Architecture Notes

Event ID 710739

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Architecture Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/710739

ED/6901 is mentioned in the catalogue slips as being a Chrystal Collection photograph of Summerhall Square but is actually of Union Street and Antigua Street.

REFERENCE : Plans for the United Presbyterian Church previously on the site of the Royal (Dick) Veterinary College: Peddie & Kinnear 1866

NMRS - Historical File

'There had been in 1793 or 1794 a proposal to start a Veterinary College in Edinburgh, by James Clark, Veterinary Surgeon in the City and Farrier to His Majesty for Scotland, but nothing was done till, in 1821, the School of Arts began to function in the Freemason's Hall in Niddry Street, and the earnest and forceful William Dick volunteered to deliver there, without fee or reward, a course of lectures on Veterinary Science. This he again did in the following session.

William Dick's father, John Dick, Smith and farrier, had come from Aberdeenshire and had set up his forge at different places, but latterly in 1815, he settled at no 15 Clyde Street. William studied under John Barclay, one of the leading scientists of the day, at no 10 Surgeon Square, and in 1817 journeyed to London to attend Camden Town School; and there the following year he obtained the Diploma of Veterinary Surgeon. IN April 1823, the Highland Society took up the matter of tuition, and a Committee recommended William Dick as lecturer in Veterinary Surgery; the forge and appendages for the practical instruction of County Farriers, were those belonging to the father in Clyde Street. The Highland Society's Veterinary School was thus established, though till 1829 the lectures were held, it is said, in the Calton Convening Rooms, the first lecture being given on 24th November 1832. About 1830 Dick added a stable for the treatment of sick animals.

The accommodation, however, proved to be too restricted, and in 1830 a new building was planned to contain a Lecture Room and Museum, Dissection Room, Infirmary and Forge; and this, erected by R & R Dickson, Architects, was opened in 1833. The dwelling of Dick and of his sister Mary, who acted as his Secretary, was in the upper parts of the building. In 1866, in his 73rd year, Professor Dick (as he had been styled his 1839) died, but not before the College has extended to take in all the buildings within the lanes at the sides and at the rear, except a small property at the North West Corner. As described by Dr. Bradley in his history of the College, the buildings at that time and substantially till the major alterations of 1886, were arranged around four sides of an oblong yard, entered from Clyde Street by an Archway; on the West side were stables and loose boxes, above which were the Lecture Room, Museum (connected with Dick's dining room by a door) and a small library; through the archway on the right was the forge and above this the Dissecting room, reached by an outside stair; while beyond was a house occupied during many years by Dick's assistant, William Worthington; and on the North side was a Chemical Laboratory and a hall, the latter used for examinations and let for the public meetings and the meetings of a religious body. He left the whole of his estate in Trust, the revenue to be applied in the interests of the College; the Lord Provost, magistrates and Council were named as Trustees, and it was they who appointed the new Principal. In 1868 a petition seems to have been presented to the Trustees praying that the College should move to another part of the Town, partly on the grounds of inadequate accommodation. Little seems to have been eventuated at this time, but in July, 1868, some 18 years later, Dean of Guild Court Warrant was granted for extensive alterations on the building to relieve pressure on the accommodation, the small property at the North-West Corner of the site only part of the block not already in possession - having been acquired in December of 1885, at the price of £600.

In 1873, The Principal of the time, on a disagreement, left, with the majority of the students, to establish another school, and it was consequently agreed that the name 'The Dick Veterinary College' should be adopted; it is remarked by Dr Bradley that the title 'Royal' was apparently only assumed in 1874.

In 1905 an agreement was reached whereby the Trustees transferred the direction of the College to a new Board of Management on which the Corporation, University, Highland and Agricultural Society, and the Edinburgh and East of Scotland, with West of Scotland and the Aberdeen and North of Scotland Agricultural Colleges, were represented. Also, represented were the Trustees of William Dick's sister, Mary, who undertook to give the college the sum of £11,500 or thereby, of the residue of her estate for the endowment of 'The Mary Dick Chair of Physiology' and about £13,000 to the University for the endowment of 'The Barclay and Goodsir Chair of Comparative Anatomy'; and Alex Inglis MacCallum, MRCVS, who paid over £15,000 for the endowment of a Chair, and who later contributed £10, 500 to the new building fund. BY the agreement the College was to be incorporated under the name of 'The Royal Dick Veterinary College, Edinburgh' and the University was to obtain power to grant degrees in Veterinary Science. Such degrees were instituted in 1911, the year in which Dr Bradley became Principal of the College.

It now became the concern of the new Board to consider the improvements of the accommodation, and a committee appointed to enquire into the circumstances reporting adversely, David McArthy, LRIBA, was asked to prepare plans of such alterations and extensions as might meet the case. Further consideration, however, led to the resolve to erect new buildings on a more extended site. In 1908, therefore, it was agreed that the Old brewery shown on the Ordnance Survey Map of 1852 and the adjoining houses, at Summerhall at the East end of the Meadows should be purchased and after long consideration of plans and estimates of cost, in 1913 the demolition of the old buildings was begun, and actual building began later in the same year. On Tuesday 21st July 1914, a fortnight before the outbreak of the Great War, the Memorial Stone, which rests beneath the threshold of the Main Entrance, was laid in position by the Marquess of Linlithgow. The circumstances of the War provided some difficulty and delay, but at the commencement of the Spring Term in January 1916, The First, Second and Third year classes, and in April of the same year the Clinical Department and the Fourth year classes were transferred to new buildings. The front of R & R Dickson's buildings of 1833, except for the upper part - that above the main cornice, has been incorporated in that of the St Andrew Square Picture House now occupying the block in Clyde Street. The figures of a horse, couchant but alert, which had surmounted the Clyde Street building has been placed over the archway leading to the MacCallum Clinical Department of the New College buildings, while the seated figure, in stone, of William Dick which had had its place under the clock in the yard, is now set on its pedestal in the quadrangle of the new College. The Library of the new building forms the College War Memorial. What appeared in 1916 to provide ample accommodation for the work of the College, had in 1937, the year of the death of Principal Bradley, led to a large scheme of extension owing to the increasing number of students; and in 1939 the Board of Management issued an appeal for funds to complete, at that time, the most urgently needed Animal Husbandry Block. This was apparently embodied in the wing at the back of the extending northwards and with an unpretentious front to Hope Park Terrace.