Medicine: Institute that Insulin Built

Professor Frederick Grant Banting, 38, of the University of Toronto, proceeded from his home in Bedford Road, Toronto, a warmish morning last week, to behold a concrete compliment for his isolating insulin from the pancreas (sweetbread). His University, which had already created a chair of medical research for him, this morning was going to dedicate his splendidly-equipped Banting Medical Institute. In black silk robe gaudy with doctorate trimmings of four universities Professor Banting spent a long day attending ceremonies and meals, hearing speeches, encomiums. Pat was the praise of Berkeley George Andrew Lord Moynihan of Leeds, president of the Royal College of Surgeons: “His memorial is the gratitude in the hearts of millions of [diabetic] people who owe their lives to Dr. Banting. Am I not right, when I add, he wears with becoming humility, the crown of immortality?” Throughout the long day Professor Banting said scarcely a word. He may have been thinking, as many of his lauders were, of his sudden flight to prestige. Dates best mark that progress:

1919. Returned from the War, wounded, with a military cross, expert in surgery.

1921. Persuaded a great teacher Dr. John James Rickard MacLeod, professor of physiology at the University of Toronto,— that he was on the verge of isolating pancreas hormone (insulin) which promised to be the best treatment (possibly the cure) for diabetes. He needed laboratory facilities and opportunities for clinical experiment. Professor MacLeod secured him a lectureship in pharmacology at the University of Toronto (pay $1,000 yearly). For pocket money Dr. Banting cut out tonsils.

1922. Insulin was announced as the specific treatment for diabetes.

1923. Professor of medical research (Toronto); Nobel Prize for medicine (jointly with Professor MacLeod).

*Since 1928 regius professor of physiology at Aberdeen.