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Past Acquisitions

Selected Recent Acquisitions (Nov. 2006)

Kristine M. Gebbie, Elizabeth Standish Gill professor of nursing, School of Nursing. Papers, c. 1964-2000 (3 cubic feet). Speeches, correspondence, and other records documenting her career in public health and especially her work with AIDS policy and health reform.  The records, which are currently closed, are the first in what will be a continuing donation.

Anna Cheskis Gelman (1911-2005). Papers, 1940s-2003 (11.5 cubic feet).  Professional and personal correspondence; course materials; genealogical records; and photographs. Gelman, who was a longtime professor of epidemiology at the School of Public Health, later became a generous benefactor of the School.

Irwin Mandel, professor emeritus, College of Dental Medicine. Papers, 1960s-2004 (1.3 cubic feet).  Additions to his papers including articles and speeches, correspondence, and biographical materials.

Maternity Center Association of New York. Records, 1917-1995 (ca.110 cubic feet). Annual reports; board minutes; administrative correspondence; educational materials; newspaper and magazine clippings; scrapbooks; publications; midwifery school and childbearing center records; fundraising materials; photographs; and film.  The MCA, now known as Childbirth Connection, has been among the nation’s leading advocates for better pre-natal and maternity care and was deeply involved in the creation of modern midwifery in the United States.

Rustin McIntosh (1894-1986). Papers, 1925-1960 (2 cubic feet). Extensive professional correspondence, along with some family letters, of this eminent pediatrician who was director of Columbia-Presbyterian’s Babies Hospital (now Children’s Hospital of New York), 1931-1960. An addition to his papers. Gift of Carey McIntosh.

Presbyterian Hospital.  Surgical Casebooks, 1882-1884; 1892 (2 vols.).  An addition to the department’s extensive collection. Gift of Dr. Kenneth Forde, CUMC Dept. of Surgery.

Selected Recent Acquisitions (Dec. 2004)

Hattie Alexander (1901-1968). Papers, 1939-1945 (1 cubic feet). Lectures and speeches, drafts of publications, and grant files of Alexander, a professor of pediatrics at Columbia. Gift of Children's Hospital of New York.

Charles F. Bodecker (1880-1965). Papers, 1880s-1960s (1.5 cubic feet). Professional and family correspondence, biographical materials, educational records, reprints, diaries and an account book of Bodecker, a long-time faculty member of the Columbia University School of Dental and Oral Surgery. There are also records of his father, Charles F.W. Bodecker (d.1912), a German immigrant who practiced dentistry in New York. Gift of Dr. Albert Schatz.

Barbara Dohrenwend (d.1982). Papers, c. 1973-1981 (4 cubic feet). Psychologist who headed the Dept. of Sociomedical Science at the School of Public Health, 1978-1982. Included is correspondence with professional colleagues both at Columbia and elsewhere; reports; reprints of articles; and biographical information. Gift of Dr. Bruce Dohrenwend.

Victor Frühwald. Notebook and album, 1913-1930 (1 vol.). Notebook kept by Frühwald, an Austrian plastic surgeon, while on lecture and surgical demonstration tours in the United States in 1913, 1922-24, 1927, 1928 and 1930. Included are names and addresses of surgeons, many of whom presumably took his courses; photographs of patients before and after operations and two portrait photographs; business cards of physicians; and notes and annotations, most likely in Frühwald's hand, listing attendees at courses and fees paid.

Alfred A. Gillespie. Notebooks, 1832-1834 (9 vols.). Notes taken by Gillespie while a student at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, 1832/33-1833/34. He records lectures by John B. Beck, Edward Delafield, Valentine Mott, John Augustine Smith, Joseph Mather Smith and Alexander Stevens. Gift of the Alumni Association of the College of Physicians and Surgeons.

Albert W. Grokoest (1917-1991). Papers, 1920-1980s (1.5 cubic feet). Correspondence, largely from patients; records relating to his art collection; articles and papers; many photographs, including a series showing the examination of a patient in the Presbyterian Hospital arthritis clinic; certificates and artifacts. Grokoest (P&S 1943, Dec.) was a specialist in rheumatoid arthritis who was interested in the psychosomatic aspects of disease. Gift of Ken Browne.

Norbert Hirschhorn (P&S 1962). Diaries, 1983-2004 (53 vols.). The journals record both the professional and personal life of this physician, public health official and poet who worked both abroad and in the U.S. The journals are on deposit by Dr. Hirschhorn and are not currently open to researchers.

Karl Meyer (1899-1990). Papers, 1932-1992 (.75 cubic feet). Correspondence, general biographical materials, certificates and diplomas, photographs, and artifacts documenting the career of Meyer, a distinguished Columbia University biochemist who was the winner of the Lasker Award and many other honors. Gift of Janet Meyer Levy.

David Rothman and Sheila Rothman. Papers, 1950s-1980s (6 cubic feet). Correspondence, subject files, research notes, and printed matter documenting the careers of David J. Rothman, historian, bioethicist, Bernard Schoenberg Professor of Social Medicine at the Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons, and Director, Center for the Study of Society and Medicine; and of his wife Sheila Rothman, historian, professor of sociomedical science and Deputy Director of the Center. This is the first installment of a promised gift of the Rothmans.

Melvin Yahr (d. 2004). Leva-Dopa (L-Dopa) Patient Records, c.1938-c.1982 (18 cubic feet). Patient records documenting Dr. Yahr's clinical trials testing the efficacy of L-Dopa in treating Parkinson's Disease. Also included is a small amount of correspondence with pharmaceutical companies; patient records of the 1930s Matheson Commission on Epidemic Encephalitis; film and video.

Columbia University. College of Physicians and Surgeons. Center for the Study of Society and Medicine. Programs in Human Rights and Urban Medicine. Records, 1985-1997 (8 cubic feet). Student records, student diaries, and administrative files on the Center's programs in Human Rights and in Urban Medicine which provided internships for medical students either in third-world countries or in impoverished urban areas of the U.S. Transfer from Center for the Study of Society and Medicine.

Columbia University. College of Physicians and Surgeons. Department of Rehabilitation Medicine. Photographs, c. 1970-2000. (approx. 200 items). Included are about 150 oversize photos of patients undergoing physical therapy (c. 1970s) as well as images of departmental parties, residents and faculty. Gift of the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine.

Presbyterian Hospital. Medical Casebook: Miscellaneous diseases - Diabetes Insipidus/Diabetes Mellitus, February 7- March 7, 1898 (1 vol.). Gift of Dr. John Loeb.

Books

Our Children's Times, or Sketches of the Past and Present (London, 1856), includes one of the earliest descriptions of Florence Nightingale in book form and perhaps the first in a children's book. Gift of the Columbia University and Presbyterian Hospital School of Nursing Alumni for the Auchincloss Florence Nightingale Collection.

Ten titles, 1855-1920, including R.T. Trall's Hydropathic Encyclopedia and E. B. Foote's New Plain Home Talk on Love, Marriage and Parentage. Gift of Martin and Saara Gallin in honor of their daughter Dr. Pamela Gallin.

Ten titles, 1796-1842, of French and Italian medical books including Philippe Pinel's La Médicine Clinique.(2nd ed., 1804) and Richerand's Nuovi Elementi di Fisiologia (Palermo, 1838, "prima versione Italiana"). Gift of Mrs. Julia Garcia, from the library of her father Dr. Ignatio Colletti-Reina (M.D., Palermo, 1893).

Four psychoanalytic titles including the first edition of Freud's Der Mann Moses und die Monotheistische Religion (Amsterdam, 1939), and Anna Freud's Das Ich und die Abwehrmechanismen (Vienna, 1936). Gift of Eva Landauer from the library of her father, Karl Landauer.

              December 2004

Papers of Viola W. Bernard Opened

Archives and Special Collections at the Columbia University Health Sciences Library is pleased to announce the opening of the papers of Viola W. Bernard (1907-1998). Dr. Bernard was an eminent psychiatrist, psychoanalyst and child welfare advocate. She is perhaps best known as one of the founders of the field of "community" or "social" psychiatry, which attempted to apply psychiatric insights to the solution of social problems. Bernard was founder and Director (1956-1969) of Columbia University's Division of Community and Social Psychiatry, where she helped to train hundreds of psychiatrists and public health specialists in the field. She was active in dozens of professional, civic, educational and child welfare organizations both locally and nationally in which she - and such colleagues as Justine Wise Polier, Marion Kenworthy, Barbara Biber and others - wielded considerable influence in setting the agenda on children's issues. In addition, she became an expert in the psychological issues surrounding adoption, infertility and family formation.

Dr. Bernard's papers are over 128 cubic feet and span the dates 1918-2000. They include correspondence, oral history interviews, reports, patient records, photographs, audio and video recordings, phonograph records, printed material, newspaper clippings, and artifacts. Almost every aspect of Bernard's life, both personal and professional, is documented. The papers are particularly rich in organizational records including those of the American Psychiatric Association, American Psychoanalytic Association, Bank Street College of Education, Columbia University School of Public Health, Citizens' Committee for Children of New York, Group for the Advancement of Psychiatry, Louise Wise Services, the New York City Board of Education's Bureau of Child Guidance, Northside Center for Child Development and Wiltwyck School for Boys.

Other sides of Dr. Bernard's life that are richly documented here include her involvement with Pierre Bernard's early ashram, the Clarkstown Country Club, where she studied yoga and "Eastern philosophy;" her marriage (1934-1938) to Pierre Bernard's nephew, Theos C. Bernard, an explorer and scholar of Tibet; her involvement with various civil liberties causes during the McCarthy era; her participation in the Alger Hiss legal defense and her friendship with the Hiss family; her advocacy of greater integration of African-Americans in medicine and psychiatry and her professional and financial support of individual black psychiatrists; and her membership in numerous organizations opposing nuclear war, including the Pugwash Conferences.

Funding for organizing the Viola W. Bernard Papers was first provided by Dr. Bernard herself and, after her death, by her estate.

The finding aid for the Viola W. Bernard Papers, including a box and folder list in PDF form, can be found at:

http://library.cpmc.columbia.edu/hsl/archives/findingaids/bernard.html

For general inquiries about the papers, please contact Archives and Special Collections at hslarchives@columbia.edu

January 2004

The papers of pioneer dyslexia researchers and diagnosticians, Samuel T. Orton (1879-1948) and his wife June Lyday Orton (1898-1977) are now open at Archives and Special Collections, Columbia University Health Sciences Library. Twelve cubic feet in volume and dating from 1901-1977, the papers document the careers of both Ortons from Samuel Orton's early neurological research to June Orton's long career in the treatment of language disorders. Included are family and professional correspondence; pupil records; diagnostic and instructional materials; and articles and speeches.

These papers join the Ortons' voluminous case records (1928-1977) which have long been at Archives and Special Collections. The approximately 3,000 case files include information on patients' developmental histories and current problems; test results; examples of patients' writings and drawings; correspondence with other doctors concerning patients; summaries of lesson plans; charts; reports; and notes. Together the two collections document the Ortons' fifty-year career in the diagnosis and treatment of language disabilities.

Because of sensitive student information found throughout both collections, access will be granted to researchers only under the terms of the Archives and Special Collections Access Policy to Patient Records.

The Orton Papers and Case Records were the gift of the Orton Language Disability Trust Committee which generously supported the organizing and processing of both collections.

To access the Orton Papers Finding Aid, including a folder list, please click on:
http://library.cpmc.columbia.edu/hsl/archives/findingaids/ortonpapers.html

For more information on the Orton Case Records, please click on:
http://library.cpmc.columbia.edu/hsl/archives/findingaids/ortoncasefiles.html

For information on the department's Access Policy for Patient Records, please click on:
http://library.cpmc.columbia.edu/hsl/archives/accesspatient.html

May 2002

Weill Medical College of Cornell University Donates Rare Books to Archives and Special Collections

A collection of over 375 rare medical books has been donated by the Weill Medical College of Cornell University to Archives and Special Collections at Columbia University's Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library. While the volumes date from 1648 into the early 20th century and are in English, German, French and Latin, most are British and American works published between 1750 and 1860. The collection covers every aspect of medicine and the biomedical sciences but is particularly strong in urology, urological surgery, venereal disease and dermatology - all areas in which the rare book holdings of Archives and Special Collections had been notably weak. Authors include John Abernethy, John Bell, Hermann Boerhaave, Astley Cooper, William Dewees, Sigmund Freud, R.T.H. Laennec, William Osler, Ignaz Semmelweis, and Alfred Velpeau.

The volumes, which were underused and fell outside the scope of Cornell's current collection development policy, will now be cataloged and integrated into the rare book holdings in Archives and Special Collections.

Columbia is deeply grateful to Cornell for this generous gift and would like to particularly thank Jim Gehrlich, Medical Archivist, and Carolyn Reid, Acting Library Director, for their help in facilitating the transfer of this important collection.

March 2002

Prof. Fritz Stern donates family medical library

Family, friends and colleagues gathered on November 15, 2001 to celebrate the donation by Fritz Stern, Columbia University Professor of History Emeritus, of his family medical library to Archives & Special Collections. The 166 volumes of German monographs, pamphlets and off-prints were gathered by his father, Rudolf Stern (1895-1962), and grandfather, Richard Stern (1865-1911) both distinguished physicians and medical educators in Breslau, Germany (now Wroclaw, Poland). They document an era when medicine in the German-speaking lands was the most advanced in the world. Included are books or articles by such luminaries as Paul Ehrlich and Rudolf Virchow.

The library is particularly rich in works by clinicians and scientists with a connection to Breslau such as Albert Neisser, Bernard Naunyn, Otfrid Foerster and Ernst Ferdinand Sauerbruch. Nobel Laureate Dr. Eric Kandel, a long-time friend of Prof. Stern, spoke at the reception of the Stern family's central place in the German scientific world.

November 2001

Earlier Manuscript Acquisitions

• Marvin Opler. Papers, c. 1935-1970 (9 cubic feet): research notes, correspondence, and other materials of Opler, an anthropologist and social psychiatrist who was a member of the Midtown Manhattan Survey.


• Maya Riviere Ward. Papers, c.1920-1980 (35 cubic feet): correspondence, reports, surveys, diaries, newsclippings, printed material and photographs documenting the life and career of Ward, an expert in the rehabilitation of the disabled.


• New York-Presbyterian Hospital. Columbia University Medical Center Campus. Office of Public Affairs. Photographs, c.1900-1990 (20 cubic feet): images of a wide range of CUMC buildings, events, and activities.


• Babies & Children's Hospital. Board of Women Managers. Records, 1907-1970s (bulk 1970s) (4 cubic feet): correspondence, minutes, financial records and other administrative material
  

For more information contact Stephen E. Novak, Head, Archives & Special Collections, at (212) 305-7931 or sen13@columbia.edu