Background and Purpose. Professional (entry-level) education in physical therapy, as an enterprise distinct from, yet central to, the profession of physical therapy as a whole, has reached a level of maturity at which there is value in reviewing its development. The authors identify major elements of importance in professional education, including the nature and institutional setting of professional education programs, curriculum content and design, and characteristics of students and faculty. Major events and developments are highlighted for each major element. Methods and Materials. Information has been drawn from published materials dating from the 1910s through the end of the 20th century and from archival records maintained by individual professional education programs and professional organizations in or related to physical therapy. This information has been augmented by the authors’ personal experience of professional education during the years from the 1940s through the end of the century. Summary of the Literature. Comprehensive reviews of professional education in physical therapy have been conducted at various points in time. Detailed analyses of different aspects of physical therapy education have been published throughout the 20th century. Comprehensive, but nonscholarly, histories of the profession of physical therapy, including discussions of events pertaining to professional education, also have been published, most recently in the mid 1990s. Conclusion. The article provides an overview of the history of professional education in physical therapy.

A thorough discussion of professional (entry-level) education in any field needs to address a variety of related topics, including curriculum content and format, institutional setting and program resources, faculty and student characteristics, and program standardization and accreditation. Fortunately, a number of these specific concerns are addressed in other articles in this special issue. This article, while not attempting to do complete justice to the remaining topics, will highlight the major issues and developments that occurred during the 20th century in regard to curriculum content and design, faculty and student characteristics, and institutional setting of professional education in physical therapy.

Put yourself in the position of responding to the hypothetical requests for information that are interspersed throughout this article. What might you emphasize in response to each one? How might your response have varied in each circumstance?

Lucy C_

Boston, Mass

Dear Cousin Lucy, February 21, 1918

I was so excited to hear that you have decided to apply to be one of these new Reconstmction Aides. It sounds so thrilling! I have been thinking that maybe I could do that, too, if I could get into a training program this summer, rather than going to normal school as I had planned. Could you tell me more about it? Where would I have to go to get training, and what would it be like?

I’m sorry you were not able to be home for Christmas . . .

Your loving cousin, Beth

The Cedars, Park City, Iowa

If Beth was considering attending normal school in the fall, she almost certainly would have been much too young to become a Reconstruction Aide, the lower age limit for applicants being 25 years.2 Her cousin Lucy, if she was entering training in the Boston area, had open to her a choice of three programs that had been identified by the Office of the Surgeon General of the Army, the American School of Physical Education, the Boston School of Physical Education, and the Posse Normal School of Gymnastics.3 Another East Coast school also was identified by this time, the New Haven Normal School of Gymnastics. Later, in 1918, a new training program was instituted at Walter Reed General Hospital under the auspices of the Medical Department of the Army. If Beth had been of an age to consider entering a Reconstruction Aide program, she would have found one nearer to hand at the Normal School of Physical Education in Battle Creek, Mich. Or she could, as did many individuals from all over the country, have attended the program at Reed College in Portland, Ore.4 If Lucy had already received training considered appropriate for a Reconstruction Aide, she might eventually have refined her knowledge and skills under the direction of Janet Boyd Merrill at the advanced training program established jointly by Harvard University and the Boston Children’s Hospital in 1918.

Both the Reconstruction Aide training programs authorized in January 1918 by the Office of the Surgeon General of the ArmyS and acceptable physical education programs were expected to have provided the potential Reconstruction Aide with knowledge and skills in the areas of massage and corrective exercise, with emphasis on the application of these interventions to pathological conditions. The programs identified as of January 1918, were-with the probable exception of the one at Battle Creek-situated within institutions with established, relatively standard physical education certificate or degree-awarding programs. Even though the Reconstruction Aide training programs in these institutions were much shorter in length-rarely lasting longer than 3 months-than the full preparation for physical education, they did incorporate such basic course work as anatomy (structural and functional), pedagogy, and various sports as well as the medically oriented courses in pathology,6 massage, and corrective exercise.7 Clinical application was closely integrated with didactic work, with students typically spending part of the day in supervised clinical practice and the remainder in class.