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"The Perfect Man" on view in the Library

February 7, 2014 - 2:05pm by Susan Wheeler

The Perfect Man recently acquired by the Historical Library
 on view in the Cushing Rotunda

Join us for an exhibit tour of selected acquisitions
with curator Susan Wheeler
Wednesday, February 19, at 12 noon



In 1895, the original bodybuilder Eugen Sandow was proclaimed “the perfect man” by Dudley Sargent (YMS 1878).  In 1827, former slave Belfast Burton was paid tribute by his patients and mentor in a rare broadside testimonial circulated in Philadelphia.  In 1871, J.J. Woodward shared the first micrographs taken in sunlight with the Surgeon General.  In 1891, Victor Emile Prouvé employed the most delicate coloring to render opium’s intoxicating sleep state in an art print distributed through subscription portfolio.   In 1902, James Haran, British medical officer in newly founded Nairobi, attended all the victims of plague (the first of many outbreaks) leaving complete case records.   In 1922, artist Käthe Kollwitz created pro bono a poster announcing public events during Anti-Alcohol Week in Schöneberg, a locality of Berlin. In 1978, Rachel Romero and the San Francisco Poster Brigade plastered the city with activist art “To Hell with their Profits:  Stop Forced Drugging of Psychiatric Inmates” produced for the Mental Patients Liberation Movement.

These and other acquisitions are on view through May 2, 2014.  They are a small sampling of the substantial number of acquisitions through endowment made by the Historical Library, Cushing\Whitney Medical Library.