Harold Amos, PhD, Class of 1952

Graduated Harvard Medical School, Master's Degree 1947, PhD 1952

Born on 7 September 1918, in Pennsauken, New Jersey, Dr. Amos completed his undergraduate studies at Springfield College, Springfield, Massachusetts, graduating summa cum laude in 1941 with a major in Biology and minor in Chemistry. Dr. Amos was a graduate assistant in the Biology Department, Springfield College, until he was drafted into the Quartermaster Corps of the United States Army (1942). He served during World War II as a warrant officer in a battalion that supplied gasoline to troops; he spent two years in England before serving in France and former Czechoslovakia until his discharge (1946). Dr. Amos enrolled in the Biological Sciences’ graduate program in the Division of Medical Sciences, Harvard Medical School, in 1946, and completed his Master’s degree in 1947. In 1952, Harold Amos was the first African American doctoral graduate of the Division of Medical Sciences at Harvard Medical School.

He went on to become the first African American Department Chair at Harvard Medical School, serving as the Chair, Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics, from 1968-1971 and again from 1975-1978. His research focused on nutrition and animal cells, including the use of bacterial RNA to program higher cell protein synthesis, enzyme inductions, insulin, serum, temperature effects, ribosomes, phosphoproteins, RNA metabolism, as well as glucose starvation and glycerol and hexose metabolism.

The Minority Medical Faculty Development Program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is named for Harold Amos, who worked tirelessly to recruit and mentor minority and disadvantaged students to careers in academic medicine and science. Dr. Amos was a founding member of the National Advisory Committee of the Minority Medical Faculty Development Program and served as the National Program Director from 1989 to 1993. He died in February 2003.

The Center for the History of Medicine holds the Harold Amos Papers; the finding aid is available here: https://hollisarchives.lib.harvard.edu/repositories/14/resources/6650. More about Dr. Amos’ career is available here: https://cms.www.countway.harvard.edu/wp/?p=12742.

Year
1952
Faculty Member
Off
School Timeline
HMS
Interview
Off