Student protests during the 1908 Rectorial electio

The building in which I work used to be a medical school and there are a number of photographs celebrating its history. Here's a copy of a photo from the Wellcome Library which was taken just outside the building on Teviot Place.

Gathered at the chemistry laboratories across from the Medical School, students protested the candidacy of Winston Churchill for Lord Rectorship of the University of Edinburgh. Churchill supported the mixing of men and women in medical classes, and the development of a single curriculum. This would have replaced the separate women's programme, which lacked dissection or other hands-on practical training. Because of his unpopular opinions on medical education, Churchill lost to Conservative candidate George Wyndham.