The Harvey Cushing and John Hay Whitney Medical Library is the central library of the Yale School of Medicine, Yale School of Nursing, and Yale-New Haven Hospital in New Haven, Connecticut. [1]
The Library was built in 1941 as a Y-shaped addition to the Sterling Hall of Medicine designed by Grosvenor Atterbury with funds from the estate of John William Sterling. The Library was renovated and enlarged in 1990 with funds from Betsey Cushing Whitney. The architects were Alexander Purves and Allan Dehar. After the renovation, the Library was named for Betsey Cushing Whitney's father, Harvey Cushing, the pioneering neurosurgeon, Yale graduate and Sterling Professor, and her husband, John Hay Whitney, the businessman, Yale graduate and philanthropist. [2] The library was again renovated in 2019. [3]
The Medical Historical Library was founded by Harvey Cushing, John F. Fulton, and Arnold C. Klebs in 1941 and possesses an internationally important collection of early and rare books, manuscripts, and other materials related to the history of medicine. Much of the early organization was carried out by Madeline Stanton, who was a librarian there from 1949 to 1968. [4] Among its treasures are numerous rare medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, including works of Islamic and Persian provenance. Its holdings of printed books are spectacular and include over 300 medical incunabula as well as significant gatherings of Hippocrates, Galen, Vesalius, Robert Boyle, William Harvey, and S. Weir Mitchell in historical editions. The Clements C. Fry Print Collection possesses rare prints and drawings from the last four hundred years with outstanding examples by James Gillray, George Cruikshank, William Hogarth, Honoré Daumier and others. [5]
The Edward C. Streeter Collection of Weights and Measures features one of the most geographically and historically comprehensive collections of weights and measures in the world. The Library also houses hundreds of important manuscript and papers collections from the last four centuries. Some of its important individual collections include: Harvey Cushing Papers, John Farquhar Fulton Papers, Charles Goff Collection on Christopher Columbus, Grace Goldin Historic Hospital Image Collection, Arnold C. Klebs Papers, Laetrile Collection, Averill W. Liebow Papers, Meyer & Macia Friedman DNA Collection, S. Weir Mitchell Papers, Peter Parker Papers and Lam Qua Portraits, Ivan P. Pavlov Papers, Herbert Thoms Papers, G. D. Hsiung Papers, and the Tobacco Advertisement Collection.
The Library's collections cover clinical medicine and its specialties, the pre-clinical sciences, public health, nursing, and related fields. They also include the Historical Library's distinguished holdings. The library now holds over 416,000 volumes. [2] As of 2016, the Library provided Yale users with access to over 23,000 online journals in the health sciences, as well as licensing bioinformatics tools, clinical point-of-care reference tools, and systematic review software. [6] [7] Library staff provide a range of information services [8] for Yale users, including interlibrary loan and document delivery; [9] classroom training on literature searching, citation management, and other research skills; [10] one-on-one consultations; expert searching for projects including systematic review and meta-analyses; and video production services for the Yale curriculum. The Library hosts an extensive collection of free online instructional videos on topics including database searching, citation management, evidence-based practice, and research impact. [11] In addition to its collections and information services, the Library hosts wellness programming including weekly drop-in mindfulness practice [12] and visits from a therapy dog. [13]
The Cushing Center, located within the Library, serves as a museum dedicated to the life and work of Dr. Cushing. It contains a collection of brain tumor specimens from Dr. Cushing's patients, [14] photos of the patients, [15] a range of personal documents and memorabilia related to Cushing, and some of the highlights of the Medical Historical Library's special collections. It is open to the public for visit, with weekly guided tours and group tours available upon request. [16]
Harvey Williams Cushing was an American neurosurgeon, pathologist, writer, and draftsman. A pioneer of brain surgery, he was the first exclusive neurosurgeon and the first person to describe Cushing's disease. He wrote a biography of William Osler in three volumes.
The Yale School of Medicine is the graduate medical school at Yale University, a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. It was founded in 1810 as the Medical Institution of Yale College and formally opened in 1813.
Sterling Memorial Library (SML) is the main library building of the Yale University Library system in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Opened in 1931, the library was designed by James Gamble Rogers as the centerpiece of Yale's Gothic Revival campus. The library's tower has sixteen levels of bookstacks containing over 4 million volumes. Several special collections—including the university's Manuscripts & Archives—are also housed in the building. It connects via tunnel to the underground Bass Library, which holds an additional 150,000 volumes.
Greentree is a 400-acre (1.6 km2) estate in Manhasset, New York on Long Island. The estate was constructed for businessman Payne Whitney in 1904 and was owned by members of the Whitney family for much of the 20th century. It is currently owned by the Greentree Foundation, a philanthropic nonprofit organization.
John Hay Whitney was U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom, publisher of the New York Herald Tribune, and president of the Museum of Modern Art. He was a member of the Whitney family.
Betsey Maria Cushing Whitney was an American philanthropist, a former daughter-in-law of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and later wife of U.S. Ambassador to the Court of St James's, John Hay Whitney.
Yale New Haven Hospital (YNHH) is a 1,541-bed hospital located in New Haven, Connecticut. It is owned and operated by the Yale New Haven Health System. YNHH includes the 168-bed Smilow Cancer Hospital at Yale New Haven, the 201-bed Yale New Haven Children's Hospital, and the 76-bed Yale New Haven Psychiatric Hospital, making it one of the largest hospitals in the world and the largest in Connecticut. It is the primary teaching hospital for Yale School of Medicine and Yale School of Nursing.
Peter Parker was an American physician and a missionary who introduced Western medical techniques into Qing Dynasty China, at the city of Canton. It was said that Parker "opened China to the gospel at the point of a lancet."
Lam Qua, or Kwan Kiu Cheong (關喬昌), was a Chinese painter from the Canton province in Qing Dynasty China, who specialized in Western-style portraits intended largely for Western clients. Lam Qua was the first Chinese portrait painter to be exhibited in the West. He is known for his medical portraiture, and for his portraits of Western and Chinese merchants in Canton and Macau. He had a workshop in 'New China Street' among the Thirteen Factories in Canton.
The Yale University Library is the library system of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. Originating in 1701 with the gift of several dozen books to a new "Collegiate School," the library's collection now contains approximately 14.9 million volumes housed in fifteen university buildings and is the fourth-largest academic library in North America.
Arnold C. Klebs was a Swiss physician who specialized in the study of tuberculosis. Born in Bern, Switzerland, Arnold Klebs, the son of renowned bacteriologist Edwin Klebs, was raised in the presence of an extensive array of scientists, artists, and historians. In his teenage years, Klebs was one of Switzerland's pioneer bicycle racers.
Mary Benedict "Minnie" Cushing was an American socialite, philanthropist and art collector.
Stephen Evan Malawista was an American medical researcher and Professor of medicine within the rheumatology department of Yale University. Malawista is credited as the co-discover of Lyme disease and led the research team which identified the disease.
John Farquhar Fulton was an American neurophysiologist and historian of science. He received numerous degrees from Oxford University and Harvard University. He taught at Magdalen College School of Medicine at Oxford and later became the youngest Sterling Professor of Physiology at Yale University. His main contributions were in primate neurophysiology and history of science.
Gustaf Elmer Lindskog was a thoracic surgeon and the William H. Carmalt Professor of Surgery and chair of surgery at the Yale School of Medicine, best known for having participated in the first pharmaceutical treatment of cancer.
Madeline Earle Stanton was a personal secretary to American neurosurgeon Harvey Cushing. She served as librarian of the Medical Historical Library at Yale University from 1949 to 1968.
Mildred B. Codding was an American medical illustrator. Her illustrations are featured in numerous textbooks and academic journal articles.
Ira Vaughn Hiscock was a bacteriologist and a leading authority on public health. He was an innovator of comprehensive health surveys throughout the United States and Samoa, and led various panels of the World Health Organization.
Herbert Thoms (1885-1972) was an obstetrician and gynecologist who was an early advocate for natural childbirth and birth control. Thoms was chairman of the medical advisory council of the Connecticut Planned Parenthood League in 1961, when the league started a legal battle against state laws that restricted access to birth control.
William H. Helfand was a collector, author, and authority on the history of medical ephemera and quackery. His many donations are held across numerous research institutions.