Division of Medical Sciences (1957 to Present)
The U.S. National Museum was reorganized on July 1, 1957, into two units, the Natural History Museum and the Museum of History and Technology. At the same time, and in view of the widening scope of the Division, its more scientifically based planning, and the constantly increasing collection with equal emphasis on all branches of the healing arts, the Division’s title was changed to the Division of Medical Sciences—the title it still bears in 1964. With the reorganization, the Department of Engineering and Industries, under which the Division fell administratively, was renamed the Department of Science and Technology of the Museum of History and Technology. It was also the first time since its establishment in 1881 that the Division had two curators, for on July 1, 1957, Dr. John B. Blake joined the staff.
Figure 19.—Curators John B. Blake and George Griffenhagen examine the newly acquired (1957) electromagnetic, Morton-Wimshurst-Holz Influence Machine. It was manufactured by the Bowen Company of Providence, Rhode Island (1889). With the discovery of x-ray, it was used for making x-ray photographs until early in the 20th century.
As a result of these changes, the Division was subdivided into a Section of Pharmaceutical History and Health and a Section of Medical and Dental History. The former was planned to encompass the collections of materia medica, pharmaceutical equipment, and all material related to the history of pharmacy, toxicology, pharmacology, and biochemistry, as well as the Hall of Health which was opened November 2, 1957, and which emphasizes man’s progressing knowledge of his body and the functions of its major organs.[18] The latter Section was planned to include all that belongs to the development of surgery, medicine, dentistry, and nursing, especially in relation to hospitals.
In October 1957, the Division acquired a collection of rare, ceramic, drug jars which included two, 13th-century, North Syrian and Persian, albarello-shaped, majolica jars; a 15th-century, Hispano-Moresque drug container; and a 16th-century, Italian faience, dragon-spout ewer. During the following two years, Curator Griffenhagen periodically toured museums and medical and pharmaceutical institutions in this country, South America, and Europe gathering specimens and information for the Division and for publication, respectively. However, on June 27, 1959, he resigned his curatorship to join the staff of the American Pharmaceutical Association in Washington, D.C. Dr. Blake became the curator in charge of the Division and Mr. Griffenhagen was succeeded on September 24, 1959, by the author of this paper as associate curator in charge of the Section of Pharmaceutical History and Health.
Dr. Blake, as curator of the Section of Medical and Dental History, acquired a large number of valuable and varied specimens for the Division’s collections. They included optometric refracting instruments, an early 1920’s General Electric, portable, x-ray machine, the Charles A. Lindbergh and Alexis Carrel pump (designed in 1935 to perfuse life-sustaining fluids to the organs of the body), the Sewell heart pump (1950) to control delivery of air pressure and suction to the pumping mechanism, and a large and valuable collection of dental equipment formerly at the universities of Pennsylvania and Illinois. Dr. Blake wrote the explanatory material and supervised the design and production of the majority of exhibits in the renovated hall of medical and dental history. He also contributed several scholarly articles and a book (see bibliography) on the history of the healing arts and public health in particular. He resigned on September 2, 1961, to join the staff of the National Library of Medicine as chief of the History of Medicine Division, and was succeeded by the author as curator of the Division. From the summer of 1962 to April 1964, the Division benefited from the expert advice of Dr. Alfred R. Henderson as consultant in the preparation and designing of the surgical and medical exhibits of the Museum of History and Technology.
During the period from 1961 to May 1964, the Division’s collections expanded greatly through its medical, dental, and pharmaceutical acquisitions. Specimens of antiques acquired from 1961 through 1963 numbered up to 1,539 and included gifts from leading institutions and individual philanthropists. The scope of these gifts and acquisitions ranges from electronic resuscitators, microscopes, x-ray equipment, and spectacles, to patent medicines, amulets, apothecary tools, dental instruments, and office material of practitioners.
Figure 20.—Exhibit on spectacles, lorgnettes, optometers, and refraction, completed in 1960. It features a cross section of the Division’s large collection of eyeglasses. (Smithsonian photo 47943-D.)