A History of the National Library of Medicine: The Nation's Treasury of Medical Knowledge

Abstract

ABSTRACT As a repository and a disseminator of health information worldwide, the National of Medicine plays a vital role in the medical sciences. In his introduction to this history, William B. Bean, MD, of the University of Iowa rightly compares the to the central nervous system in terms of medical thought and research. It is gratifying to report that the writing of this official account has been carried out so well by Wyndham D. Miles, a professional historian at the National Institutes of Health. The book is a thoroughly documented, profusely illustrated work. As a chronological narrative, it is replete with dramatic episodes and witty sketches of personalities and situations.In the early years, the was known as the Library of the Surgeon General's Office. The name provided a literal description of the collection before the Civil War, when it was housed on bookshelves in offices rented for