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It turns out that the breed “Sauteur d’Alfort” means “Alfort jumper.” Etienne Letard was a French veterinarian\n(1890-1983). He is remembered for his work in genetics and reproduction. Living\nin Australia or the USA, we hear little about celebrated French veterinarians. The\nfirst veterinary school in the world was at Lyon and created in 1761. It has served\nas a model for all European veterinary schools. Alfort veterinary school was\nestablished shortly after in 1766 under the name of the Royal School of\nVeterinarians at Paris. Other European schools were founded in rapid succession,\nand the first English-speaking school was the Veterinary College of London in\n1791. By comparison, the first veterinary school in the US was the Veterinary\nCollege of Philadelphia, which started in 1852. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the 1920s, genetics applied to breeding\nwas only in its infancy, and not much was known\nabout the heredity of quantitative traits: researchers comprehended little, other\nthan Mendel’s laws. Letard observed and wrote about various peculiarities and\nanomalies in animals such as the Rex coat in rabbits, alopecia in dogs and cats\nand locomotor disorders in rabbits, which helped to stimulate new interest in Mendelian\nlaws in domestic animals. His work on the Rex rabbit, which has curly whiskers\nand eyelashes (but the coat is generally too short to display curling) showed\nthese animals frequently developed keratitis from curling eyelashes. Practical conclusions were drawn from Letard’s\nwork on these genetic variations and applied to breeding animals. In 1924, Letard\npointed out the possible applications of artificial insemination in the breeding\nof animals. In 1937, he made the first public demonstrations of insemination in\na cow. He was also the first to publish methods of semen dilution,\nconservation, and transport.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There is a building constructed in the\n1950s named after Letard on the grounds of Alfort. It is soon to be demolished.\nWill veterinarians and students still remember Letard? I was pleasantly\nsurprised when I showed pictures and a video of the Alfort jumper that most\npeople knew of the rabbit and Letard. Veterinary students at Alfort will still\nprobably know of Letard from his famous rabbit. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
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In November 2015, the Camille Guerin\nbuilding was opened. It houses pathology and other analytical diagnostic\nservices. Who was Guerin? He is the veterinarian (1872-1961) in the\nabbreviation BCG (Bacillus Calmette-Guerin) of the famous vaccine that protects\nagainst tuberculosis. When I was doing my post-doctoral fellowship at\nRockefeller University, one of my mentors,\nErnst Friedheim (1899-1989), a pathologist, microbiologist and chemist who\ndeveloped drugs that saved the lives of many victims of sleeping sickness and\nother tropical parasitic diseases, told me the story of how Guerin cultured the\nBCG. Calmette and Guerin worked out a way to culture Mycobacterium bovis in a\nmedium consisting of cow bile, potatoes and glycerin. They repeated the culture\nevery three weeks, starting in 1908. Every three weeks they took a dose of the\nculture and injected it into guinea pigs to see if they lived or died. The guinea\npigs died. However, in 1921, after 231 passages in subcultures during 13 years,\nexperiments in guinea pigs showed that the virulent tubercle bacillus had\nbecome attenuated to a nonvirulent but genetically stable form. This was the\nfamous BCG bacillus. Ernst (who invented melarsoprol) asked at what point did\nthe repeated subcultures become stubbornness versus optimistic expectation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n