Steven J. Peitzman MD: Medical School Architecture in Philadelphia: A Very Short History

With its numerous medical schools and hospitals, Philadelphia has provided work for local architects famous and obscure. This short illustrated review will focus on the Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania and Hahnemann Medical College in the period from the 1870s to 1940, with a quick look at Philadelphia’s newest medical school tower. These questions will shape the presentation: how did the external appearance of a new medical school building aim to “make a statement” ? And how did the interior design reflect changes in American medical education?

Steven J. Peitzman is a 1971 graduate of Temple University School of Medicine. He spent most of his career at the Medical College of Pennsylvania (the former Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania) practicing and teaching internal medicine and nephrology, as well as offering elective courses in the history of medicine. He is now partly retired, but still teaches at Drexel University College of Medicine, and works with medical students at a free clinic. He is widely recognized as an historian of medicine; his areas of publication include the history of nephrology, medical education, and medicine in Philadelphia. In recent years, he has brought together his historical and architectural interests as an active preservationist.