FALK LIBRARY MEDICAL MEDALS FOUND

Medal of Andreas Vesalius

Ten years ago, I told the readers of The E-Sylum of an unusual discovery of medals in the library offsite storage. I made some assumptions at that time, which passing time corrected. Since I researched, described, and mounted an online exhibit of these medals in 2014, I know now that my declaration in 2012, December 23rd issue of The E-Sylum that some medals have no ties to medicine was premature. I just could not see the connection at the time I wrote the announcement.

The most obvious example is medal of famous German poet, Johann Friedrich von Schiller, who had a medical degree and worked for several years as physician before changing his career. Another speculation I made was to suggest that some of the missing medals had been sold before the rest of the collection was donated to the library. They were not! Last month I made a new discovery that proves how far off was my guess.

Before we had internet and Google search to rely on, librarians had many home-grown resources to assist them in searches for patrons. One of these useful tools from the past is an old reference file of portraits of famous physicians, organized alphabetically by name. It is not used anymore, but we still keep this vast assembly of images gathered by the former Falk Library librarians in our historical collections.

The boxes with hundreds of folders with images were moved (together with the rest of rare books and special collections) to the newly renovated space just before the pandemic-related closure of the library. Last month I noticed that labels for this collection had faded so much they are not readable anymore. Recreating labels required opening each box to read folder names. Digging into folders was not necessary. However, since I was working on a project about Andreas Vesalius, I could not resist opening his folder. I am glad I did, because this is how I discovered a bronze medal commemorating the father of modern anatomy. I found not only a medal but also a topic for my next library newsletter article!

While working on it, I realized that it is one of the missing medals and I decided to go back to the portrait file and check folders for others. Acting on a hunch to check for all previously missing medals was worth all the work. I found 14 medals commemorating the greatest names in medicine and biological sciences buried in the portrait file. They are no longer missing! They are on display in the Falk Library lobby. In the fall, we will describe, photograph, and add them to our online exhibit of Medical and Scientific Medals at Falk Library.

To view the online exhibit, see:
Medical and Scientific Medals at Falk Library (https://www.hsls.pitt.edu/medical-and-scientific-medals)

To read the earlier E-Sylum articles, see:
QUERY: MEDICAL MEDAL DONOR IDENTITY AND NEW DONORS SOUGHT (https://www.coinbooks.org/esylum_v15n53a16.html)
VIDEO: MEDICAL AND SCIENTIFIC MEDALS AT FALK LIBRARY (https://www.coinbooks.org/esylum_v18n26a13.html)

	NBS (coinbooks.org) Web