New / Old

1907 was a fiery year in McGill’s history. On April 5th, the Macdonald Engineering building was completely gutted by fire, and less than a fortnight later on April 16th, the first Medical Faculty building (erected 1872) went up in flames, destroying the Medical Library (founded 1823) and the first Medical Museum curated by Maude Abbott.

The Strathcona Building – now known as Strathcona Anatomy & Dentistry – was built in its place, opening its doors in 1909. It became known as the New Medical Building and housed the Medical Museum, Osler Library (which opened in 1929), and the resurrected Maude Abbot Medical Museum.

The following photographs show different floors of the Strathcona Medical Library in beautiful black-and-white detail: the well-lit third floor Reading Room, the librarian’s Cataloguing Room, the book stacks, the Bindery, and the empty shelves of the original Osler Library awaiting the overseas arrival of Sir William’s collection.

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Reading Room, Medical Library, New Medical Building (Strathcona), 1927.

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Cataloguing Room, Medical Library, New Medical Building (Strathcona), 1927.

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Stacks, Medical Library, New Medical Building (Strathcona), 1927.

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Bindery Room, Medical Library, 1927.

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The original Osler Library of the History of Medicine, Strathcona Medical Building, 1927.

Join us on Osler Day!

CoatOfArmsPlease join the library on this year’s Osler Day, Wednesday, November 4th, for a presentation of essays by the three finalists chosen as part of the Pam and Rolando Del Maestro William Osler Medical Students Essay Awards. The presentations will be held at 11:30 in the McIntyre Medical Building, room 1034.

The following students will be presenting their research:

Christian Dabrowski, “Between Commitment and Contentment: the Story of Norman Bethune in Montreal.”

Steph A. Pang, “Man and his Health Pavilion: An Architectural Reinterpretation of the Patient-Doctor Relationship.”

Zhu Yin Xu, “Diffusion of Medical Innovations: Minimally Invasive Surgery in China.”

Final chance to see Designing Doctors exhibit

Designing Doctors, an exhibition curated by Prof. Annmarie Adams highlighting the contributions of physicians to hospital architecture is on through August. Come and see it now if you haven’t yet had a chance! In the Osler Library lobby, 3rd floor of McIntyre Medical Building, 3655 promenade Sir William Osler.

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Royal Victoria Hospital inkwell. Photo by Don Toromanoff.

Designing Doctors showcases the Osler Library’s outstanding collection of architectural advice literature on hospital architecture.   Its focus is on the development of the so-called pavilion-plan hospital, a ubiquitous typology for hospitals in the English-speaking world in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries which maximized ventilation and daylight; their signature detail, however, was the Nightingale ward, a large, open space which typically housed about thirty patients.

Two sub-themes shape the organization of the exhibition:  the role of physicians in the design of pavilion-plan hospitals and the position of hospitals as tourist destinations.  Consequently, Designing Doctors presents a series of classic books written by doctor-architect teams or physicians who saw themselves as architectural experts. Several of these books are dedicated by or to famous figures, including Florence Nightingale, Henry Saxon Snell, and Edward Fletcher Stevens.  Included here too are delightful souvenir items featuring hospital imagery:  an inkwell, a soup bowl, hospital postcards, and a humorous board game as reminders of the wide reach of hospital architecture images in twentieth-century popular culture.

The exhibition is curated by Professor Annmarie Adams, Director of the School of Architecture, McGill University, and member of the Osler Library’s Board of Curators.

 

Exhibition: Designing Doctors

 

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Royal Victoria Hospital inkwell. Photo by Don Toromanoff.

A new exhibition highlighting the contributions of physicians to hospital architecture is up now at the Osler Library.

Designing Doctors showcases the Osler Library’s outstanding collection of architectural advice literature on hospital architecture.   Its focus is on the development of the so-called pavilion-plan hospital, a ubiquitous typology for hospitals in the English-speaking world in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries which maximized ventilation and daylight; their signature detail, however, was the Nightingale ward, a large, open space which typically housed about thirty patients.

Two sub-themes shape the organization of the exhibition:  the role of physicians in the design of pavilion-plan hospitals and the position of hospitals as tourist destinations.  Consequently, Designing Doctors presents a series of classic books written by doctor-architect teams or physicians who saw themselves as architectural experts. Several of these books are dedicated by or to famous figures, including Florence Nightingale, Henry Saxon Snell, and Edward Fletcher Stevens.  Included here too are delightful souvenir items featuring hospital imagery:  an inkwell, a soup bowl, hospital postcards, and a humorous board game as reminders of the wide reach of hospital architecture images in twentieth-century popular culture.

The exhibition is curated by Professor Annmarie Adams, Director of the School of Architecture, McGill University, and member of the Osler Library’s Board of Curators.

Through August 2013.