Dr. Denton, another member of that first Faculty, was long remembered by his students because of his high hat and his buck-board wagon, as well as by his belief in the medical efficiency of alcohol; in which he came into violent conflict with one of his confrères and eventual successor in the Professorship of Pathology and Theory and Practice. This was Dr. A.B. Palmer, a graduate of the College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1839, who in 1854 succeeded Dr. Allen, the first of the original Faculty to go. Dr. Palmer was a conspicuous personage in Ann Arbor for many years, energetic in public welfare and a lover not only of his profession but of his professorship and its duties. One of his students remarks: "He would have been willing to get up in the night and lecture if asked, so enthusiastic was he in his efforts to help the student." He was the first member of the Medical Faculty to apply for leave of absence that he might study abroad. That was in 1858.
Other appointments of particular importance in the earlier years of the Medical Department were those of Samuel G. Armor, Missouri Medical College, '44, who became Professor of the Institutes of Medicine and Materia Medica in 1861, and of Albert Benjamin Prescott, '64_m_, who entered the same year upon his long term of distinguished service in the Chemical Laboratory and later the Department of Pharmacy, loved and honored by many generations of students. Changes in the personnel of the Faculty were frequent, however, and few men remained long enough to identify their lives wholly with that of the University. When Dr. Sager retired as Emeritus Professor and Dean in 1874, Dr. Edward S. Dunster, New York College of Medicine and Surgery, '59, was appointed to his chair, and held it until his death in 1888. Dr. Palmer succeeded Dr. Sager as Dean, but in 1887, the position passed to Dr. Ford, and then, in 1891, to Dr. Victor C. Vaughan, Mt. Pleasant (Mo.) College, '72; M.D. (Michigan), '78, the first graduate of the School to become its Dean. He has been a member of the Faculty since 1879, serving as Professor of Physiology and Pathological Chemistry and Assistant Professor of Therapeutics and Materia Medica.
As the growth of the School continued and as the field of medical knowledge widened, new laboratories and professorships were continually becoming necessary. The early history of the Anatomical Laboratory has been touched upon. Dr. Ford remained in charge until 1894, when he was succeeded by Dr. J. Playfair McMurrich, Toronto, '79, who did much for the advancement of the scientific study of anatomy until his return to Toronto in 1907, when George Linius Streeter, Union, '95, assumed the chair. He resigned in 1914, and Dr. G. Carl Huber, '87_m_, Professor of Histology then became Director of the Anatomical Laboratories. Mention should also be made in this place of the services of Dr. George E. Fothingham, '64_m_, Professor of Ophthalmology from 1870 to 1889, who for some years was connected with the Department of Anatomy and drafted the first good anatomical law.