Awards

Distinguished Alumni Service Award - 1953

About Arthur R. Metz

One of Chicago’s foremost physicians and surgeons, Dr. Arthur R. Metz was born in South Whitley, Indiana, in 1887, and came to Indiana University in 1905.

After receiving a medical degree from Rush Medical College, Metz served during World War I in the Armed Forces. After the war, Metz worked as a physician. A devoted doctor, Metz most notable contribution (though there are many) to the medical world came in 1924, when he developed barium meal, which became universally adopted as a means by which the gastrointestinal tract could be X-rayed.

Examples of Metz’s prominence in the medical field include acting as the personal physician to Philip Wrigley, chairman of the Wrigley Company, and the team doctor for the Chicago Cubs.

In 1948, Metz created the Metz Foundation, an organization that aimed to help medical students with financial assistance.

The foundation funded medical scholarships at Northwestern University, where Metz had taught, and at Indiana University. Since that time, the Metz Foundation support to IU has grown exponentially, and now provides funding for numerous scholarships as well as important campus initiatives. Current contributions include funds to the Department of Theatre and Drama, the Arthur R. Metz Distinguished Scholarships, the Wells Scholars Program professorship endowment, the Arthur R. Metz Medical Scholarship, and the Arthur R. Metz Carillon. The foundation also funded the construction of a special suite on the sixth floor of the Indiana Memorial Union which has been frequented by such dignitaries as Mikhail Gorbachev and His Holiness the Dali Lama.

In 1953, IU presented Metz with the Distinguished Alumni Service Award, though Metz’s service didn’t end there. In 1956, he became the national chairman of the Annual Giving Campaign Also, from 1960 until his death, Dr. Metz served on the Board of Directors for the Indiana University Foundation.

Professionally, Metz was associated with numerous medical organizations. He was a founding member of the Certified American Board of Surgery. An avid outdoorsman, he enjoyed yacht racing, deep-sea fishing, and big-game hunting in North Africa.

To this day, he is remembered as a scholar, soldier, surgeon and philanthropist, whose main goal in life was to better the lives of others.