences, and several similar societies in Denmark, Norway, and France, and he received honorary degrees from eight universities, including Cambridge, Michigan, Yale, and Chicago. A winner of the Kovalenko Medal of the National Academy of Sciences, the Distinguished Service Award of the American Cancer Society, the Lasker Award, the National Medal of Science, the Paul Ehrlich-Ludwig Darmstädter Award, and the United Nations Prize for Cancer Research, his career was capped with receipt of the Nobel Prize in 1966, shared equally with cancer researcher Charles B. Huggins of the University of Chicago, whose research centered on the relationship between hormones and prostate cancer.

Rous had three daughters with his wife, Marion Eckford DeKay, one of whom, Marion, married the Nobel laureate Alan Hodgkin. Rous died on February 16, 1970.

Scope and content

The papers of Peyton Rous are a large and diverse assemble of correspondence, manuscripts, and photographs relating to the medical researcher and Nobel laureate who developed the viral theory of the origins of cancer.

The collection includes a substantial series of files relating to Rous' involvement as editor of the Journal of Experimental Medicine, providing a glimpse into his editorial philosophy, and more generally, his philosophy on medical research.

Arrangement


Series I. Correspondence	ca.1917-1970	47 linear feet
Series II. Oswald H. Robertson Material	1917-1960	0.5 linear feet
Series III. Card files and miscellaneous	1909-1950s	12 linear feet

Administrative information

Restrictions

None.

Provenance

Gift of Francis Peyton Rous, 1969; the Rous estate, 1970; and Paul F. Cranefield, 1973 (accession numbers 1969-756ms, 1970-1563ms, and 1973-2538ms).

Preferred citation

Cite as: Peyton Rous Papers, American Philosophical Society.

Other finding aids

Also described in Lily Kay, Molecules, Cells, and Life

Additional information

Separated material

Two sets of Rous's reprints were transferred to the Printed Materials Department for storage. These includes two boxes of reprints by Rous (call no. 616 pam.r) and seven boxes of reprints by other researchers (616 pam.ro).

Related material

The papers of Rous' former assistants, Oswald Hope Robertson (call no. B R546) and James B. Murphy (B M956), contain correspondence with Rous and information on their work in establishing blood banks during the First World War and after. Rous appears as a correspondent in several other collections, including the papers of Simon Flexner, Eugene Opie, Leon Cole, and Harold Amoss.

References

Renato Dulbecco, "Francis Peyton Rous, October 5, 1879 - February 16, 1970," Biographical Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences 48 (1976). Call no.: 506.73 N18b v.48.

"A notable career in finding out : Peyton Rous, 1879-1970," Rockefeller University Occasional Paper 16 (1971). Call no.: B R77r.