Early Pharmacopoeia Influences

Throughout the nineteenth century, members of USP's Committee of Revision sought communication and cooperation with their British counterparts. USP's first president, Samuel Latham Mitchell, received his medical degree from the University of Edinburgh, and the Edinburgh Pharmacopoeia was used as a foundation for the Massachusetts and New York Pharmacopoeias. Together these compendia were USP's main predecessors, and the influence of their layout and style can be seen in the 1820 USP. George B. Wood, USP Committee of Revision Chairman, traveled to London in 1850 to meet with the members of the Royal College of Physicians, publishers of the British Pharmacopoeia, to harmonize formulas and nomenclature. Later, in the 1860s, the Committee of Revision delayed publication of the USP until they were able to review the newly published British Pharmacopoeia's system of weights and measures, again demonstrating interest in harmonization. In addition to the British Pharmacopoeia, members of the early Committees of Revision also were well acquainted with contemporary pharmaceutical research from France and the French Pharmacopoeia of 1818.