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The National Academy of Sciences was created, along with numerous other organizations, by the signing of the Act of Incorporation by President Abraham Lincoln on March 3, 1863. The Academy was designed to be a science-based organization that would provide aid and information for other branches of the United States Government. After the signing of the Act of Incorporation, the National Academy of Sciences was officially organized on April 22, 1863 during a meeting in the University of the City of New York’s chapel. The Academy did not have an established base of operations until a vote decided in 1870 that Washington, DC, would serve as the organization’s headquarters. Even after the establishment of a location, however, the Academy did not have an actual building until decades after its founding. In 1900, the Washington Academy of Sciences began to raise money in order to construct a building to house scientific organizations in the area, and in 1913, it seemed as though Congress would provide land to house the prospective building. The funds needed could not be raised by the involved parties, however, and as a result, the project fell through.By 1916, it became clear to the federal government that the Academy was of consistent use to them for their technical and scientific expertise, and efforts to raise money for a permanent building resurfaced. By 1919, sufficient funds were raised to craft the building, and plans went into motion for selecting sufficient land, an architect, and the actual construction of the building. Construction began in July of 1922, and on Monday 28th of 1924, the building was completed and an opening ceremony was held to commemorate its completion. The building still serves as the base of operations for the National Academy of Sciences today.

A view of the National Academy of Sciences building.

The land where the building now stands was a marsh within an undeveloped space until the end of World War I

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) 

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Founded in 1863 through an Act of Congress signed by Abraham Lincoln, the National Academy of Sciences is a non-profit private organization that serves to further scientific research and knowledge. Currently, the National Academy of Sciences is part of the International Council for Science, and is headquartered in its main building in Washington, DC. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on March 15, 1974.

Listen to an overview of this building and the organization by Dr. David Trowbridge

National Academy of Sciences Building

This trail begins at the home of two pathbreaking physicians and a memorial dedicated to nurses and continues on to a variety or organizations dedicated to the study of science and medicine along with historic hospitals. The tour concludes at the National Library of Medicine, the National Museum of Health, and the Clara Barton House and Historic Site. 

Dr. Charles Richard Drew was a pioneer in the field of pathology until his death in 1950. Dr. Drew had multiple discoveries but most notable is in the isolation of blood plasma. While working at Columbia Dr. Drew found that blood could be stored in better ways. He also was a first for many contributions in his field as an African American while campaigning against segregation in various areas of his field. In his lifetime, types of blood were just being discovered so transfusions were only becoming possible. However, blood only had a life of around seven days so the likelihood one could get a transfusion was lower than today. Dr. Drew worked to study how and why blood would become dehydrated after this seven days and with separating plasma from blood, he showed that it was possible to store it much longer. Storage had another issue as blood would have to stay cooled so Dr. Drew developed methods in combatting this problem with so called "bloodmobiles" or "refrigerated trucks". This was most useful in wartime situations as blood could not be transported to areas before Dr. Drew's inventions.While Dr. Drew was most known for his work in pathology it should also be noted he was a pioneer for African Americans. Dr. Drew was the first African American to join the American Board of Surgery at Johns Hopkins University. He was also the first to graduate Columbia with a Doctorate of Science as well as the director of the first American Red Cross blood drive. His work with the American Red Cross led him to the nickname "father of the blood bank".Dr. Drew was ahead of his time, however, and was not able to participate in his own discoveries because he was African American. In the 1940s-50s African Americans were not allowed to donate blood. He found this to be "insulting" and "unscientific". Dr. Drew resigned from the Red Cross and went on to teach at Howard University to help African Americans advance in the world of surgery. He believed this was his greatest contribution to society as well as campaigning against excluding people of his own race from organizations such as the AMA.

A small marker designates this modest Arlington house as the home of the late Dr. Charles R. Drew, a physician and researcher who is credited with the discovery of blood banking-- a method of containment and delivery that saved countless lives. The first African American to graduate Columbia University with a Doctorate in Science, Drew was also the first African American to join the American Board of Surgery at Johns Hopkins University. His work saved countless lives in World War II and some of his methods are still used today. He later served as a director of the Red Cross Society and taught at Howard University. Throughout the 1940s and until his death in 195, Drew protested the policies of exclusion that kept African American students out of medical schools and even restricted Black blood donors. When the Red Cross announced in 1941 that they would only accept blood from white donors, Drew pointed out that this policy meant that he could not donate blood despite leading the work to discovery and implementation of the life-saving procedure he helped create. He later protested against the Red Cross and others when they adopted a policy of separating blood donations by race.

Doctor Charles Richard Drew's Home- Historical Marker

Prior to the Spanish-American War, all nurses in the military were men, as the U.S. Military did not allow females to serve in any way. Furthermore, nursing was not a sought-after position in the military. At this time, there were only 791 male nurses serving in the Army, far too few for a war. Congress finally recognized that women needed to be hired to serve as nurses, however, they only approved their hiring through contracts- military nurses would not actually be military personnel. Congress gave the task of leading the recruitment effort to Dr. Anita Newcomb McGee. The largest group targeted by Dr. McGee was the D.A.R.- the Daughters of the American Revolution. &nbsp; Out of the 1,563 nurses now working through contracts for the military, 76 were sent to Cuba, 30 to the Philippines, nine were sent to Puerto Rico, six to Honolulu, eight served on board the hospital ship USS Relief, but the vast majority worked in U.S. hospitals. Although none of the nurses died during combat, several did succumb to diseases such as typhoid and yellow fever.&nbsp;Several of the&nbsp;women who died while serving in the United States are buried close to the memorial in Arlington National Cemetery, although those few that died overseas are buried overseas as well. In June of 1899, Dr. Anita Newcomb McGee was instrumental in the formation of the Order of Spanish-American War Nurses, in memory of the service of the contract nurses during the Spanish-American War. A monument to these brave women was planned, however it was not dedicated until 1905, due to several unforeseen problems. In 1901, the Secretary of War, Elihu Root, still hadn't approved the creation of the memorial, and fund-raising for the project was going at a very slow pace. Disagreements over design, size and style for the monument were also to blame. Finally, in 1905, Barclay Brothers Granite Company out of Barre, Vermont, was given the job of constructing the memorial. The monument is six feet wide, three and a half feet across, and seven feet high, and is constructed out of gray granite, with a boulder shape and a rough texture. At the top sits a Maltese Cross, which is the symbol for the Order of the Spanish-American War Nurses, and the front of the memorial has several palm branches carved into the granite. The monument was dedicated on May 2, 1905, with a simple but meaningful ceremony. Officially, the monument is dedicated to "deceased Army nurses in the National Cemetery at Arlington, Virginia."

The Spanish-American War Nurses Memorial is a monument located in Arlington National Cemetery, installed on May 2, 1905. This monument, made of granite, was created to pay tribute to the nurses who died during the Spanish-American War, which took place in 1898. The Spanish-American War marked the first time that females served in any capacity in the United States Military; prior to this, military nurses were male. The monument resides in Section 21 of Arlington National Cemetery, the same section in which the Spanish-American War Nurses are buried. 

Spanish-American War Nurses Memorial

When the Civil War began, the medical corps of the Union Army was relatively inexperienced and without access to professional training and research opportunities.&nbsp;In 1862 the Surgeon General of the Union Army commissioned&nbsp;Brigade Surgeon John Hill Brinton to " "collect and properly arrange in the Military
Medical Museum all specimens of morbid anatomy, both medical and surgical,
which may have accumulated since the commencement of the Rebellion in the
various U.S. hospitals or which may have been retained by any of the medical
officers of the Army." &nbsp;The museum was originally&nbsp;located in the Ford's Theatre following renovation by the federal government&nbsp;after&nbsp;President Lincoln was&nbsp;assassinated there in 1865, and moved three times until in 1887 a permanent structure was built at the site on Independence Avenue,&nbsp;where the museum was housed until&nbsp;1969. &nbsp;In 1883 Billings was&nbsp;in charge of the newly merged Army Medical Museum and&nbsp;Surgeon General's Library, and he&nbsp;commissioned the architectural firm Cluss and Schulze to design a building that could accommodate both. The location was chosen&nbsp;by the secretary of war, the architect of the Capitol and the secretary of the Smithsonian Institute in 1885, and&nbsp;$200,000 was&nbsp;allocated by Congress for its construction. The four-story, H-shaped building was made of red brick. It had separate wings for the museum and library, and was in an excellent location to attract the public. The center of the building contained the&nbsp;Records and Pension Division, a dark room for processing photographs, rooms for dissection and anatomy research, and a secure room to house the museum's collection of genitals, then considered too unsavory to display to the public. Natural light was used in the exhibit halls, where wood-panelled vitrines contained an enormous collection devoted to the&nbsp;human anatomy and embryology, pathology, numismatics, ethnography and physical anthropology, specimen preparation, and the history of the microscope. The building was heated by gas heaters and fireplaces. Through the efforts of&nbsp;Brigade Surgeon John Hill Brinton, and those of his successors, the&nbsp;museum amassed an enormous collection of medical artefacts from all over the world, including many that were recovered from famous theatres of war by the Surgeon General of the Army. This was no cabinet of curiosities; by using this collection army medical researchers took great steps towards the study of&nbsp;cells, gunshot wounds, bone injuries, and diseased organs. In addition, it became a kind of impromptu national memorial following the end of the Civil War, as its collection also held specimens of maimed soldiers from both sides of the conflict.The glass cases where these&nbsp;specimens were held also contained&nbsp;flags and standards of both Union and Confederate&nbsp;ambulance corps, as well as swords and sabers.&nbsp;In 1888 the museum was opened to civilian medical professionals by&nbsp;Lieutenant Colonel John S. Billings, then&nbsp;museum curator. In 1922 the American Registry of Pathology was
founded as a focus for the interchange of knowledge between military and civilian medicine and science. The Museum was renamed as the&nbsp;Army Institute of Pathology in 1946, and from that point served as the U.S. Army's laboratory for pathological research (six years later this extended to&nbsp;the Department of Defense and other federal agencies). However,&nbsp;the building became largely redundant in&nbsp;1955, when the laboratory and researchers were&nbsp;moved to the Walter Reed Army Medical
Center in Bethesda.
&nbsp;The building was demolished in 1969, and&nbsp;the extensive collection was split between different institutions, with the library collection discarded.

The Army Medical Museum and Library was one of the earliest federally appointed research institutes combining medical and military science. Founded in 1888, the building served as the Army Medical School and library of the Surgeon General of the Army (which would later become the National Library of Medicine) until the 1960s, when different locations were chosen for its services. Despite becoming a National Historic Landmark in 1965 and being added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1966, the building was demolished in 1969. The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden can now be found on the site. The museum's collections are now held by a variety of institutions, including the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Maryland. 

Army Medical Museum and Library (1888-1969)

<div><div></div></div><div><div>Known as "the Angel of the Battlefield," Clara Barton's work embodied the true spirit of humanitarianism. Her legacy at the Missing Soldiers Office Museum shows her dedication to ensuring the well-being of others. Born in Massachusetts on Christmas Day, 1821, Barton's first career was as a teacher. At the time, nursing was considered a man's profession while teaching was a woman's. She demonstrated care through others in her teaching, establishing a school for the children of mill workers in Oxford, Massachusetts, and the first free public school in Bordentown, New Jersey. Yet she left the profession after being told that instead of running the school herself, it should be a man's job.&nbsp; Barton first came to D.C. when she worked in the U.S. Patent Office, located in what is now the National Portrait Gallery building. She was one of the first women to work in the federal government and struggled to hold her status. She briefly returned to Massachusetts before moving back to D.C. in 1861, when she moved into the boarding house that is now the museum.&nbsp; With the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, D.C. became a political and military battleground for saving the Union. After the Baltimore Riot in April 1861, in which the first deaths of the war occurred, Barton instinctively received and cared for wounded soldiers of the 6th Massachusetts Infantry sent to D.C. As the war progressed, Barton made it her mission to ensure soldiers had proper access to healthcare. Barton became an important point of contact for getting supplies to Union soldiers, with members of the general public, aid societies, and politicians sending her bandages, food, and clothing to redistribute at battlefields and camps. She responded to battles including the First and Second Battles of Bull Run, Cedar Mountain, Antietam, Fredericksburg, Petersburg, and Cold Harbor. While thousands of soldiers lay in field hospitals, there were also thousands of soldiers who went missing. Some of these soldiers were unidentified dead, while others were still alive but their families could not locate them. As the battles ended in early 1865, Barton received&nbsp;official government correspondent status from President Abraham Lincoln to begin her search for missing soldiers. She had seen the dire conditions of freed Union soldiers returning from Confederate prisoner-of-war camps. She hired staff and opened the Office of Correspondence, also known as the Missing Soldiers Office, with the Friends of the Missing Men of the United States Army. Barton took up the cause of grieving parents, friends, and family whose relatives and neighbors were missing at the end of the Civil War. Barton and her team responded to over 63,000 letters, some that required research that lead to publishing "Rolls of Missing Men," lists of names of soldiers who loved ones inquired about. 22,000 missing men were identified, 13,000 of whom were at Andersonville Prison in Georgia.&nbsp;With support from Congress, Barton's office remained open until the end of 1868.&nbsp; After the Missing Soldiers Office closed, Barton traveled to Europe where she encountered the International Red Cross. When she returned home, she established the American branch of the Red Cross in 1881. Barton continued responding to humanitarian crises across the United States until her death in 1912 in Maryland. The Missing Soldiers Office was rediscovered in 1996 when General Services Administration staff member, Richard Lyons, found an envelope jutting from the ceiling of the building. The third floor had remained a time capsule from Barton's time, sealed in the early twentieth century in response to newly-established fire codes. The discovery naturally led to the establishment of a museum to preserve the Missing Soldiers Office. The museum, in partnership with the&nbsp;National Museum of Civil War Medicine in Frederick, Maryland, honors Clara Barton's tireless work. Other sites associated with Barton include the Clara Barton National Historic Site (her home in Glen Echo, Maryland) and the Clara Barton Birthplace Museum in Oxford, Massachusetts.&nbsp;</div></div>

The Clara Barton Missing Soldiers Office Museum is located in the building where Clara Barton, nurse and founder of the Red Cross, lived during and after the Civil War. From 1865 to 1868, Barton operated an office at this property to handle correspondence concerning soldiers who went missing during the Civil War. In 1996, Richard Lyons of the General Services Administration rediscovered the Clara Barton Missing Soldiers Office when the building was slated for demolition. The General Services Administration, which owned the building, partnered with the National Museum of Civil War Medicine in 2007 to save this unique historic site. The Clara Barton Missing Soldiers Office Museum opened in 2015, giving the public access to preserved rooms and exhibits.

Clara Barton Missing Soldiers Office Museum

The Carnegie Institution for Science is an endowed,
nonprofit dedicated to basic research and discovery. The Institution’s staff
are leaders in the fields of plant biology, developmental biology, Earth and
planetary sciences, astronomy and global ecology. The Institution is responsible
for numerous contributions to various scientific fields. It also has research
departments throughout the country. 

Investigators at the Institution have help with the
development of hybrid corn, radar and the technology that led to Pyrex glass,
among other achievements. Through the years the staff has been a virtually who’s
who of influential scientists. It’s been the home for Nobel Prize winners
Barbara McClintock, Alfred Hershey and Andrew Fire as well as Presidential
Medal of Science winner Vera Rubin. Other notable employees include Edwin
Hubble, who discovered that the Milky Way isn’t the only galaxy and Charles
Richter, who created the earthquake measurement scale.

An auditorium was added to the original building in 1938. It
allows the Institution to share its findings with public lectures and film
screenings. The building has also become quite the special events venue winning
numerous awards. It hosts award ceremonies, graduations, dinners, receptions, corporate
events and is an immensely popular wedding venue.

The Carnegie Institution for Science was one of many organizations to develop from the mind and fortune of Andrew Carnegie. It was formed for the purposes of scientific discovery. It was endowed in 1902. The building was designed by the architects John Carrere and Thomas Hastings. The building, a Beaux-Arts style, has a neoclassical façade. It was completed in 1908. It was declared by the National Park Service as a National Historic Landmark in 1965.

Administration Building, Carnegie Institution for Science

A short history of Howard University and Howard Medical SchoolSince 1867, Howard has awarded more than 100,000 degrees in the professions, arts, sciences, and humanities. Howard ranks among the highest producers of the nation's Black professionals in medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, engineering, nursing, architecture, religion, law, music, social work, and education. Carter G. Woodson, "The Father of Black History," was a professor and Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Howard.&nbsp;Howard has grown from a single-frame building in 1867 and evolved to more than 89 acres, including the six-story, 400-bed Howard University Hospital. Since 1974, it has expanded to include a 22-acre School of Law West Campus, a 22-acre School of Divinity East Campus and another three-fifths of an acre facility in northeast Washington and a 108-acre tract of land in Beltsville, Maryland.Shortly after the end of the Civil War, members of The First Congregational Society of Washington considered establishing a theological seminary for the education of African-American clergymen. Within a few weeks, the project expanded to include a provision for establishing a university. Within two years, the University consisted of the Colleges of Liberal Arts and Medicine. The new institution was named for General Oliver Otis Howard, a Civil War hero, who was both the founder of the University and, at the time, Commissioner of the Freemen's Bureau. Howard later served as President of the university from 1869–74.Revella Hughes, a talented singer, musician and educator were alumni from Howard. She received her Bachelor's in Music in 1917.&nbsp;Alain Locke, Chair of the Department of Philosophy and first African American Rhodes Scholar, authored The New Negro, which helped to usher in the Harlem Renaissance. Ralph Bunche, the first Nobel Peace Prize winner of African descent, served as chair of the Department of Political Science. Beginning in 1942, Howard University students pioneered the "stool-sitting" technique, which was to play a prominent role in the later civil rights movement. By January 1943, students had begun to organize regular sit-ins and pickets at cigar stores and cafeterias around Washington, D.C. which refused to serve them because of their race. These protests continued until the administration asked the students to stop in the Fall of 1944. Stokely Carmichael, also known as Kwame Toure, a student in the Department of Philosophy and the Howard University School of Divinity coined the term "Black Power" and worked in Lowndes County, Alabama as a voting rights activist.&nbsp;Historian Rayford Logan served as chair of the Department of History E. Franklin Frazier served as chair of the Department of Sociology. Sterling Allen Brown served as chair of the Department of English. In 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson delivered a speech to the graduating class at Howard, where he outlined his plans for civil rights legislation and endorsed aggressive affirmative action to combat the effects of years of segregation of Blacks from the nation's economic opportunities. At the time, the Voting Rights bill was still pending in the House of Representatives.In 1975 the historic Freedman's Hospital closed after 112 years of use as Howard University College of Medicine's primary teaching hospital. Howard University Hospital opened that same year and serves as Howard University College of Medicine's teaching hospital with service to the surrounding community. U.S. Department of Education&nbsp;fundsHoward University and Howard University Hospital.

A small historic marker at the entrance of Howard University Hospital commemorates Freedman's Hospital which was established near this location in 1862. The first hospital was located at  12th and R Street and seven years later, a new hospital was constructed at this location. A teaching hospital, Freedman's Hospital trained nurses, physicians, and surgeons who upon graduation established practices and worked at hospitals throughout the nation. A new building was completed in 1908 and this third version of Freedmen’s Hosptial was in operation from 1908 to 1975. That facility, located on Bryant Street, closed when Howard University Hospital opened this facility and the building now houses the Howard University School of Communications.

Howard University Hospital (Freedmen's Hospital Historical Marker)

Since its founding in 1867, Howard University has offered the most advanced degree opportunities to African American students, including the medical programs. The original campus, located in a one-room building, grew to become an institution that served the people of DC and trained thousands of Black physicians. The first graduating class of Howard Medical College was comprised of one white student and seven African American students, a reflection of the university's commitment to have an acceptance policy that did not require a high school diploma and only required students to be of good moral character. Howard University has expanded since its founding to included Howard Hospital, a law school, and 13 satellite campuses.Dr. Augusta, the first professor of color at Howard's Medical Department, was born in Norfolk, Virginia on March 8, 1885. He later moved to Baltimore, where he pursued a career as a barber and received private tutoring in the field of medicine.&nbsp; Augusta was rejected from each college in the United States but persisted until he was able to receive formal training outside of his home country. Augusta, under the guidance of Professor William Gibson from the University of Pennsylvania, applied for admission to the University of Toronto. Rejected from American colleges owing to his race, Augusta was accepted to the university and graduated with a bachelors in medicine from Toronto’s Trinity Medical College.

Augusta became the Toronto region’s first African American physician. Augusta used this status to become a role model and leader of the community, and often donated his services to the poor of Toronto. He also founded literary organizations that donated books to African American students and authored several antislavery articles. In 1863 he returned to the states to support the Union cause and help people of color escape the bonds of slavery.&nbsp;

Augusta wrote to President Lincoln on January 7, 1863, shortly after the Emancipation Proclamation went into effect. Augusta requested that he be placed as a surgeon in the African American unit in the Union Army which started his military career as the first African American regimental surgeon of the 7th Regiment of U.S. Colored Troops. After this appointment, Augusta rose to the rank of Brevent Lieutenant Colonel and was later placed in charge of an army hospital in Savannah, Georgia. This opportunity allowed Dr. Augusta to rise to the rank of Major on April 4, 1863 which made him the first African American to achieve that rank in the army.&nbsp;

While Dr. Augusta broke down barriers within the segregated armed forces, but in the first part of his service, he was only paid the salary of an enlisted man. However, he successfully petitioned the army and received pay based off his rank. After winning this battle, Augusta was the victim of a brutal hate crime. When coming off a train in Baltimore, Maryland Augusta was attacked by white passengers who were offended by the sight of an African American in an officers uniform. Augusta responded by publicizing the details of his horrific ordeal despite the likelihood of reprisals. He also led efforts to desegregate the railway system in DC.Augusta resigned his commission on October 13, 1866. After his military service, he taught human anatomy at Howard University while serving as a private physician from 1866 to 1877 when he retired. Dr. Augusta passed away on December 21, 1890, and became the first African American officer to be buried in Arlington Cemetery.&nbsp;&nbsp;

Howard Medical College dates back to November 9, 1868, when the Medical Department of Howard University held its first classes with five faculty members and eight students. Seven of the eight students were African Americans, and as the department grew along with the university, a rising number of Black physicians joined the ranks of Howard graduates. The founding faculty members included four white and one African American professor, Dr. Alexandra Augusta. Augusta was the forebearer of many African American physicians whose career served African American communities at a time when they were denied service in many doctor's offices and hospitals. And like Augusta, these graduates became leaders in the military, civil service, business, and community organizations. 

Howard Medical College

When the Children’s Country Home opened on Bunker Hill Road in 1930, it was the third location of the hospital. The organization was originally founded in 1883 as Children’s Country Home by “a few young ladies of St. John’s Parish." At that time, the parish leased a building on Grant Road and operated the facility for only a few months each year during the summer. The founders hoped that the home would enable children “in feeble health” to benefit from a change in air and exercise. From the beginning, the home was open to all children and during the first summer of operation, the home cared for forty-eight patients.  The 1930 Children’s Country Home was the first building in Washington, D.C. designed as a purpose-built children’s convalescent home. First Lady Lou Hoover laid the cornerstone at the groundbreaking ceremony. With the new building, the function of the Children’s Country Home expanded to a year-round institution with a more professional nursing staff at its helm. The new Children’s Country Home provided care to children under six years of age with non-communicable diseases - ailments treated here ranged from broken bones to malnutrition. Children would be referred to the Home by neighboring hospitals, where beds were needed for more seriously ill patients. The average stay for children at the Children's Country Home was approximately two months.  Constructed to resemble a Norman cottage, the building demonstrates the influence of the Progressive Era on the design of medical buildings in later decades. It also serves as a testament to the work of the notable architectural firm, Wyeth and Sullivan. Wyeth and Sullivan were prominent architects local to the Washington, D.C. area, and the partnership they established produced some of the city’s most notable public, residential, and institutional buildings. The building was acknowledged during its day and was deemed “Outstanding Building of the Year” in 1931 by the Washington Board of Trade.   Wyeth’s previous firm completed construction of the Columbia Hospital for Women and Lying-In Asylum, with Sullivan as the principal designer for both. The firm designed several hospitals for the military and the Loudoun County Hospital, as well. For the Children’s Country Home, Wyeth and Sullivan chose an asymmetrical layout, or a “connected corridor plan”, that was designed to be reminiscent of a Normandy cottage. The layout not only looked picturesque in the sprawling landscape that surrounded Bunker Hill Road, but it also gave the hospital a very domestic feeling that was believed to be more comforting for children than an institutional layout.

The cornerstone of this children's hospital building was laid in a ceremony attended by First Lady Lou Hoover in 1929. The hospital was completed the following year and served as the third location for a children's hospital that was established in the late 19th century and was designed by the architectural firm of Wyeth and Sullivan. The building's cottage-style design and connected corridor plan reflected the influence of the Progressive era and the hope for improving the treatment of children by offering ample light and fresh air for patients along with a more home-like atmosphere. The original core of the building has been preserved and serves as part of HSC Pediatric Center.

Children's Country Home / Hospital for Sick Children

In 1862, during the heat of the American Civil War, the Surgeon General William Hammond opted to establish the Army Medical Museum in order to promote further understanding of military medicine. Around the time of the Museum’s founding, Museum staff went around to battlefields with the mission of collecting “samples” from the battlefields themselves, as well as from Union Army doctors, for research in surgery and other medical purposes. Additionally, staff would take photographs in order to document the effects of military wounds, such as gunshot wounds, as well as military medical procedures, such as amputations. The work done by the Museum in the Civil War was ultimately made into a six-volume set called The Medical and Surgical History of the War of the Rebellion.After their work in the Civil War, the Army Medical Museum took to furthering their research in the 19th and 20th centuries, accomplishing such feats as discerning the cause of yellow fever, contributing to efforts against typhoid fever and STDs, and creating a library and system of cataloguing that served as the starting point for the National Library of Medicine. The Museum came to focus more on pathology around World War II, and in 1946, it was made into a division of the Army Institute of Pathology. The Museum underwent a number of name changes over the next four decades, ultimately becoming the National Museum of Health and Medicine in 1989. Today, the Museum continues to focus on researching advances in medicine, as well as focusing on educating the public through their many exhibits.The NMHM embodies five collections consisting of about 25 million artifacts, including 5,000 skeletal specimens, 8,000 preserved organs,12,000 items of medical equipment, an archive of historic medical documents, and collections related to neuroanatomy and developmental anatomy. The museum's most famous artifacts relate to the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln.

In the midst of the American Civil War, the National Museum of Health and Medicine was founded as the Army Medical Museum in order to house specimens for use in army medicine and surgery research. The Museum always held a focus on research, and its topics of research continually branched out over the years. Today, the Museum still conducts research and is home to numerous exhibits on pathology, anatomy, the advancement of military medicine, and other exhibits dedicated to advancing public understanding of military medicine.

National Museum of Health and Medicine

In 1809, the Surgeon General of the Navy proposed that a naval medical training school be established. That idea never came to fruition. Several decades later in 1878, the first naval medical courses were offered at the Brooklyn Naval Hospital. The naval school was eventually established and in 1902 moved into the former Naval Observatory on 23rd and E Streets N.W. in Washington. A hospital was added in 1906. Over the next couple of decades the complex grew to include dental school, a medical technology school, and a library of medicine and surgery. By around 1935 it was renamed the Naval Medical Center (NMC). However by then it became clear that the site was too small for the growing facility. As a result, in 1937, Congress approved funds to build a new center and President Roosevelt selected this location in Bethesda, which was a rural area at the time. Interestingly, it was Roosevelt who sketched the basic design of Building 1, which he modeled after the Nebraska State Capitol building (he had seen it on a trip). Construction began in 1939 and was completed three years later. The building had room for 1,200 beds and housed the Naval Medical School, the Naval Dental School, and the Naval Medical Research Institute. The first major expansion occurred in 1960. Other expansions and new buildings were constructed during the following decades. There are now 500 in-patient beds and a total of 880,000 square feet of space at the facility. In 2005, Congress passed the Base Realignment and Closure Act, which enacted the eventual merger of the NMC and the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in 2011.

The Walter Reed National Military Medical Center (WRNMMC) is one of the largest and most prestigious military hospitals in the country. It is named after U.S. Army doctor and researcher, Walter Reed (1851-1902), who proved that yellow fever is transmitted through mosquito bites. The original building of the complex, which is known as Building 1, was erected in 1942 and features a 20-story tower and a pair of "L"-shaped wings. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977. The facility, which has grown over time, was first known as the National Naval Medical Center. In 2011, it combined with the former Walter Reed Army Medical Center to form the WRNMMC.

Walter Reed National Military Medical Center

The tree is a plane tree or sycamore, with the Latin name Platanus orientalis. In 1961, Greek Ambassador Alexis Liatis presented the National Library of Medicine with the small tree. It was a clone from a tree from the island of Cos. The ancient physician Hippocrates (ca. 460-375 B.C.), for whom the Hippocratic oath of "do no harm" is named, is said to have sat and taught under the parent tree. The library's new building was dedicated on December 14, 1961. Frank B. Rogers, the library's first director, was part of a planting ceremony in the spring of 1962. The original plaque was on a pumice stone base. A fungal disease to which sycamores are vulnerable took its toll on the tree's health from the 1980s onward. NIH Landscape Architect Lynn Mueller worked to keep the tree alive while also collaborating with the Champion Tree Project (now called Archangel Ancient Tree Archive) to create a clone. During the winter of 2012-2013, the original tree died, but still stood until 2013. The following year, The NIH planted two additional clone trees. One is here in front of the National Library of Medicine (the location of the original 1961 tree) and the other is in front of the NIH Clinical Center. April 25, 2014, Principal Deputy Director of the NIH Lawrence A. Tabak, Greek Ambassador Christos P. Panagopoulos, and NLM Director Donald A. B. Lindberg led the planting ceremony on April 25, 2015. During the ceremony, David J. Lipman, Director of the National Center for Biotechnology Information, also presented the DNA Barcode for the tree, demonstrating it as a clone of the parent tree. Amy Driscoll of the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History sequenced a sample from the first NLM tree. The original volcanic stone base for the National Library of Medicine tree's plaque now holds the plaque for the other clone tree in front of the Clinical Center. At the National Library of Medicine site, the plaque has a new stone base.

This tree along the Bethesda Trolley Trail near the National Library of Medicine building is a clone of the tree on the island of Cos, Greece, under which Hippocrates,  the "father of medicine" is believed to have taught his students. In 1961, the Greek Ambassador gave a cutting from this parent tree to the National Institutes of Health on the occasion of the opening of the new National Library of Medicine Building. That tree died in 2013, but the NIH planted a new clone of the parent tree at the same site in 2014. A second clone of the Cos tree was planted in front of the NIH Clinical Center at the same time.

Tree of Hippocrates, National Library of Medicine

In 1956, an act of Congress transferred the Army Medical Library to the Public Health Service and renamed it the National Library of Medicine. Chief supporters of this transfer were Alabama Senator J. Lister Hill and Massachusetts Senator John F. Kennedy, under whose future presidency the National Library of Medicine would move to its current building in 1962. The Bethesda campus of the National Institutes of Health, largely donated by the Wilsons of the Tree Tops estate, became the home of the new National Library of Medicine building. Its architecture demonstrates the anxieties of military threats during the Cold War; its key features are foot-think limestone walls, a collapsible roof, and underground book storage. The library became a hub for medical information technology with the establishment of the Lister Hill National Center for Biomedical Communications in 1968, MEDLINE in the 1970s (with a free service beginning in 1997), and the National Center for Biotechnology Information in 1988. In 2000, both ClinicalTrials.gov and PubMed Central opened. Two reading rooms are open to the public in the library: the Main Reading Room and History of Medicine Division Reading Room. Visitors can access reference materials and request books, serials, audiovisual materials, pamphlets, and dissertations. As part of the library's bicentennial celebration in 1976, it planted a garden of healing herbs and other plants. Thomas Cook, Chief of the NIH Grounds Maintenance and Landscaping Section, directed the planting. The layout of the garden echoes the layout of the library. Over 100 different plants now grow in the garden. Standing in the garden is A Totem of Healing, carved by Jewell Praying Wolf James of the Lummi Nation from a 500-year-old Pacific Red Cedar tree. The tree fell naturally in the state of Washington. A cross-section of the tree also resides in the library. The totem depicts a series of symbols, including a healing woman gathering herbs, a tree of life, and the Algonquian figure of the medicine woman in the moon.

The National Library of Medicine began as a small collection of medical texts in the office of the U. S. Army Surgeon General in 1836. This collection grew into a library for use by military personnel until a 1956 act of Congress established the library under civilian authority. This library building on the National Institutes of Health's campus in Bethesda was completed in 1962 and reflects the Cold War environment with foot-thick limestone walls, underground book storage, and a collapsible roof. In addition to maintaining a massive print collection, the library has been at the forefront of computer innovations in medical information sharing, including MEDLINE, PubMed, and ClinicalTrials.gov. The National Library of Medicine is the world's largest biomedical library.

National Library of Medicine

Clara Barton is a one of the most famous and influential people&nbsp;in American history. She was a teacher for much of her early life before her service as a nurse during the&nbsp;Civil War led her to become a national leader and expert about the needs of wounded&nbsp;soldiers. Barton&nbsp;began her work locally,&nbsp;collecting items for the wounded while also helping them write letters to loved ones. She also&nbsp;read to the wounded and even prayed with them. Her efforts as a nurse and activist led to her&nbsp;nickname, "Angel of the Battlefield". After the war,&nbsp;Barton worked with others to&nbsp;create the American Red Cross. During the Civil War, Burton was one of the first women who served in a position similar to modern combat medics, administering to wounded&nbsp;soldiers on the battlefield. Barton also&nbsp;served as a nurse in makeshift hospitals during the Second Bull Run, Antietam, and Cedar Mountain.&nbsp; The Clara Barton House is where Clara Barton spent the last fifteen years of her life. The 38-room home is now sparsely furnished with period furniture. Daily tours are lead through the property to give a better understanding of the way that Barton led her life. During the Civil War these rooms would have been filled with the supplies that she sent off to soldiers. The home also includes a small exhibit to explain Barton's work with the American Red Cross.&nbsp;

Located along the Potomac River in Glen Echo, Maryland, the Clara Barton House and Historic Site is the best place to learn about Barton's lifetime of activism including her role in the founding of the American Red Cross. Visitors to the home and historic site will find many artifacts and exhibits related to her many causes and the early history of the American Red Cross. The Museum was founded in 1974 and has offered free daily tours from that time to the present. 

Medical History of Washington D.C. Heritage Trail

National Academy of Sciences Building

Introduction

Images

Backstory and Context

Sources

Additional Information