Letter of the Day: September 14

Curatorial Records: Numbered Correspondence 6989

 

Surgeon General’s Office,

U.S. Army Medical Museum and Library,

Corner 7^th and B Streets SW.,

Washington, September 14, 1903.

 

To the Surgeon General, U.S. Army.

 

Sir:

 

I have the honor to request authority to purchase for deposit in the Army Medical Museum:

 

1 head of viper greatly enlarged showing the fangs, poison glands and muscles, and demonstrating the mechanism of this apparatus. Cost ……..$24.00 to be paid for from the Museum appropriation.

 

Very respectfully,

 

C.L. Heizmann

Col. Asst. Surgeon General, U.S. A.

In charge of Museum & Library Division.

Sol Pargament, a long-time Museum volunteer, has died

For about a decade, Sol helped out in historical collections, identifying objects due to his long career as a medical and surgical equipment salesman. As a former salesman, Sol had an inexhaustible fund of corny jokes and stories too. He was a good man, a good friend and a real asset to the Museum. We hadn’t seen much of him since his health started failing, but he’ll be missed. – Mike Rhode

 

Sol Pargament on the far left, with other volunteers on a trip to the National Library of Medicine

Sol Pargament

http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/washingtonpost/obituary.aspx?n=sol-pargament&pid=145227787&fhid=2133

  |   Visit Guest Book

PARGAMENT SOL PARGAMENT On Thursday, September 9, 2010, SOL PARGAMENT, native Washingtonian, of Silver Spring, MD. Beloved husband of the late Florence B. Pargament; loving father of Jeffrey (Jacqueline) Pargament, Kenneth (Aileen) Pargament and Marcia (Glen) Goldmark; devoted brother of Miriam Terlitzky, and the late Albert Pargament, Robert Pargament and Florence Blank; cherished grandfather of Robert (Liz), Sherri (Robert), Ellen, Jonathan (Jessica), Matthew, and Benjamin; dear great-grandfather of Reid, Claire and Emma. Also survived by his companion, Jeanette Diamond; nieces, nephews and many friends. Funeral services will be held Sunday, September 12, 3 p.m. at Danzansky-Goldberg Memorial Chapels, Inc., 1170 Rockville Pike, Rockville, MD 20852, 301-340-1400. Interment to immediately follow at King David Memorial Gardens, Falls Church, VA. Family will be observing Shiva following interment through Tuesday evening at the residence of Marcia and Glen Goldmark. In lieu of flowers, expressions of sympathy in Sol''s memory may be made to Hadassah. www.danzanskygoldberg.com

Published in The Washington Post from September 11 to September 12, 2010

 

Burns Archive post-mortem photos on display in NYC

Friend of the Medical Museum Dr. Stanley Burns has an exhibit of post-mortem photographs from his collection on display in New York City. Here’s the Times on it:

 

Now Showing | The Graceful Dead

By ANDREW BELONSKY

September 9, 2010

http://tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/09/now-showing-the-graceful-dead/

Letter of the Day: September 13

Post Hospital

Fort Clark Texas

Sept. 13. 1883

 

To

Col. J.S. Billings

Surgeon US Army

Curator Army Medical Museum

Washington D.C.

 

Sir:

 

In reply to your communication of the 5^th Inst. I regret to say that no specimen was preserved in the case of Pvt. George W. Trump. Co. K 19 Infantry who died June 15^th 1885 of embolism of Right Middle Cerebral Artery.

 

The specimen removed in this case became, under examination, much broken down and torn (through softening of the brain structure), and was through to be of too little value to forward to the Army Medical Museum.

 

Very Respectfully,

Your Obt. Servt.

F.L. Town

Major and Surgeon US Army

Post Surgeon

Walter Reed born today

The Mutter Museum calendar, always an interesting item, notes that Walter Reed was born today in 1851.

 

Letter of the Day: September 12

Camp Letterman Hospital
Gettysburgh (sic) Pa, Sept. 12th 1863

Sir

Yours of the 11th is just received. As a general rule Medical Descriptive Lists have not been forwarded with patients sent to Baltimore and Philadelphia because, except those transferred by special order, nearly all those recently sent have been well or so nearly well that their Surgical histories could be completed. When cases terminate the histories are classified and compiled in a book ruled like the enclosed form. I was intending to forward the lists to you as soon as this was done; but you will save yourself a great deal of labor if you will wait until the compilation is done. You have no idea how difficult it has been to get even such poor histories as those I send to day. I have approved Dr. McArthur to attend to the compilation and have directed him to send the lists back unless they were tolerably satisfactory, in many cases this has been done several times before any thing of the least use could be obtained. Many of the Medical officers who have been relieved have left no records behind or records so imperfect as to be useless.

At the time your keg of whiskey was received there was no whiskey at the dispensary to I exchanged it for alcohol. We are now saving a considerable quantity of postmortem specimens, mostly injured bones and joins. Some cheap spirits for their preservation would be acceptable.

Except in very rare instances no capital operations are now performed.

It will be impossible for me to make a report and tabular statement of all the gunshot wounds for the month of July. On the 27th of May Dr. Letterman ordered that the monthly reports of the different corps hospitals should be made through the Medical Directors of the Corps to him. I suppose the reports for July were forwarded accordingly. At that time I had not sufficient clerical assistance to do my ordinary every day business, much less to consolidate the tabular statements.

The Corps registers have been copied and the names arranged alphabetically; except the registers of the 6th and 12th corps, none were complete, and that of the 1st Corps containing, according to Dr. Ward the Surg. in charge, 2200 names was taken to the [illegible], contrary to my orders, before it was copied.

As soon as the men are sufficiently recovered to need no further surgical treatment we send them off; the Union men to Philadelphia and the Confederates to Baltimore; very few, if any, will be able to serve in the field again.

Respectfully
Your obt. servt.
Henry James
Surg. U.S.A.

Surg J. H. Brinton U.S.A.

Letter of the Day: September 11

Certified list of articles contained in one package, turned over to the Post Quartermaster for shipment to the Surgeon General U.S.A.

No of packages and how marked
One package.
Marked:
Surgeon General U.S.A.
Washington, DC.
For Army Medical Museum

Contents
One kidney (human)
One bladder (“)

How packed
Air tight tin box enclosed in a wooden box

I certify that the above list is correct.

Henry S. Haskins
Actg Asst Surg. U.S.A.
Post Surgeon
Camp Halleck Nevada
September 11, 78

New World War 1 scrapbook donated to Archives

Here’s information on one of our latest acquisitions – a really interesting scrapbook from the Great War.

 

 

Guide # OHA 213.5 Leach Scrapbook

 

Album of photographs of World War I facial case reconstructions and other surgical injuries. Dr. Charles Leach Sr. was born July 2 1884, and got a BA in Chemistry and an MD from Stanford University. He interned at San Francisco General Hospital in 1910. He joined the Commission for Relief in Belgium in 1916, then the US Army Medical Corps in 1917. From 1919-1920, he worked for the American Relief Administration. In 1920-1921 he earned a MPH from Johns Hopkins and after that joined the Rockefeller Foundation. For the rest of his career, he worked in public health. Dr. Leach died in 1971.

 

 

 

 

Letter of the Day: September 10

Jarvis

U.S. Army General Hospital,

Late Steuart’s Mansion,

Baltimore, Md., Sept. 10^th, 1863

 

Sir:

 

I have the honor to enclose herewith the histories of six specimens, which have this day been sent by Adams + Cos Express Co. to the Surgeon Generals Office.

 

I am Sir,

Very Respy

Yr Obdt Servt

DeWitt Peters

Asst Surgn USA

 

Sugn J.K. Barnes

Surgeon Genl USA

Washington DC

Letter of the Day: September 9

United States National Museum

Under Direction of

The Smithsonian Institution

Washington Sept. 9. 1886

 

Dear Sir:

 

I venture to request that you will lend me, for a few days, the mounted skeleton of Logenorhynchus acutus [aka Atlantic white-sided dolphin] in the Army Medical Museum. I have a paper on the genus Logenorhynchus in preparation and am desirous of comparing an authentic European specimen of the species referred to with others from our own Atlantic coast in this museum.

 

If you find it possible to grant my request, I will arrange to send a wagon for the specimen.

 

Very respectfully

 

Frederick W. True.

Curator of Mammals

 

Dr. J.S. Billings, U.S.A. +c

Director, U.S. Army Med. Museum.

Washington

 

Answered by Dr. Billings in person Sept 11. 86.

 

Prof True sent for No 2489. Sect. Comp Anatomy Sept 11, 1886, + the specimen was delivered to the messenger.

Letter of the Day: September 8

The Hague, Holland

Sept. 8^th 1886

 

Dr. John S. Billings,

Surgeon US Army

Washington, D.C.

 

Dear Sir,

 

Your letter of June 19^th was duly received by me, but not sooner answered on account of your absence mentioned in it.

 

After due consideration, I think it better to renounce my possible appointment as a clerk of the Army Medical Museum, employed for special duty.

 

I am sorry the great uncertainty as to the time of my appointment, and the terms relating to it oblige me to take this decision.

 

Very respectfully

 

Dr. H. ten Kate

Smithsonian's physical anthropology staff in newspaper

 

Natural History Museum's Origins of Western Culture hall will close for a 3-year renovation

By Jacqueline Trescott
Friday, September 3, 2010; C01

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/02/AR2010090204957.html

 

Letter of the Day: September 7

Indianapolis General,

Sep. 7^th 1868.

Brvt Maj Genl. J.K. Barnes, U.S.A.

Surgeon General.

 

Sir,

 

I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of a  circular, headed, “Memorandum for the information of Medical Officers.”

 

I have in my possession the skull of a New Mexico Indian, which I know nothing of the history of, except that it was brought direct from there by Mr James B. Dunlap – deceased - + given to me.

 

The skull is at your service. Please inform me how I shall send it, if you wish to have it in your collectin.

 

Your Obt Servt,

F.S. Newcomer,

A.A. Surg, U.S.A.

President McKinley's nurses

According to the NY Times, President McKinley was shot today by anarchist Leon Czolgosz at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, N.Y. in 1901. Here's a related picture from our collection.


The Hospital Corps Men who served as the male nurses of President McKinley until his death. Private Ernest Vollmeyer, Acting Hospital Steward Palmer A. Eliot, and Private John Hodgins. Photographed at the Pan-American Exposition, Buffalo, NY, 1901. CP 2459

Letter of the Day: September 6

Dear Doctor:

I have been called upon to give testimony in a criminal case - in which there is a bullet wound of the head with extensive fracture of the skull – and no external marks of violence.

Would I be asking or troubling you too much in requesting you to send me such photographs as will have a bearing upon the case, such as will illustrate the average amount of fracture of the skull from bullets, + especially pistol shots.

Also such as will illustrate well authenticated cases of fracture from “Contre Coup.”

With great respect
I have the honor to be-
Very Sincerely,
Your Obdt Servant
A. Van Deveer

^^^^

Respectfully submitted to the Surgeon General, U.S.A. for instructions. A certain number of the illustrations contained in the Army Medical Museum on the subjects referred to have been photographed and prints have been furnished to two medical men of Albany, engaged in a medico-legal inquiry – possibly the same to which Dr. Van Derveer refers.

George A. Otis
Ass’t Surg. USA

SGO
Sept. 13. 69.

^^^^

Let him have them if in hand --

Letter of the Day: September 5

U.S.A. Post Hospital,
Fort Niagara, N.Y., September 5, 1879.

Asst. Surg. G.A. Otis, U.S.A.
Washington, D.C.

Sir:

In looking through one of the old volumes of the Medical History of the Post, I found this memorandum. These old relics are now in the Hospital Dead House. If you would like to have them sent on for the Army Medical Museum I will have them packed and turned over to the Post Quartermaster for transportation to you.

Very respectfully,
Your obedient servant,
William Wilson
Asst. Surgeon, U.S.A.
Post Surgeon

^^^^

Shot and Shell!
--+--

Relics of the Siege of Fort Niagara, N.Y., in 1759, -- fired by the forces of General Prideaux, and Sir William Johnson, --the Fort being held by the French.

These missiles were picked out of the old walls of the Fort when those walls were taken down, preparitory (sic) to the building of the present ones in 1843 and immediate subsequent years. The walls were of logs, set upright and with pointed logs or timbers projecting over the top.

These articles, several hundred points in weight in all, were in the keeping of the Engineer, Brevet Colonel Wilson, and Asst. Engineer, Mr. J. Lawrance, until sold at auction with other engineer property in the spring of 1874:

I procured these pieces of the purchaser at the time of sale.

John H. Bartholf,
Captain & Asst Surgeon, U.S.A.

Fort Niagara, N.Y.
September 1, 1874

The pieces alluded to above are pieced selected by Dr. Bartholf from those sold at auction + will weigh say about 40 to 50 lbs.
W. Wilson.

^^^^

The specimens were assigned number 1001, Sect 4, but then “These specimens were turned over to the Ordnance Department, October 3, 1879.”

Letter of the Day: September 4

Curatorial Records: Numbered Correspondence 906

Sept. 4, 1895.

Mr. Nathan Joseph,
641 Clay Street,
San Francisco, Cal.

Dear Sir:-

Your letter of August 28th, addressed to Dr. J.S. Billings is received.

In reply I would say that the offer therein contained is respectfully declined, as the Army Medical Museum contains a certain number of the skulls described by you,-- sufficient for its purposes, and is not now in a position to enlarge in this line.

Very respectfully,

D. L. Huntington
Depty. Surg. Genl., U.S. Army,
In Charge of Museum and Library.

Letter of the Day: September 3

Curatorial Records: Numbered Correspondence 905

Health Department, District of Columbia
Washington, September 3rd, 1895

Dr. Walter Reed,
Curator, Army Medical Museum,
Washington, D.C.

Dear Sir:-

I send you herewith a dog killed on the 1st. instant and alleged to have had hydrophobia. If you can kindly arrange to make the necessary tests, I shall be greatly obliged.

Very respectfully,
Wm. C. Woodward M.D.
Health Officer.

Letter of the Day: September 2

War Department,

Surgeon General’s Office,

Washington, DC, Septbr. 2^nd, 1870

 

General,

 

I have the honor to report that in obedience to instructions from the Adjutant General’s Office, dated September 1^st, 1870, I have this day re-enlisted Hospital Steward Geo. A. Jones, to date from August 31^st, 1870, and have ordered the steward to report in person, fro duty, to the Surg Genl.

 

I herewith resp. transmit a copy of his enlistment papers.

 

E. E. Townsend

Letter of the Day: September 1

Curatorial Records: Numbered Correspondence 1627

 

Fort Reno, Okla. Ter.

Sept. 1, 1896.

 

Dear Doctor:-

 

The photographs of the malarial parasite were duly received. If I do not hear from you to the contrary, I shall consider that you meant to have me keep them.

 

There were no cases of malarial fever during August at this post. But if I am again unable to find the parasite in a case which I feel certain from other evidence is malarial, I shall certainly take advantage of your very kind offer and send on some dried specimens.

 

With many thanks, I am,

 

Very truly yours,

 

Sam Q Robinson

 

Major Walter Reed,

Surgeon, U.S.A.

Army Med. Museum.