When Mary died in 1933, her brain was sent to Ales Hrdlicka, the Smithsonian's "bone doctor." The Post couldn't find any records that Mary or her family consented to this. So what happened to Mary's brain? And what is the extent of the Smithsonian's "racial brain collection"?

"Brain desirable," Part 1

"Brain desirable," Part 2

Watch the videos

"Searching for Maura": Animated illustrated reporting. Also available on YouTube.

"Paghahanap kay Maura": Animated illustrated reporting. Also available on YouTube.

How The Post reported on the Smithsonian's human remains. Also available on YouTube.

Order "Searching for Maura" and "Paghahanap kay Maura"

Maura came to St. Louis from the Philippines to be put on display at the 1904 World's Fair. Records suggest that after she fell ill and died, a world-renowned anthropologist took part of her brain. Few people would know what happened to her for more than a century.

Available in English and Filipino. Order your copy now.

Tune in on Washington Post Live

The Post's Nicole Dungca interviews Michael Blakey, a member of the newly created Smithsonian human remains task force, about The Post's year-long investigation and how the organization is reckoning with this history. Watch the interview.

About the reporters

Claire Healy is a freelance journalist and newsroom copy aide who has written for The Post.

Nicole Dungca is an investigative reporter for The Post.

Andrew Ba Tran is an investigative data reporter for The Post.

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Who are we?

Mike Rhode was the chief archivist of the Museum from 1989-2011, and is the founder of this blog. I maintain an interest in the course of the museum, and will be posting relevant information.

The Army Medical Museum was founded in 1862 during the American Civil War. After World War II, a parent-child relationship was inverted and the Museum became part of the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology. Since then, the Museum has moved around Washington, stopping for years in Ford's Theatre, and on the National Mall where the building it shared with the National Library of Medicine once stood, until it was demolished in 1968 for the Hirshhorn Museum. For 35 years it was at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, and now is in Silver Spring, MD.

So what about that blog name?

It's historical. I found it in a quote from one of the former curators. World War II confirmed the Army Medical Museum's primary role in pathology consultation. James Ash, the curator during the war and a pathologist, noted, "Shortly after the last war, more concerted efforts were instituted to concentrate in the Army Medical Museum the significant pathologic material occurring in Army installations." He closed with the complaint, "We still suffer under the connotation museum, an institution still thought of by many as a repository for bottled monsters and medical curiosities. To be sure, we have such specimens. As is required by law, we maintain an exhibit open to the public, but in war time, at least, the museum per se is the least of our functions, and we like to be thought of as the Army Institute of Pathology, a designation recently authorized by the Surgeon General."

After the war, it evolved into the tri-service Armed Forces Institute of Pathology.

A Repository for Bottled Monsters

Pages

Monday, February 26, 2024

WaPo articles on Smithsonian human remains collections

Smithsonian should speed up return of human remains, task force says

The Collection

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