Francis William Schofield
Korea’s Norman Bethune

More famous in Korea than in Canada, Dr. Frank Schofield was, nonetheless, highly respected throughout North America during his long career on the staff of the Ontario Veterinary College (OVC) as a bacteriologist and veterinarian. In Canada he is remembered mostly for his discovery of a new disease of cattle that would become known as sweet clover disease. Affected cattle might die quietly from internal hemorrhage or, more obviously, after a minor operation. The blood just would not clot! After much experimentation, Schofield demonstrated that mouldy sweet clover in silage was the cause. With further well controlled experiments Schofield identified and isolated a chemical substance that prevented blood from clotting in cattle.

It took two decades before scientists realized that Schofield’s extract could be refined and used as a clinical anticoagulant. His stimulated studies on the U.S.A. and Canada to determine which of the many factors in blood coagulation were failing to work.

K.P. Link and his team at the University of Wisconsin were eventually successful in the development of two new drugs, Dicumarol and Warfarin, which have been used successfully for many years for treating coronary thrombosis and for preventing strokes. All this took place between 1921 and the 1950s. Basically, it is a Canadian discovery (OVC/University of Guelph). This is an interesting reverse comparison to Heparin that was discovered in the U.S.A. at Johns Hopkins University and refined for clinical use in Canada at the University of Toronto. 

In 1916, Dr. Frank Schofield, a 27 year old doctor of veterinary medicine from the University of Toronto, went to Korea as a medical missionary to be an instructor in bacteriology and hygiene at the Medical College of Yonsei University in Seoul. While speaking out against Japan's harsh colonialism there, he maintained close relationships with underground Korean leaders until he was deported by the Japanese in 1920. [Photo, courtesy Special Collections, University of Guelph Library]
In 1910 Schofield led his class when he graduated with a Bachelor of Veterinary Science degree. The college immediately recruited him as an instructor and graduate student, and, during the next six years, he earned a fine reputation as researcher and teacher. As a teacher he was admired for his clarity and eloquence but feared for his strictness and rough-tongued criticism.

In 1916 Schofield went to Korea as a missionary of the Presbyterian Church in Canada to teach bacteriology in the medical college of Yonsei University, the first modern medical school in Korea. He soon became fond of the Korean people and they of him as he tried to learn as much as he could about them by cycling extensively around the country. In Korea, as in Canada, Schofield lived austerely but gave generously to the poor and needy. Korea was then a colony of Japan and a strong Independence Movement was developing with which Schofield sympathized openly. In 1919, there was a demonstration that became violent; because he was evidently involved, he was expelled from Korea in July of 1920. Returning to Canada via Hawaii, he may have called on Syngman Rhee, president in exile of Free Korea. What is certain, however, is that after Schofield retired from the Ontario Veterinary College in 1955, Syngman Rhee invited him to return to Korea. This he did in 1958, returning to teaching at the National University after a 38-year interval. He never returned to Canada. When he died in Korea in 1970, he was buried in the National Cemetery, the only foreigner to be interred there at the time.

When he returned to Canada in 1920 following his expulsion, Schofield had no trouble finding a job, first with his former teacher and hero, Dr. John Amyot, head of the Laboratory of the Provincial Board of Health. Amyot also had him appointed assistant professor of hygiene in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Toronto. In 1921 the Ontario Veterinary College claimed him back as professor in charge of pathology and bacteriology. There, until he retired in 1955, he worked, with relentless energy, mostly on infectious diseases of farm animals. He had no use for pets: to him they were “useless chattels of the privileged.” 

Dr. F.W. Schofield's tenure at the University of Guelph, both as teacher and researcher, was a productive, 33-year career.  His outstanding discovery that a substance in mouldy sweet clover, later identified as dicumarol, prevented blood from clotting, formed the basis of modern anticoagulant therapy in humans.  When he retired in 1955 as professor and head of the department of pathology at Guelph, he was ceremoniously recognized, as viewed here, by the Hon. F.S. Thomas, Ontario's Minister of Agriculture.  [Photo, courtesy Special Collections, University of Guelph Library]
In 1989, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of Schofield’s birth, lavish celebrations organized in Korea included a reception at the Canadian Embassy in the Seoul YMCA. Celebrations were held, too, at the Ontario Veterinary College in Guelph. Of the many honours awarded to Schofield, most came shortly before or after his retirement. An early one in 1954 was from the Ludwig Maximilian University in Germany. The citation contains the clause, “and who in those years in which our people suffered from hunger and poverty set an example of remarkable humanity and generosity towards the young students of Germany.” What this refers to remains a mystery. Another honour of 1954 was the Ste-Eloi Medal from the College of Veterinarian Surgeons of Quebec. After his retirement he received two honorary degrees from two Korean universities and two high awards from the Korean government. From his alma mater, the University of Toronto, he received an LL.D. in 1962.

J. Ken W. Ferguson