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The original LSU School of Medicine Building.

When the LSU School of Medicine in New Orleans began planning its Diamond Jubilee, no one could have guessed that conditions at the school's 75th anniversary would bear so much resemblance to those of the school's first year of existence.

Construction of the medical school began in March 1931, and classes began Oct. 1 of that year, said Dr. Russell Klein, associate dean of alumni affairs of the School of Medicine.

"The buildings were not completed when classes started," Klein said. "It was one of the shortest gestations of a medical school in history."

Only one floor of the eight-story LSU Medical Center building was opened when classes started, Klein said. The first students were a small transfer class of juniors and a larger class of freshman.

Since Hurricane Katrina, LSU's schools of medicine and dentistry have been operating at temporary sites in Baton Rouge. Both are expected to return to New Orleans in August. While this time around the school buildings are ready, it's the housing for students, faculty and resident physicians that is lacking.

Klein said the Diamond Jubilee has been scaled back considerably to "a minimalist approach."

With all the challenges facing New Orleans and its residents, as well as the medical school, its faculty and students, it did not seem appropriate to proceed as the school originally planned, Klein said.

Gone are the Lucite diamond favors for attendees. Gone are the special purple-and-gold tablecloths and the mandatory black tie and formal dress. Gone as well is the re-creation of the founding event of the medical school, complete with a portrayal of Huey P. Long. Even the site of the celebration, the Fairmont Hotel, is gone. The Diamond Jubilee will now be held Jan. 7 at the Hilton.

"It's not going to be as big. It's not going to be as fancy, but I think it's going to be meaningful for the school and perhaps meaningful for the city," Klein said.

The event will also be a sort of welcome back to New Orleans, Klein said. Marking the school's 75th anniversary bears out the validity of the saying that life goes on.

In the post-Katrina environment, even everyday activities have taken on a new significance, said Klein, who like thousands of other New Orleans residents is living in Baton Rouge.

Now everything a person does, whether it involves visiting a favorite restaurant or buying gasoline at his preferred gas station, is another small step toward normalcy, Klein said.

Not much about the school of medicine's beginnings could have been considered normal, unless you were Huey P. Long. The idea that the LSU system should establish a medical school had percolated for decades, Klein said. There were even mentions of a medical school as far back as the 1870s.

Nothing was ever done about it until 1930, when Long decided the state needed a medical school here "to train Louisiana boys," as he put it, Klein said.

The formation of the school and the appointment of its first dean took place on Jan. 4, 1931, during a special meeting of the LSU Board of Supervisors, Klein said. On that day, Long summoned the board to his suite at the Roosevelt Hotel, now the Fairmont, in New Orleans.

Legend has it that Long attended the two-hour meeting in his pajamas.

In short order, the board passed a resolution appointing Dr. Arthur Vidrine the first dean of the school, Klein said. Not surprisingly, there wasn't a lot of discussion about Long's candidate for the job.

Vidrine, a surgeon and Rhodes Scholar, graduated from Tulane School of Medicine. In 1935, when Long was shot in Baton Rouge, Vidrine was the doctor who unsuccessfully attempted to save the governor's life.

The school's history is filled with colorful characters, although none more so than Long.]

Dr. Urban Maes, the first chairman of surgery at LSU, was described as a first-rate educator and a man of very strong opinion, according to the school's Web site. One contemporary, Dr. Edgar Hull, admiringly called him a "tyrant."

Maes' strong personality helped him hold the school together in 1945 when Beryl I. Burns, the medical school's dean, was fired and the head of Tulane University's Department of Athletics, Wilbur "Bull" Smith, installed in his place, according to the medical school history. Maes led a revolt that saw the faculty resign en masse. Eventually, the Tulane athletic department head was canned and replaced by a member of the medical school's faculty, Dr. George W. McCoy, and the school's faculty returned.

Maes served as surgery chair from 1932 to 1954.

For more information on the Diamond Jubilee or the LSU School of Medicine's history, go to www.medschool.lsuhsc.edu.

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