On this page you will find information and links to every NLM Exhibit the Medical Library has hosted, as well as links to where a digital archive of those exhibits lives on the NLM website.
In some instances, we weren't able to obtain photographs of our own exhibits within Kresge, and so for those sections we have borrowed images from the NLM Exhibits website to create a fuller picture of our history with the traveling exhibit.
Click on each of the photos to view a larger version.
This Lead is Killing Us - January 17, 2023 - February 25, 2023
Lead exposure can cause neurological problems and sometimes even death; yet this metal has been pervasive in many aspects of American life for over a century. Many industries have included lead in their production processes and in products like household paints and gasoline, endangering health. This Lead Is Killing Us: A History of Citizens Fighting Lead Poisoning in Their Communities tells an important story of advocates protecting their communities from the dangers of lead and making their voices heard with industry, housing authorities, and elected officials.
Politics of Yellow Fever in Alexander Hamilton’s America - January 06, 2020 - February 15, 2020
In 1793, yellow fever ravaged Philadelphia. Citizens confronted the epidemic in the absence of an effective cure or consensus about the origins of the disease. Medical professionals, early political parties, and private citizens seized on the epidemic to advance their respective agendas. As a result, Philadelphia’s sick and dying received medical care informed as much by politics as by the best available science. Politics of Yellow Fever in Alexander Hamilton’s America considers how science and politics helped determine the response to the 1793 yellow fever epidemic in Philadelphia.
Rashes to Research - Scientists and Parents Confront the 1964 Rubella Epidemic - July 29, 2019 - September 07, 2019
As the rubella epidemic raged in 1964, 20,000 children were born with serious heart, hearing, and vision problems related to rubella exposure during pregnancy. While the nation’s scientists rushed to create a vaccine and develop better screening tests, families faced difficult decisions about current and future pregnancies. Rashes to Research: Scientists and Parents Confront the 1964 Rubella Epidemic highlights the work of researchers and parents to respond to rubella in the years before an effective vaccine nearly eliminated the disease from the United States.
For All the People: A Century of Citizen Action in Health Care Reform - March 18, 2019 - April 27, 2019
Often, the public associates health care reform with presidents and national leaders, but communities, workers, activists, and health care professionals have made their voices heard in the debate about whether and how to make quality health care available to all. For All the People: A Century of Citizen Action in Health Care Reform tells the lesser-known story of how movements of ordinary citizens helped shape the changing American health care system.
Confronting Violence: Improving Women’s Lives - July 30, 2018 - September 8, 2018
Activists and reformers in the United States have long recognized the harm of domestic violence and sought to improve the lives of women who were battered. Beginning in the late 1970s, nurses were in the vanguard as they pushed the larger medical community to identify victims, adequately respond to their needs, and work towards the prevention of domestic violence. Confronting Violence: Improving Women’s Lives explores these developments during latter half of the 20th century, when nurses took up the call.
Frankenstein: Penetrating the Secrets of Nature - March 12, 2018 - April 12, 2018
In 1816, Mary Shelley conceived a story about a scientist who creates a creature that can think and feel, but is monstrous to the eye. Spurned by all, the embittered creature turns into a savage killer. Shelley’s story served as a metaphor for apprehensions about scientific advancement that continue to resonate today. Frankenstein: Penetrating the Secrets of Nature explores the power of this story to expose hidden fears of science and technology as human efforts to penetrate the secrets of nature continue.
Pick Your Poison: Intoxicating Pleasures & Medical Prescriptions - July 24, 2017 - September 2, 2017
Throughout the history of America, people have used mind altering drugs. While some of those drugs are socially acceptable, others are outlawed because of their toxic, and intoxicating, characteristics. These classifications have shifted at different times in history, and will continue to change. Pick Your Poison: Intoxicating Pleasures and Medical Prescriptions explores the factors that have shaped the changing definitions of some of our most potent drugs, from medical miracle to social menace.
Binding Wounds, Pushing Boundaries: African Americans in Civil War Medicine - February 06, 2017 - March 18, 2017
During the American Civil War, African Americans overcame prejudices to serve as soldiers, nurses, surgeons, laundresses, cooks, and laborers. Their participation challenged the prescribed notions about race and gender and pushed the boundaries of Blacks’ role in America. Binding Wounds, Pushing Boundaries: African Americans in Civil War Medicine explores the stories of men and women who came from different backgrounds and life experiences, but whose desire to participate in the cause for freedom transcended class, education, and social position.
Life and Limb: The Toll of the American Civil War - August 01, 2016 - September 10, 2016
Over three million soldiers fought in the American Civil War. More than half a million died and almost as many were wounded. Hundreds of thousands were permanently disabled by battlefield injuries or surgery, which saved lives by sacrificing limbs. These men remained a stark reminder of the costs of the conflict for long after the war. Life and Limb: The Toll of the American Civil War explores experiences of disabled veterans and their role as symbols of the fractured nation.
From DNA To Beer: Harnessing Nature in Medicine and Industry - February 8, 2016 - March 20, 2016.
Over the past two centuries, scientists, in partnership with industry, have developed techniques using and modifying life forms like yeast, molds, and bacteria, to create a host of new therapies and produce better foods and beverages. From DNA to Beer: Harnessing Nature in Medicine and Industry explores some of the processes, problems, and potential inherent in technologies that use microorganisms for health and commercial purposes.
Every Necessary Care and Attention: George Washington & Medicine - July 06, 2015 - August 15, 2015
George Washington had many different concerns and responsibilities, from running his plantation to ensuring the stability of a new nation. His status and wealth gave him—and his community—access to a growing class of medical experts and new knowledge about the spread and prevention of disease. Even so, Washington encountered the limits of medicine when faced with serious illness. Every Necessary Care and Attention: George Washington and Medicine examines the ways in which Washington sought to ensure the health and safety of his family, staff, enslaved workers, and troop.
In 1981, a new disease appeared in the United States. Reactions to the disease, soon named AIDS (acquired immune deficiency syndrome), varied. Early responders cared for the sick, fought homophobia, and promoted new practices to keep people healthy. Scientists and public health officials struggled to understand the disease and how it spread. Politicians remained largely silent until the epidemic became too big to ignore. Activists demanded that people with AIDS be part of the solution. Surviving and Thriving: AIDS, Politics, and Culture/Sobrevivir y Prosperar: Sida, Política y Cultura, a bilingual exhibition in English and Spanish, illustrates an iconic history of AIDS alongside lesser-known examples of historical figures who changed the course of the pandemic.
Against the Odds: Making a Difference in Global Health - July 14, 2014 - August 23, 2014
A revolution in global health is taking place in villages and towns around the world. Communities, in collaboration with scientists, advocates, governments, and international organizations, are taking up the challenge to prevent disease and improve quality of life. Against the Odds: Making a Difference in Global Health examines stories of the people who are working on a wide range of issues around the world—from community health to conflict and disease to discrimination.
Renaissance Science, Magic, and Medicine in Harry Potter's World - January 13, 2014 - February 22, 2014
In 1997, British author J. K. Rowling introduced the world to Harry Potter. Since then, millions of readers have followed Harry’s story. The magic in the Harry Potter novels is based partially on Renaissance traditions that played an important role in the development of Western science, including alchemy, astrology, and natural philosophy. Renaissance Science, Magic, and Medicine in Harry Potter's World explores the intersection of these worlds in the NLM’s History of Medicine collection.
The Henkel Physicians: A Family's Life in Letters - September 9 - October 19, 2013
Several generations of fathers and sons studied medicine after the Henkel family settled in New Market, Virginia in 1790. Over the course of their careers, these physicians ministered to their community, tended to their countrymen on the battlefield, and testified in the nation’s courts of law. The letters of the Henkel family richly document the daily life of men in medicine in the 19th century and reveal the challenges, rewards and responsibilities of the profession.
“And there’s the humor of it!”: Shakespeare and the Four Humors - April 08, 2013 - May 18, 2013
English poet and playwright William Shakespeare created characters that are among the richest and most humanly recognizable in all of literature. Yet Shakespeare understood human personality and health in the terms available to his age—that of the now-discarded theory of the four bodily humors—blood, yellow bile, black bile, and phlegm. "And there's the humor of it": Shakespeare and the four humors explores the language of the four humors and their influence in Shakespeare’s plays.
A Voyage to Health - August 13, 2012 - September 22, 2012
Around the year 400, migrating voyagers from the South Pacific began to settle on the island of Kaho‘olawe. For centuries, the island served as a navigational hub for the region and sacred site until European colonizers invaded. Following WWII, the United States military seized the island for bombing exercises. A Voyage to Health explores the history of Kaho‘olawe, traditional voyaging, and how the resurgence of Native Hawaiian culture has helped heal the community.
Opening Doors: Contemporary African American Academic Surgeons - 2012
African Americans have always practiced medicine, as physicians, healers, midwives, or “root doctors.” Early Black physicians became not only skilled practitioners, but also educators and trailblazers, paving the way for future physicians, surgeons, and nurses, as well as improving health care for African American communities. Opening Doors: Contemporary African American Academic Surgeons recognizes this long tradition and those pioneers, by highlighting contemporary surgeons and educators who exemplify excellence in their fields and mentor younger generations of African American physicians.
Changing the Face of Medicine: Celebrating America's Women Physicians - 2011
As mothers and grandmothers, women nursed the sick in their homes. As midwives, wise women, and curanderas, women cared for people in their communities. Yet, when medicine became a formal profession in Europe and America, women were shut out. Nevertheless, they fought to gain access to medical education and hospital training. Changing the Face of Medicine: Celebrating America’s Women Physicians acknowledges how women have created and broadened opportunities in medicine and introduces many extraordinary women who have studied and practiced medicine in America.
