Transfer of Medical Books in the United States

Abstract

THE New York Public Library has recently given twenty thousand medical volumes to the New York Academy of Medicine, these books being in the main the original collection accumulated by the Public Library during the nineteenth century when Dr. John Shaw Billings, earlier noted for his association with the Army Medical Library, was connected with it. This gift to the Academy of Medicine represents the fulfilment of an agreement entered into in 1910 between the Academy and the Public Library, whereby the former took over the medical part of the latter's library service. Since that time the Academy has served freely the needs of all in New York who have desired to consult medical literature, and it caters at present for about forty thousand readers a year. Of the twenty thousand volumes it has received, the Academy has decided to retain some eight thousand, adding them to its present collection of 260,000, and to give the remaining twelve thousand to the Southwestern Medical College in Dallas, Texas. This latter is a new College, founded in 1943, and is in the process of building up its library. Most of the larger medical libraries of the United States are located east of the Mississippi River, and it is highly commendable that the New York Academy of Medicine has made this contribution to the growth of a medical collection in the newer areas of the West.