Henry Herbert Donaldson’s (1857–1938) contribution to an organized approach to the experimental study of the mammalian central nervous system

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis article shows that the academic and research careers of Henry Herbert Donaldson (1857–1938) were directed to provide basic information about the growth of the vertebrate nervous system and to provide standards and the means to make such research efficient. He earned the reputation of making the albino rat a standard laboratory animal. His academic career began when he was an undergraduate at Yale University in 1875 and concluded with his death as Professor and Head of the Department of Neurology at the Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology of the University of Pennsylvania in 1938. During that period, pivotal experiences occurred, including research in physiological chemistry with Chittenden at the Sheffield School at Yale, graduate study at Johns Hopkins University, postgraduate study in Europe, and professorial positions at Clark University and the University of Chicago. It was at Johns Hopkins University that Donaldson learned about the need for physiological, anatomical, and psychophysical research and about the techniques to allow such research. It was at Clark University that he had first-hand and detailed experience with the anatomy of the brain of a deaf-blind-mute woman, as he attempted to correlate her sensory deficits with her brain development. It was at Clark University that he clearly recognized the need for standardization in neurological research. At the University of Chicago, he developed administrative skills and began a coordinated research effort to delimit the growth of the nervous system. It was at Chicago that he learned that the albino rat could be a reasonable subject for such research. It was also at Chicago that he was able to formulate ideas about the future organizational needs of human neuroanatomy. It was at the Wistar Institute that his research program and his professional career matured. He organized a research effort to elucidate the growth of the nervous system. He contributed to the coordination of neurological research in the United States and Europe. It was while at the Wistar Institute that he became well-known for making the albino rat a standard laboratory mammal—a convenient living material for research.