Duke Medical Center Archive Blog

In honor of Dr. Lefkowitz’s 50 years at Duke, we would like to spotlight his collection of personal papers that are held at the Medical Center Archives.

The Medical Center Archives began collecting Dr. Lefkowitz’s materials in 2004 with the initial transfer of two boxes of records. The collection has since grown to 410.75 linear feet of materials and is one of our largest. It documents Dr. Lefkowitz’s career and contains his professional papers, including travel and conference materials, speeches, memoranda, committee materials, awards and honors, former employee files, old equipment files, grant materials, alumni files, material… MORE

Category: News, Collection Spotlight

In honor of Dr. Lefkowitz’s 50 years at Duke, we would like to spotlight his collection of personal papers that are held at the Medical Center Archives.

The Medical Center Archives began collecting Dr. Lefkowitz’s materials in 2004 with the initial transfer of two boxes of records. The collection has since grown to 410.75 linear feet of materials and is one of our largest. It documents Dr. Lefkowitz’s career and contains his professional papers, including travel and conference materials, speeches, memoranda, committee materials, awards and honors, former employee files, old equipment files, grant materials, alumni files, material… MORE

Category: News, Collection Spotlight

“The senseless murder of George Floyd gave birth to a movement — around the globe and right here at Duke Health.”

In the summer of 2020, Duke University and the School of Medicine took steps to acknowledge and address systematic racism, both within their institutions and across the nation. Emphasis was given to the effects racism has on Black communities and individuals. On June 16, 2020, Duke University held "Living While Black," an all-day symposium bringing together distinguished Black faculty, students, and staff. Speakers discussed the history of race and racism within Duke and the United States, their personal perspectives as Black individuals at… MORE

Category: News

This is Part 1 of a multi part series on the Duke Center for Hyperbaric Medicine & Environmental Physiology (CHMEP) and the records held documenting CHMEP at the Medical Center Archives.

Part 2: “NASA, the Apollo Program, and the Duke Center for Hyperbaric Medicine & Environmental Physiology”, 

Part 3: “How Low Can you Go? Atlantis Dive Series at the Duke Center for Hyperbaric Medicine & Environmental Physiology” 

Part 4: "… MORE

Category: Collection Spotlight

Highland Hospital
Medical Center Library & Archives - Level 1
Now on Display through October 2023

Highland Hospital, a small, inpatient mental hospital located in Asheville, NC was owned and operated by Duke University from 1944 to 1980. This exhibit showcases materials from the Highland Hospital Records and provides an interesting case study of 20th century mental health care.

Category: News

This summer we rolled out some new updates to the Duke Medical Center Archives website. You might notice some slight changes to the front page, but the biggest update is a brand new portal for our finding aids.

Findings aids, also called collection guides, are detailed online descriptions of our materials. We publish a guide for every open collection in the Duke University Medical Center Archives. The guides outline the contents of the collection, explain how a specific collection is organized, and give a history of the person or organization that produced the collection.

Previously our website simply had a list of the published finding aids on one page. This new portal allows for more advanced searching with several new… MORE

Category: News

Care and Custody: Past Responses to Mental Health
Medical Center Library & Archives - Level 3
On Display: July 3 - August 12, 2023

The Medical Center Library & Archives is hosting "Care and Custody: Past Responses to Mental Health," a six-banner traveling exhibition. Developed and produced by the National Library of Medicine, it displays the history of societal attitudes towards people with mental health conditions in the United States.

In conjunction with the NLM display, a companion exhibit will be produced featuring Highland Hospital, a small, for profit, inpatient mental hospital located in Asheville, NC that was owned and operated by Duke University… MORE

Category: News

The Duke University Medical Center Archives is happy to announce that the Root Causes Records are open to researchers. The collection contains the groups’ administrative files, which date from 2017 to 2022. Files document the group's meetings, email communications, budget information, grant materials, public relations, education and outreach, event planning, articles of incorporation, and organizational structure.

Root Causes, a Duke led student group first organized in 2016, was created by health professionals with the mission to support sustainable and humane production of food in combination with access to healthy food. Through their efforts to serve, advocate, and educate they hope to involve the… MORE

Category: Collection Spotlight

Oral history interviews are some of our favorite items to share from the Medical Center Archives’ collections. This month we are featuring a recent interview with Dr. Nelson Jen An Chao. He was interviewed by Joseph O'Connell as part of the Department of Medicine's Oral History Project on March 25, 2021.  

Dr. Chao is a Professor of Medicine in the Department of Medicine at Duke University School of Medicine. His leadership at Duke includes roles as Chief of the Division of Cell Therapy in the Department of Medicine and Director of the Global Cancer Program at the Duke Global Health Institute.

He received his medical degree from Yale University and completed his Residency in Medicine as well as a Fellowship in Oncology, Medicine at Stanford University. He first came to Duke… MORE

Category: Collection Spotlight

In March 2020, COVID-19 changed and disrupted all of our lives, at Duke and around the world. Essential workers remained on site at their jobs, and those who could work remotely did; classes for students from pre-K to professional schools went online; and all planned events were canceled or postponed. All the while we lived with the fear of how this virus would affect ourselves, our loved ones, and the world around us. Nearly 3 years later, we are still collectively living through this historic time and processing the changes that ensued.

As part of our mission to preserve, maintain, document, and make available for research the permanent records of the functions of the Duke University Medical Center and Duke University Health System, the Duke University Medical Center… MORE

Category: News

Beebalm and Butterfly-Weed: Native Plants from the Medical Garden 
Medical Center Library & Archives - Level 1
On Display March 2023 – June 2023

We are excited to announce the installation of a new exhibit on Level 1 of the Medical Center Library & Archives. This exhibit will focus on the Library's Medical Garden, highlighting two of its native plants, Beebalm and Butterfly-Weed.

Category: News

In November 2021, Dr. Kevin Lindsey Thomas, MD, an electrophysiologist and Associate Professor of Medicine in Duke’s Division of Cardiology, was named the Duke University School of Medicine’s Vice Dean for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion by Dean Mary E. Klotman. The role is a first for the school, and was among the key action items outlined in the anti-racism and advancing equity strategic plan launched by the School of Medicine in June 2021.  Dr. Thomas received his undergraduate degree from Emory University and his medical… MORE

Category:

The Duke University Medical Center Archives (DUMCA) actively collects the official records of the DUMC and DUHS departments and divisions, including a variety of materials that provide evidence of business, interests, and activities through the years. In doing so, the DUMCA serves as the institutional memory of the DUMC and DUHS by collecting, preserving, and making accessible materials that provide evidence of day to operations. Guided by our collection development policy, we strive to document the intellectual, administrative, social, cultural, and visual history of the DUMC and DUHS in order to provide evidence of past actions and contribute to an understanding of the structure and history of the DUMC and DUHS. See below for a listing of materials added to the DUMCA. The types of… MORE

Category: News

The Medical Center Archives is happy to announce the donation of the North Carolina Licensed Practical Nurses Association (NCLPNA) Records by Mrs. Jessie Parker Smith, a member of the 1946 inaugural graduation class of the Durham School of Practical Nursing, as well as one of the cohorts of the “Trailblazers”, the first African American nurses hired by Duke. Mrs. Smith, an LPN, remained at nurse at Duke for over 40 years.

… MORE

Category: News

Duke Nursing Magazine is now available to users on MEDSpace. Users can view past issues here. Issues available on MEDSpace go back to 2006, and the Archives will continue to add new issues as they become available. MEDSpace is the Duke University Medical Center Archives’ Digital Repository. Digital repositories are “the technical infrastructure, services, and resources for the storage and management of digital information” (Society of American Archivist’s Dictionary of Archives Terminology)… MORE

Category: News, Collection Spotlight