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Project completion: Pennsylvania Hospital Historic Image Collection 

Forwarded to STHC-L (The Science, Technology, and Health Care Archives Forum) from ARCHIVES.

Russell Johnson
STHC-L administrator

----- Original Message -----
From: Stacey Peeples [peepless@PAHOSP.COM]
Date: Tuesday, January 6, 2004 8:38 am
Subject: Pennsylvania Hospital Image Collection Project Complete

Pennsylvania Hospital Image Collection Project Complete

The Pennsylvania Hospital is proud to announce the completion of an
eighteen-month, NHPRC-funded project to process and preserve the
Pennsylvania Hospital's Historic Image Collection. The collection, which
spans 150 years of Hospital history, contains thousands of images, all of
which are now organized, preserved, and individually identified in an
Access database. The Pennsylvania Hospital wishes to thank the NHPRC for
their support, without which the collection would not now be accessible.

The Pennsylvania Hospital's Historic Image Collection consists of over
20,100 unique photographic prints, slides, and negatives, which document
the history of the hospital from the dawn of photography to the end of the
20th Century (c.1850-1997). The photos cover numerous subjects, including,
but not limited to, patient care activities, Hospital architecture, nursing
school activities, and Hospital events. The most abundant group of images
in the collection is comprised of thousands of portraits of hospital
personnel, from prominent doctors to support staff members. The images in
the collection not only paint a complete picture of Pennsylvania Hospital's
own unique past, but also provide a more generalized view of the evolution
of medical and social history. Images of treatment devices used
throughout the years, as well as photos of surgical procedures and patient
care methods, clearly depict the abundant advances in medical technology
over the past century.

The vast majority of the images in the collection were taken in
Philadelphia at the Pennsylvania Hospital, with the exception of the World
War I & II photographs, which visually document the activities of Hospital
personnel overseas during military conflict. Many of the earliest
photographs in the collection were taken by well-known Philadelphia
photographers, including Frederick Gutekunst, William H. Rau, and Gilbert
Bacon; however, the bulk of images were taken between 1948 and 1984 by
hospital staff photographer Robert S. Halvey.

Before the project began, the images were in no discernable order, and
hence access to the collection was extremely limited. However, now the
images are clearly arranged by format, subject, and date, and are easily
accessible.

To further facilitate access, each individual image has been entered and
described in an Access database, and the collection has been entered into
Franklin -- the University of Pennsylvania's Online Catalog. Finally, some
200 images from the collection, along with a detailed finding aid, will be
available at the Hospital's Historic Collections website

http://www.pahosp.com

for researchers to view.

As it is extraordinarily diverse, the collection would be both interesting
and useful to anyone interested in the history of Pennsylvania Hospital, or
in the history of medicine in general. Questions may be directed to the
Hospital Archivist at (215) 829-5434.
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