Page 8 - BCMS History for 2016 Booklet FINAL2

to overlook the frailties that besets us all. This building will increasingly
become our home, and as such the center of our scientific and social
activities. Those physicians who shall come after us and call this building
their home, we trust, will always harbor a spark of divine discontent
sufficiently bright to keep them in the vanguard of medical progress.
May we not be assured that the Library housed here will more and more
serve as an antidote to professional complacency and intellectual
laziness? And may we not hope that succeeding medical generations will
testify that in this house we laid the foundation for that unity and
friendship which is so essential to the dignity and usefulness of the
medical profession? Is it too much to believe that in this meeting today,
the spirits of Dr. George Cupples, Dr. Ferdinand Herff, Dr. Frank Paschal,
Dr. F.M. Hicks, Dr. G.H. Moody, Dr. T.T. Jackson and others of that
gallant galaxy of medical pioneers, are adding their words of
commendation? And is it too much to fancy that, as their souls go
marching on, we may hear today the echo of their inspiring words: ‘Well
done’?”

In 2004, the French Place building was sold after 71 years as the home
of the Bexar County Medical Society. It had become apparent that the
society needed to move again for a number of reasons, including: 1) The
building was actually larger than the Society needed, 2) It was no longer
centrally located to where physicians work and live because most
physicians had moved their offices to the medical center area and their
homes to the Northwest, 3) The French Place building was in need of
major repairs, 4) The once attractive residential area had been replaced
by numerous apartments and other commercial enterprises.

In November of 2004, the society moved onto the sixth floor of the bank
building at 6243 W. IH-10, and was temporarily without a permanent
home. The new offices provided adequate space for staff and for the
various committee and board meetings every month, however the
regular general membership meetings of the society demanded much
larger venues to accommodate hundreds of physicians. Membership
had now exceeded 4,000.