New York Academy of Medicine, Carte de Visite Collection
Description
The Carte de Visite Collection consists of 223 late 19th and early 20th century photographs of national and international figures in medicine and public health. This collection contains portraits both of lesser known individuals and of famous New York physicians, such as Abraham Jacobi, Lewis Albert Sayre, Willard Parker, Stephen Smith, Emily Blackwell, and Valentine Mott, as well as of many with international reputations: Robert Koch, Louis Pasteur, Hermann von Helmholtz, Rudolf Virchow, and others. New York photographers took a number of the photographs; others were created by the New York offices of such establishments as Mathew Brady, as well as by photographers in Paris, Berlin, and London. The Carte de Visite Collection is held at the New York Academy of Medicine. The New York Academy of Medicine and its library were founded in 1847 and the library opened to the public in 1878. It is now one of the largest medical library collections in the United States, and is open to the general public by appointment. Our collections include over 550,000 volumes, including approximately 32,000 volumes of rare books; 275,000 portraits and illustrations; over 1,450 linear feet of manuscript material; and 400,000 pamphlets. Strengths of the collection include anatomy, epidemic diseases, surgery, materials related to William Harvey and the circulation of the blood, culinary history, New York history and the history of public health. Together, these materials are an extraordinary resource, demonstrating our attempts to understand our bodies, minds and health across time and culture. Our collections are open to the public by appointment: library@nyam.org - (212) 822-7315 Subscribe to our blog "Books, Health and History" at nyamcenterforhistory.org. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @NYAMhistory.
