Staff – Page 13

The Diversity of Hormone Therapies in the United States, 1920-1964

Staff From our researchers, Out of the stacks May 29, 2018December 16, 2019Birth control pill, History of medicine, Hormone therapy, Tuberculosis

– by Kate Grauvogel*

With the isolation of estrogens, androgens, progestins, and insulin in the 1920s and 30s, boundless therapeutic uses for hormones became possible.[i] Fertility control, mental illness, and tuberculosis were just a few of the seemingly disparate problems that researchers attempted to treat or control by regulating hormones. My research adds to this picture by showing just how varied these uses were and how the community of researchers compared and coordinated their efforts. At the Historical Medical Library of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, I discovered additional diverse uses for hormone therapies in the published works of Dr. Edward Strecker and the papers and published works of Dr. Max B. Lurie.

Battle Creek Sanitarium

Staff #TravelTuesday May 1, 2018April 17, 2018Battle Creek Sanitarium, Diets, Health food, Medical trade ephemera, Vegetarian diets

Looking for your beach bod? Some new found Battle Creek Sanitarium ephemera may be able to help you out! To read more about the company check out our digital exhibit here.

Battle Creek specialized in health foods, their most famous being cornflakes. The Sanitarium promoted a grain-heavy diet without stimulants and added sugars. Battle Creek sent out colorful ephemera to doctors and wealthy patients in hopes they would visit or buy their food through the catalogs.

Follow us on #TravelTuesday!

Staff #TravelTuesday April 30, 2018April 17, 2018Cataloguing, History of medicine, Medical trade ephemera

Welcome to #TravelTuesday! Every first Tuesday until September, Caitlin Angelone, Reference Librarian, will be showing off some intriguing, ephemera-based destinations to visit, beginning with health resorts!

Before Leprosy became Hansen’s Disease

Staff From our researchers, Out of the stacks, Voices from our collection April 4, 2018April 20, 2020Albert Ashmead, Gerhard Armauer Hansen, Hansen's disease, History of medicine, Leprosy

– by Elizabeth Schexnyder*

I’m always on the lookout for materials that have a connection to leprosy. In particular to the leprosarium established in Carville, Louisiana. Hansen’s disease is another name for leprosy.

Last year, a visitor from Philadelphia toured the National Hansen’s Disease Museum in Carville, where I am the curator. He suggested that I look into the collections at the Mütter Museum and Historical Medical Library. He thought we had much in common. And so we did.

Why Wood-n’t You Want to Be An Archivist?

Staff Intern work March 9, 2018June 21, 2018Access, Archives, EAD, Institutional records, Processing

– by Carly Schanock, Archives intern

As a graduate student in the Library and Information Sciences program at Drexel, you learn a lot about theory and read many articles about archives and archival work from those who have experience in the field. I couldn’t help but be jealous of those with practical experience in the archival field as there is only so much you can learn from reading. I’d previously done work with digital archives so I wanted an opportunity to work with physical materials. I had visited the Mütter Museum one weekend but hadn’t realized at the time that they also had a library and archives. It was during one of my graduate courses at Drexel that I had to interview an archivist. I discovered the Historical Medical Library and ended up touring there for the class. Luckily, just a short time later I received an email about an archives internship available at the Historical Medical Library and I jumped on the chance. I began my internship at the Historical Medical Library in January 2018.

The Importance of Nooks, Crannies, and Color in Researching National Negro Health Week

Staff From our researchers, Out of the stacks January 10, 2018February 20, 2018African American medical care, History of medicine, National Negro Health Week (NNHW), Public health, Roscoe C. Brown

– by Paul Braff*

In 1896, statistician Frederick Hoffman confirmed what Charles Darwin and other scientists and doctors had asserted for years: African Americans were going extinct.[1] Within the context of the burgeoning professionalization of the medical field, such a conclusion had the potential to omit African Americans from medical care, especially when combined with the preconceived racial differences of the time. Indeed, white physicians in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries frequently wrote African Americans off as a lost cause, categorized the race as inherently unhealthy, and refused to treat black patients or used heavy-handed tactics, such as forced vaccinations, to improve black health.

To fight this perception, in 1915 Booker T. Washington inaugurated National Negro Health Week (NNHW), a 35 year public health campaign, and the subject of my dissertation. Washington, and his successor, Robert Moton, ran the Week for its first 15 years out of Tuskegee Institute. After a brief transfer of control to Howard University, the U.S. Public Health Service (USPHS) decided to take over the Week in 1932. Under the leadership of Roscoe C. Brown, head of the Office of Negro Health Work, the campaign blossomed. Participation estimates increased from 475,000 in 1933 to millions by the mid-1940s as the Week became a National Negro Health Movement and increased its focus on year-round health improvement.

Vale

Staff #MedievalMonday December 18, 2017April 17, 2018Digitization, History of the book, Medieval manuscripts

Over the past 11 months, we have examined the College’s collection of all things medieval: manuscripts, incunabula bound in manuscript waste, and uncatalogued documents. Features of our medieval materials that I’ve written about include catchwords, ink (here and here), illuminations (here, here, and here), scripts (here, here, here, and here), and parchment. But what’s the point? Why study these books, leaves, and documents that are over 500 years old?