By the fall of 1947, veterans had swollen University enrollment to an all-time high, had overflowed from the Houses to converted barracks at Fort Devens, and had bred 2500 babies. This baby boom worried the Hygiene Department and Cambridge pediatricians: how were student fathers, supported only by G.I. subsistence, to pay for the medical care which their children needed? The Harvard Pediatric Study has provided that care since October, 1947--free medical treatment for children of student fathers, veteran and non-veteran alike. Financed by research funds from the United States Public Health Service and the Children's Bureau, the Study is collecting data on children's medical needs, and will publish a report within a year after it closes this May.

Sore throats, infected cars, and wheezing and coughing are baby's chief troubles, says Dr. Francis C. McDonald, the Concord physician who heads the Study. In its first year, 1,500 children were treated at the Study's Fort Devens and Mount Auburn Street clinics and in home visits by Study doctors. Since the close of the Fort Devens project last year, 1,200 have been on file at the Gold Coast building, the University's rent-free contribution to baby care. Jim Cronin hopes to annex the child clinic, originally his beer emporium, after the pediatricians move out in May.

The staff--one full-time and six part-time doctors, two full-time nurses, and a three-man research team--has found that most parents ask for medical service only when it is really necessary. One exception, the doctors agree, is a mother who telephoned last spring, announced the arrival of her baby's first tooth, and asked if she should buy him a tooth brush.

For the patients, most of whom are under three years of age, the Pediatric Study has been an undeniable success. A play corner, equipped with crayons, colored paper, and a rattle, keeps babies busy while they wait to be examined. When the doctor is ready, a nurse lures the child away from his play with the promise of lollypops just around the corner, indeed right inside the doctor's office. The bait has been so successful that lollypops have won infant praise for the Mount Auburn Street project: each patient leaves licking, and liking pediatric study.