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hec iNaaie an oa sse e Design and Production:-The Wellcome Trust gens: Department. Published by the Wellcome Trust. The Wellcome Trusti s a registered charity, no. 210183 W103-1233/400/06-1998/NC AAI 22502961239 THE WELLCOME INSTITUTE FOR THE HISTORY OF MEDICINE LIBRARY CONTEMPORARY ARCHIVES CEN AND 1 OCTOBER 1996 —- 30 SEPTEMBER 1997 STAFF CONTEMPORARY MEDICAL ARCHIVES CENTRE Archivist Julia G A Sheppard, BA, DipArchAdmin Sed SCgD eet: ¥3 “a ieee°+ e Nefeee N4e a RNG SAT reat Senior Assistant Archivist ee ene A ra "Lesley A Hall, BA, PhD, DipArchAdmin ss ee ee “ é WI ae 7 = ‘ & Sieeny ap RATAN ire se avi oid = H yi Te. Yay \\ Wel Benes ag Renee SM, ,i “—e@ yo AssiOs tant Archive is° ts oe ae oe ane Shirley Dixon, BA, DipArchAdmin Isobel Hunter, BSc(Econ), DipArchAdmin Temporary Assistant Archivist Jennifer Haynes, BA, MA, DipArchAdmin Secretary Tracy Tillotson STAFF DEPARTMENT OF WESTERN MANUSCRIPTS Curator of Western Manuscripts Richard Aspin, BA, PhD, DipArchAdmin Assistant Curator of Western Manuscripts Christopher Hilton, BA, DPhil, DipArchAdmin Secretary (part-time) Sue Chapman LOOSE GARMENTS PROTECT THE BODY AGAINST SUN, SCRATCHES BITES, AS NATIVES KNOW BY EXPERIENCE - One of a series of cartoons by Sir Harold Whittingham, illustrating ‘Health hints for warm climates’ used in a manual for British servicemen in the Second World War (PP/HEW//C.3/4) [and cover]. CONTENTS lintinalmonionem & tices ster Ws Nees Ae poe ae 2, Necessions (Wester dViamiscripts)) 22.4ee ee, 4 NCCESISC I IS CINE) PN EGE 1S APG Oa Ae leet aren oh BOR, 1 CVU appre achiogae cy le BO ea Ge ees 24 |BCICIGl NOTES:1 0/5 Sas, Mic Fam go ee eR ay Mes ee ca aan Ca 28 Consemationand reproerapliye ss Aye) aewee.. ee eo a2 eadetsmip ance ollection tise 2). ...ee ese GL,e la oD RC iromonan Dion, enn ree at, juigertl and ere cuaRenFRe ee 40 SURI TEER, ane oe ORO rree gi eo ee a See Rae 42 Miecunesraitcl comenntbees = eer G1 aN ata Jaa. a eS 44 Research; calles andl publications. 7% 5.6 2sCe.e eke 47 INTRODUCTION This year’s Annual Review covers the work of the Library’s two departments for European non-printed materials, the Department of Western Manuscripts and the Contemporary Medical Archives Centre (CMAC). The Department of Western Manuscripts continues to acquire materials for the history of medicine and related subjects in the UK and continental Europe. Most such acquisitions enter the numerical series of Western Manuscripts, but a few especially large and complex accessions are held as separate collections, akin to the CMAC collections. This year Mr Anthony Morson generously deposited his remarkable collection of family papers and records of the firm of Thomas Morson and Son Ltd, which will be treated in this way. Like many other collections, the Morson papers straddle the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and thus the theoretical dividing line between the respective responsibilities of the two departments. This points up another good reason for bringing the increasingly awkward departmental separation to an end. At the same time as the Western Manuscripts Department acquired the Morson papers, the CMAC received records of Fennings Pharmaceuticals, another firm dealing in proprietary medicines. In a year which saw the Business Archives Council’s database of records of the British Pharmaceutical Industry in the final stages of production, 1998 looks set fair to be the year of pharmaceutical archives. It is good too to be able to report that progress is finally being made with the Hospital Records Project, originally set up by the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine and the Public Record Office (PRO) in 1985. At the end of September 1997 the database was virtually ready to be mounted in the Wellcome Institute Library for final testing, before being made generally available here and at the PRO. Reviews of the Guide to the Contemporary Medical Archives Centre appeared in the Journal of the Society of Archivists and in Archives and it is gratifying to report that the former noted the national standing of the CMAC and praised the publication, while the latter commented that since its establishment in 1979 the CMAC had “proved an invaluable resource for researchers in the burgeoning field of the history of medicine”. At the end of August Jennifer Haynes left to take up a newly created post of Archivist at the Institute of Education, University of London. Jennifer had been with the CMAC for four years, on a number of temporary contracts, during which she listed several of the larger collections. She also assisted in selecting and setting up the database for the Wellcome Archives Project. She will be greatly missed. Isobel Hunter will take over the cataloguing of the Project, which is more than half completed. A one-year temporary post covering for Isobel’s work commenced in October 1997. ACCESSIONS Western Manuscripts The most important acquisition of the year was the collection of papers formed by Anthony Morson, relating to his ancestor Thomas Morson, the chemist, and the firm he founded, Thomas Morson and Son Ltd. Thomas Morson (1799-1874), apprentice apothecary, succeeded to his master’s business in the old Fleet Market in the City of London in 1821, after a peri- od of study in France. He moved to larger premises in Southampton Row in 1825, and subsequently became one of the leading British pharmacists, acting as a bridge between continental chemistry and pharmacology and the London pharmaceutical establishment. He thus did much to transform the traditional empiricism of the English apothecary. He was also a successful entrepreneur, opening a factory at Hornsey, largely for the manufacture of medicinal creosote. Later expansion included a second works at Homerton in 1869 (although Morson products continued to be retailed through the pharmacy in Southampton Row until the turn of the century). In 1901, the company’s main base of operations moved out to Ponder’s End, Enfield, at the time a green-field site. In 1957 the firm was acquired by the American conglomerate Merck. Mr Anthony Morson deposited the collection in stages during the course of the year and at the time of writing it awaits cataloguing. However, already it is clear where the strengths of the collection lie. The manufacture and sale of fine chemicals and proprietary medicines is richly documented by manufac- turing and financial records, sales literature, price lists and advertisements, largely of the later nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The Morson premises, processes and workforce are superbly recorded in a fine visual record, including a series of magnificent photographs of the Ponder’s End works taken in 1915, the year of incorporation as a limited liability company. The earliest dated acquisition of the year was a medical consilium in Latin for the recently appointed Bishop of Ferrara, Cardinal Lorenzo Magalotti (d. 1637), by the Roman physician Vincenzo della Croce, 1628 (MS.7464). This document was formerly bound in the same volume as the statutes of