Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies

Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies
Established	1823
Type	Veterinary school
Head of School	Professor David Argyle
Location	Edinburgh, Scotland
Former names	Clyde Street Veterinary College, Dick Veterinary College, Royal (Dick) Veterinary College
Affiliations	University of Edinburgh
Website	http://www.vet.ed.ac.uk/

The Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies, commonly referred to as the Dick Vet, is the veterinary school of the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.

Professor David Argyle has been head of the school since 1 November, 2011.

History

Originally called the Highland Society’s Veterinary School, Edinburgh, the Dick Vet, as it came to be known, was established by William Dick, a former student of the anatomist John Barclay of the College of Surgeons. The first regular classes at the school were begun in November 1823, although lectures to small groups of students had been provided for four years prior to this date. That first session of regular classes was financed by student fees and a grant from the Highland Society of Scotland at Edinburgh, of which John Barclay was a director. Mary Dick, William's elder sister, was reputed to have been instrumental, from the early days, in the administration of the school. Although an autonomous institution, the students also attended the lectures in (human) medicine at the University of Edinburgh and the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh.

Clyde Street

In 1833, William Dick, who was by then a successful veterinary practitioner and teacher, paid for the erection of purpose-built accommodation near the site of his father’s forge in a Clyde Street courtyard. This was the base for the school until it moved to its next site at Summerhall in 1916. In 1839, his school officially became a College and William Dick was given the title Professor. By the time of Dick's death in 1866, the over 2000 students he had taught were to be found throughout the world. Among them were the founders of veterinary schools in Australia, Canada, Ireland and the United States. Upon his death, Dick bequeathed his College in trust to the Burgh Council of Edinburgh. It was officially named Dick’s Veterinary College following a request made by his sister, in 1873, in response to a crisis caused by the establishment of the rival New Veterinary College set up by alumnus and former Principal William Williams. Williams had taken with him the majority of the students, and the library. The two schools existed amicably within 100m of one another in Edinburgh’s New Town until 1904 when the Williams' school moved to Liverpool, England, forming the basis of the University of Liverpool Faculty of Veterinary Science. The Royal (Dick) Veterinary College was incorporated by Act of Parliament in 1906.

Summerhall

Prof. Orlando Charnock Bradley was Principal of the Dick Vet when it moved in 1916 to the south side of Edinburgh, to another purpose-designed building, at Summerhall. In 1951 the college was reconstituted as ‘The Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies’, an integral part of the University of Edinburgh, and became a full Faculty of Veterinary Medicine in 1964. Reorganisation of the university in 2002 resulted in the abolishment of Faculties, and the Dick Vet once again became The Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies, one of the four Schools within the College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine.

In 2009, Scottish Television filmed a five part documentary at the Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies. Some of the cases shown on the documentary follow a wild swan needing an endoscopy, a horse in emergency colic surgery, a skunk being neutered, a chameleon with an eye infection, and a the removal of a tumour near a cat’s heart. STV filmed a second documentary in 2010.

Easter Bush Veterinary Campus

In 2011 the Summerhall site was vacated and the staff and students relocated to an impressive new teaching building on the Easter Bush campus 7 miles (11km) south of the City. For the first time since 1962 all the veterinary facilities, together with the Roslin Research Institute, have been consolidated on this campus. The Faculty's undergraduate degree in Veterinary Medicine (BVM&S) is accredited by the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons in the UK, and by the American Veterinary Medical Association in North America.

Notable alumni

• Sir Frederick Fitzwygram, President of the RCVS (1875-77) and as such unified the veterinary profession.
• William Robertson, Principal of London Vet College 1881-87
• George Fleming, Founder of the Veterinary Journal in 1875, architect of the 1881 Vet Surgeons Act
• James Law, The first professor of veterinary medicine in the United States (Cornell)
• James McCall, Established the Glasgow Vet College in 1862
• William Williams, the Welsh veterinary surgeon who founded of the New Veterinary College in Edinburgh in 1873 (which went on to become the Faculty of Veterinary Science of the University of Liverpool) and author of several standard works on veterinary science
• John Luke Poett, the first veterinary surgeon in the Canadian North West Mounted Police.
• Andrew Smith, founder of the Ontario Veterinary College, Canada, the oldest veterinary college in the Americas
• Sir Thomas Dalling, Director of Ministry of Agriculture & Fisheries
• Sir John McFadyean, principal of the London Veterinary School and credited as the founder of modern veterinary science
• Duncan McNab McEachran, Established the Montreal Vet College in 1875
• Otello Festiri Soga, First South African veterinary surgeon
• Albert E. Mettam, First Principal of Royal Vet College, Dublin
• Sir Stewart Stockman, Built first UK research laboratories (Weybridge) President of the RCVS (1923-24)
• Sir John N. Ritchie, Chief Veterinary Officer, the highest veterinary post in the Government, Dean of Royal Vet College, London
• John Boyd Dunlop, inventor of the first practical pneumatic tyre, and founder of Dunlop Rubber Company
• Sir Alexander Robertson, CBE, MA, BSc (Aber), PhD (Edin), FRIC, FRSE
• Robin Coombs, He devised 'The Coombs Test', a critical diagnostic test for use in haematology and blood transfusion.
• Noah M. Wekesa, Minister for Science and Technology in the Kenyan Government
• Hamish Moore, Through his recordings, teaching, and pipe-making he has done much to promote the bellows blown pipes of Scotland.
• Brian Sinclair, The brother to Siegfried Farnon in Alf Wrights's (James Herriot) novels. Portrayed as Tristan Farnon.
• Harry Steele-Bodger, President of the British Veterinary Association

External links

• Official website
• "Royal support for £40m investment at veterinary college", The Herald, 13 June 2006