Swift and Company
Kansas City Stock Yards
Kansas City
Address All Mail To Station ‘A’
1/29/96.
Dr. Sternberg,
Bacterialogical (sic) Dept.,
Washington, D.C.
Dear Sir:-
Referring to our favor of recent date, we enclose herewith memorandum invoice covering 2 Sour Hams, shipped [to] you.
Will appreciate a copy of your report when completed on these two hams. Shipment made at the request of Dr. D. H. White.
Yours respectfully,
Swift and Company,
Per, JAH
Numbered Correspondence 1215
January 29, 1896
Mr. Wayland F. Reynolds,
Clarksburg, W. Va.
Dear Sir:
In answer to your letter of the 28th inst., I would state that there is in this Museum a microscopic slide which contains the Lord’s prayer, 227 letters, in a space 1/294 x 1/441 of a square inch.
Very respectfully,
D.L. Huntington
Deputy Surgeon General, U.S. Army,
In charge of Museum and Library Division.
Dr. Fred Pettersen
Comfort, Texas.
January 29, 1881
Surgeon General, U.S.A.
Washington, D.C.
Sir:
By to-day’s mail I have forwarded a piece muscle (biceps) taken from a girl aged 8, who died from trichinosis, the same is remarkably full with trichinae spiratis in the second stages.
Very respectfully
Your Obt. Servt.
Fred Pettersen
M.D.
Fort Larned, Kansas
Jan. 29 1878
Surgeon General
U.S. Army
Sir
I have the honor to enclose copy of receipt issued this day to me by Post Quartermaster for one box addressed to the Army Medical Museum.
The contents are,
1) One Golden Eagle – shot near here Dec 2, 1877. I have roughly dressed it so as to leave the plumage on the skeleton, that the curator may use it as preferred, applying salt or alum.
2) One skull & bal. [balance] of skeleton of a male Raccoon found dead here Dec 2, 1877.
3) I also send in behalf of Asst. Surg. W.E. Whitehead the skin & extremities of one whooping crane (I believe) shot near here in fall of 1877 – arsenic and Plaster of Paris were used.
I am, Sir, with great respect
Your Obt Servt
Francis H. Atkins
A.A. Surgeon
U.S. Army
The photographs he refers to have not been catalogued and may no longer exist. Darn it.
County Clerk’s Office
John C. Johnston,
County Clerk
Newton, Kas. Jan 29, 1885
David Flynn
Army Medical Museum
Washington City DC
Dear Sir
If you remember I was in your Department last May (1884) and you had me photographed. I am the original of Cast No 1401 Shell wound in right side of my face, Battle of Spotsylvania CH [Court House] May 10 1864. You gave me several phots. But you said if I would write you would sand me some better ones when you had more leisure to get them up. If it is not asking too much I wish you would please send me ½ doz. of each side. I had both sides of my face taken etc.
Yours Truly
John C. Johnston
Newton PO
Harvey Co.
Kansas
[1 doz Photographs sent April 9, 1885]
The world of medical museums is pretty small today, but there are still ones spread around the world. Our new copy of South Africa's Adler Museum Bulletin arrived today. Topics include disease detectives, British colonial nurses in Concentration Camps of the Anglo-Boer War, world’s first in vitro fertilisation of a gestational surrogate mother and “Do museum objects speak for themselves?” among others.
Selected by Kathleen this time.
ND [immediately following letter of January 28 1864]
Specification of jars, for Army Medical Museum
Best pure glass, ground stoppers (extra with Emory) – stopper with glass knob, as in pattern. Each stopper to be provided with a hook inside. This hook to be attached as in figure 1, & not on the bottom of stopper as in sample, the object of the change to being to gain room for suspension of object. The mouths of the jars to be as wide as possible. In case it is not possible to make stoppers to the larger jars (24 in by 10 in; 18 in by 9 in; 16 in by 8 in) then these jars must be made as in figure 2, the top edge of the jar ground level so that a plate of glass or lead may be laid over it, & tied on with bladder.
The sizes and number of the jars required by the museum are as follows
12 jars 24 inches high by 10 inches wide
12 jars 18 inches high by 9 inches wide
48 jars 16 inches high by 8 inches wide
72 jars 12 inches high by 6 inches wide
72 jars 10 inches high by 4 inches wide
144 jars 7 inches high by 2 inches wide
---
360
Gentlemen, I desire to know the price per pound at which these jars can be delivered in Washington, and also the approximate number of pounds in all. As the funds at the command of the museum are somewhat limited the number of jars ordered must depend on this information. Is the government tax included in the prices as specified?
Yrs respectfully
JH Brinton
Surgeon, USA & Curator, A.M. Museum
Mssrs Muzzey & Munro
419 Commerce St.
Philadelphia, PA
Jasmine High has been managing the Medical Illustration Service Library since last April, and handling the quality assurance on our large scanning project. She’s leaving us for the Smithsonian’s Natural History museum and we’ll miss her.
Six months after the establishment of the Museum, Civil War hospital doctors were saving material for it.
U.S.A. General Hospital No. 1,
Frederick, MD., Jany 27 1863
Doctor.
I will endeavor to pl[ea]s[e] also [illegible] to take Davis place & at any rate the specimens “shall be preserved”. Enclosed please find corrected bill.
Respectfully,
R.F. Weir
Asst Surgeon, USA
Dr. J.H. Brinton, USA
Surg. Gen’l Office
Washington, DC
Curiosity over this letter leads me to transcribe the earlier one:
U.S.A. General Hospital No. 1,
Frederick, MD., January 25 1863
Doctor.
Enclosed find your vouchers for expenditures for whiskey to preserve pathological specimens. Will you please have them settled as the money had been advanced by Dr. Davis who has recently left for England & me, heir to bones & [illegible – whiskey?] collections. When may we expect to see the new Catalogue[?]
Respectfully,
R.F. Weir
Asst Surgeon, USA
Dr. J.H. Brinton, USA
Surg. Gen’l Office
Washington, DC
The Museum’s eventual transformation into a pathology institute is foreshadowed…
Numbered Correspondence 1956
January 26, 1897
Captain John L. Phillips,
Assistant Surgeon, U.S. Army,
Fort Walla Walla, Wash.
Dear Doctor:
The specimen of testicle referred to in your letter of January 9th has been embedded and examined microscopically, with the following result: Marked fibroid thickening of the normal covering of the testicle together with such extensive interstitial change in the structure of the testicle proper as to render it extremely difficult to even make out any of the remains of the spermatic tubules, which are here and there seen as narrow crevices lined by low epithelium. The diagnosis, therefore, would be chronic interstitial orchitis, which may have had a syphilititic origin. There is no appearance, whatever, of any malignant disease.
A slide will be forwarded by to-day’s mail.
Very sincerely yours,
Walter Reed
Surgeon, U.S. Army,
Curator
This letter followed immediately after one thanking a Colonel C. Sutherland for his donation of two Indian arrowheads.
January 25, 1869
General:
It appears to me right that the contributors to the section of Indian Curiosities etc., should be notified of the transfer of their donations to the Smithsonian Institution, and I would therefore respectfully submit the enclosed “Memorandum,” and suggest that it be printed, or some modification of it, and distributed in the form, if you approve, of the Memorandum of Sept. 1868.
Very respectfully,
Your obd’t servant,
[George A. Otis]
Ass’t Surgeon, U.S.A.
Curator, A.M.M.
Bvt. Brig Gen’l C.H. Crane,
Ass’t Surg. General, US Army
