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Guide to

National Museum of Health and Medicine Audio-visual collection
OHA 253

Otis Historical Archives, National Museum of Health and Medicine, Armed Forces Institute of Pathology

Date of Records:  1918-present, Bulk Dates: 1940-1999

Boxes: 200+ Page: | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 |12 |13 |14 |15|

IMPORTANT NOTE TO RESEARCHERS!! The Otis Historical Archives does not have the requisite equipment to play many of the films in this collection. Those researchers who wish to view or use these films must independently contract with an approved outside vendor for duplication services and pay for a courier service as well as a duplicate copy for the Museum. Researchers should call in advance as many films are housed in a separate storage facility.

Collection History: The collection began during World War I when the Army Medical Museum's Medical Arts Department began using motion pictures to document medical treatments. It appears to have increased substantially during World War II when the Museum 's Medical Illustration Service took footage overseas and in America. In Washington, the Museum hosted showings of films, the majority of which were probably propaganda. The propaganda films were transferred to the Library of Congress in the late 1990s, but the collection has been replenished through transfers of film and video from the Walter Reed Army Medical Center's TV branch (aka WRAMC-TV) and by a very large transfer of films from the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research. The collection remains open for the inclusion of more films into the forseeable future.

Scope and Content: This collection is comprised nearly 4,300 medical films dating from 1918 to 2005. An additional 4000 films of surgery and the Vietnam War are included in the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research Film Collection, and some have been catalogued in the following list. As artifacts, they note the progress of medical science at various points in history. The medical topics addressed by the films are varied, including but not limited to AIDS, HIV, veterinary medicine, grand rounds lectures, the activities of the Army Medical Museum and the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology (AFIP), oral surgery, malaria, the treatments of various diseases, military hospitals, hygenic food processing, plastic surgery, autopsies, and entomology. Many are raw footage.

Most of the films in this collection were created by various U.S. Government entities, but films created by private entities and foreign governments may be covered by copyright. Films may be restricted for privacy. Notable creators in this collection include:

  • Academy of Health Sciences
  • Armed Forces Institute of Pathology (AFIP)
  • American Red Cross
  • American Society of Clinical Pathologists
  • Royal Canadian Air Force
  • United States Army
  • Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR)
  • Walter Reed Army Medical Center (WRAMC)
  • Walter Reed Army Medical Center Television (WRAMC-TV)

Arrangement and Processing Note: The films in this listing are organized by date from earliest to latest. Films without dates (there are over 1000 undated films in this collection) are listed at the end of this finding aid. Organizing by date makes the most sense for this collection for two reasons; not all of the films in this collection have titles and not all of the films in this collection have titles that relate to a given film's subject. Those films lacking a title are either described by a cursory examination of the first frames or notes written on the film container.

The Otis Historical Archives does not have the capability to play many of the films in this collection. Consequently, titles and descriptions may be in error as they are taken directly from what was written on each film's individual container at the time they were accessioned into the archives. Because the archives is forced to rely on what appears on each container, the amount of description afforded to each film varies. Some film descriptions are highly detailed and others are sorely lacking.

Compiled by Chief Archivist Michael Rhode, Assistant Archivists Joan Redding, Tabitha Oglesby, Heather Lindsay, and Cathy Sorge, Contract Historian Lisa Cartwright, Volunteer Marcy Levernz, Interns Christopher Abraham

Inventory:

This inventory is the product of a download from an internal archives database.

Record Format: --TITLE, YEAR, SOURCE (creating agency), TIME, STOCK (physical format, color, black and white, sound)

Pre- 1920

  • Red Cross Work on Mutiles, At Paris, 1918 [Duplicate], 1918, US Army / Allied Expeditionary Force, Beta videotape
  • Red Cross Work on Mutiles, At Paris, 1918 [Master], 1918, US Army / Allied Expeditionary Force, b&w silent 16mm film

1930s

  • National Park Seminary, c.1930, Hollywood Motion Picture Studies of Washington, DC, 10:00, 3/4" videotape
  • National Park Seminary, c.1930, Hollywood Motion Picture Studies of Washington, DC, 10:00, Beta
  • House Fly, The, 1936, ERPI, b&w, sound, 16mm film
  • [No Title] Experiments with rabbits, 1936, b&w, silent, 16mm film
  • [No Title] Man demonstrating scientific instrument, 1936, b&w, silent, 16mm film
  • Random Shots of the Rexall Good Will Tour (copy 1), 1936, Rexall Drug Company (United Drug Company), 16mm, sound, b&w, film
  • Random Shots of the Rexall Good Will Tour (copy 2), 1936, Rexall Drug Company (United Drug Company), 16mm, sound, b&w, film
  • Reproduction Among Mammals, 1937, ERPI Classroom Films in collaboration with University of Chicago Biological Sciences Series, 400', b&w, sound, 16mm, film
  • The Nervous System, 1937, ERPI Classroom Films, 350', b&w, silent, 16mm, film
  • Cleft Lip and Palate, 1938, color, silent, 16mm film
  • Moving X rays, 1938, American College of Surgeons, 350', b&w, silent, 16mm film
  • Official Training Film No. 33, War Department: First Aid Part 1 Emergency Treatment of Bleeding Wounds. Also includes Official Training Film T.F.3 650: Collective Chemical Protection 1942., 1938, Signal Corps., 200', b&w, sound, 16mm film
  • The Alimentary Tract, 1938, ERPI Classroom Films, 400', b&w, sound, 16mm film
  • Yellow Jack, 1938, MGM, 83:00, VHS videotape
  • Day of Rest with Robert Benchley, The, 1939, MGM, b&w, sound, 16mm film
  • Truck Farmer, The (copy 2), 1939, ERPI, 10:27, 1/2" videotape

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