Read Source, the online newsletter, to learn about the news, events, people and happenings in UC Libraries

sourceRead Source, the online newsletter, to learn about the news, events, people and happenings in UC Libraries.

In this issue of Source, Dean Xuemao Wang takes time to reflect as work begins to transition back on campus and we showcase UC Libraries innovation and impact during the pandemic. In addition to articles highlighting collections such as Albert Sabin’s papers and Obed Wilson’s library, this issue also marks the commemoration of the first national Juneteenth holiday and features an interview with the authors of the recent University of Cincinnati Press book, Bicycling Through Paradise. As our 19th year of publication comes to a close, we feature a retrospective of past covers and a look back at the 2009 Edible Books event.

Read these articles, as well as past issues, on the website. To receive Source via e-mail, contact melissa.norris@uc.edu to be added to the mailing list.

 

The University of Cincinnati Libraries Annual Progress Report, 2019-2020: A Year Like No Other

annual progress report graphicWhat a year it’s been.

The University of Cincinnati Libraries Annual Progress Report, this year completely online, covers July 2019 through June 2020, an academic year that started off normally, but in the spring would be disrupted in ways never thought possible because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Fall semester was business as usual with students, faculty, researchers and staff accessing our facilities and resources for research and study, or simply to grab a cup of coffee between classes. Librarians and staff provided instruction on how to find the best research materials, offered reference assistance, collected and made our collections available and collaborated with faculty and researchers to translate information and data into knowledge. The usual activities in the library would come to a sudden halt spring semester.

This year’s report reviews how we responded to the Covid-19 pandemic, but it also celebrates our numerous accomplishments, highlights new special collections and library exhibits, spotlights the achievements of our faculty and staff and provides usage stats and financial information.

As the semester and 2020 come to a close, we wish you warm wishes for the holiday season. May the new year bring you health, harmony and joy.

Join us Oct. 29 for “Sabin’s Oral Polio Vaccine vs. the Race to Cure COVID 19: Historical Differences and Similarities”

albert sabin lecture

The Henry R. Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions, as part of the Albert B. Sabin Research Notebook Project, invites you to a presentation titled “Sabin’s Oral Polio Vaccine vs. the Race to Cure COVID 19: Historical Differences and Similarities” presented by the Hauck Center for the Albert B. Sabin Archives’ visiting scholars Karen Torghele and Larry Anderson, MD.

When: Thursday, October 29, 2020 at 12:00 p.m. via Zoom (link available at https://libraries.uc.edu/libraries/hsl/winkler-center.html)

Project financially assisted by The John Hauck Foundation, Fifth Third Bank, John W. Hauck and Narley L. Haley, Co-Trustees.

Read Source to learn more about the news, events, people and happenings in UC Libraries.

sourceRead Source, the online newsletter, to learn more about the news, events, people and happenings in UC Libraries.

In this issue of Source, Dean Xuemao Wang writes about his new role as vice provost for digital scholarship, which ties in with the article Introducing the Research @ Data Services Team.

The Libraries special collections are featured prominently in this issue with news of an exciting, surprise gift to the Neil Armstrong Commemorative Archives, promotion of a lecture series celebrating the digitization of the Albert B. Sabin Research Notebooks, and an announcement of a new UC exhibit featuring the Special Collections of four UC Libraries.

This fall brings new faces and new publications from the University of Cincinnati Press, along with the conclusion of the university’s Bicentennial celebration, which university archivist and head of the Archives and Rare Books Library Kevin Grace uses as the occasion to recount a gift from William A. Procter that was instrumental to the libraries.

Lastly, we announce that the Cecil Striker Society Annual Lecture is now our first fully endowed annual lecture.

Read these articles, as well as past issues, on the web at http://libapps.libraries.uc.edu/source/ and via e-mail. To receive Source via e-mail, contact melissa.norris@uc.edu to be added to the mailing list.

Billie Broaddus

Billie Broaddus with Heloisa Sabin at the Albert B. Sabin Historical Marker Dedication, June, 2013

The Winkler Center was saddened last week to learn of the passing of former Health Sciences Librarian and Director of the Cincinnati Medical Heritage Center (Winkler Center), Billie Broaddus. Billie is remembered fondly by the colleagues who knew and worked with her. “She often used the ‘iron fist in the velvet glove’ and was able to achieve much through that approach,” remembered Senior Librarian Sharon Purtee.

From 1961 to 1971 Billie worked at the University of Kentucky Medical Library. She graduated from the University of Kentucky with a B.S. in History in 1973 and a M.S.L.S in Library Science in 1974. She began work at the University of Cincinnati Medical Center Library in August, 1974 as Head of Reference. She later became the Coordinator of Information Services and then Head of the Health Sciences Library. Serving a dual role in 1981, she directed both the Health Sciences Library and the History of Health Sciences Library. Later that year, she applied to become director of the historical collections, a job in which she could merge her love of history with her library experience.

She held the position of Director, University of Cincinnati Medical Heritage Center until her retirement in 2003. Billie was professionally active in several organizations, including the Medical Library Association, and served on many professional committees. She was elected President of the Midwest Chapter/Medical Library Association in 2001. Billie was also a member of the Archivists and Librarians in History of the Health Sciences and the Ohio Academy of Medical History, the American Association for the History of Medicine, the Ohio Academy of Sciences, the Society of Ohio Archivists and the Cincinnati Academy of Medicine History Committee.

During her tenure as Director of the Medical Heritage Center, the archives of alumni and faculty including, Drs. William Altemeier, Charles D. Aring, Stanley Block, Benjamin Felson, Martin Fisher, and Robert Kehoe were all added to the repository’s holdings. Forging personal relationships with the Sabin family, she was instrumental in bringing the Albert B. Sabin Papers to the Center. In addition, Broaddus supervised the centralization into one repository of the many decentralized historical collections of the departments within the College of Medicine.

She was adamant too that because the Heritage Center served a different audience than the Health Sciences Library, the two institutions keep somewhat distinct identities. In the early 1990s as the UC Libraries developed an online presence for its collections, Broaddus made sure the Heritage Center was given its own webpage. Under Broaddus’s leadership, the Medical Heritage Center became a preeminent resource center for the history of the health sciences. She served the University of Cincinnati Medical Center Libraries for almost 30 years and was appointed Librarian Emerita when she retired from the University of Cincinnati in February 2003.

Another colleague, Edith Starbuck, remembers “Billie was a generous colleague [who] shared her knowledge and skills without hesitation…[she] also knew how to bring history to life with her wealth of knowledge and ability to tell the stories about the individuals whose information and artifacts were housed in the Heritage Center.

Heloisa Sabin

At the Albert Sabin memorial at Children's Hospital, 2010. Courtesy of the Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio

Heloisa Sabin at the Albert B, Sabin memorial at Children’s Hospital, 2010. Courtesy of the Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio

Heloisa Sabin

1917-2016

The Winkler Center was saddened to hear of the passing recently of Heloisa Sabin.  Born, Heloisa Dunshee de Abranches, she married famous medical researcher and developer of the oral polio vaccine, Albert B. Sabin, in 1972.

Before her marriage to Dr. Sabin, she was women’s editor of a family-owned newspaper, Jornal do Brasil, in Rio de Janerio where she worked for 16 years.  The Jornal was the largest daily newspaper in Rio at the time.  She also studied at Columbia University in New York and held a law degree.

Asked what it was like being the wife of the famous research professor and virologist, “exciting,” she said. “I thought he was fascinating before I met him and I still think he is.” “Life with Dr. Sabin is certainly different from any other kind of life I could lead,” Mrs. Sabin asserted. “We are traveling all the time and I get to meet a lot of people who really enrich my life. Not only do we travel in the United States but we also travel in Europe and other countries where my husband has speaking engagements.” The Sabins not only traveled to numerous locales, but also resided at various times in New York, Washington D.C., Charleston, SC, Switzerland and Israel.

Heloisa became a steward of the Sabin legacy and a tireless activist in later life.  Upon Albert Sabin’s death in 1993, she spent a majority of her time speaking out and fundraising to continue her late husband’s work in the study and improvement of immunizations, specifically in regard to Polio.  In addition, she became a strong proponent of the use of animals in medical research, as the Polio vaccine her husband developed would not have been so successful had it not been for data gleaned from animal testing.   She was a founding member of the Albert Sabin Research Institute, which advocates for global immunization to end all vaccine-preventable diseases.

She visited UC frequently, promoting ways to memorialize her husband’s accomplishments in the place where they occurred.  Working with administration of what was then the Cincinnati Medical Heritage Center (now the Winker Center), she saw to it that Albert B. Sabin’s professional and personal papers came here in 1993.

In addition to her meaningful charitable contributions to the University, Mrs. Sabin played a role in the naming of the Children’s Hospital Sabin Center, Albert Sabin Way, and the Hauck Center for the Albert Sabin Archives. She also influenced the development of the Sabin exhibit in the Vontz Center and the Ohio Historical Marker dedicated to Sabin at the Vontz’s entrance.

The Winkler Center will miss Heloisa as will all those whose lives she touched.

If you are interested in researching the Sabin collection at the Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions, please call 513.558.5120 or email chhp@ucmeil.uc.edu. To view an online inventory of the Albert B. Sabin Papers please visit Winkler-Albert B. Sabin Papers.

Works Used

Hembree, Linda.  “Life with Noted Researcher Fascinating.”  Spartanburg Herald (Spartanburg, SC).  Wednesday, 3 December 1975.  P. B3.

Marine, Steve.  Correspondence with UC Foundation, Donor Files, Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions, University of Cincinnati,

Heloisa Sabin greets visitors at the 50th Anniversary of Sabin Sundays in 2010. Courtesy of the Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio

Heloisa Sabin greets visitors at the 50th Anniversary of Sabin Sundays in 2010. Courtesy of the Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio

Sabin with Executive Director of the Winkler Center, Steve Marine, at the 50th Anniversary of Sabin Sundays, 2010. Courtesy of the Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio

Sabin with Executive Director of the Winkler Center, Steve Marine, at the 50th Anniversary of Sabin Sundays, 2010. Courtesy of the Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio

 

 

Vaccination Efforts from Around the Globe: The Story of Dr. Sabin and Dr. Harshavardhan

Dr.

Dr. Harshavardhan (1969)

By: Dr. G. V. J. A. Harshavardhan and Nathan Hood

Dr. Albert Bruce Sabin’s extremely influential role in the development and production of an Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV) simply cannot be disputed; however, information on the precise details of his contributions are not always as well-known or as accessible as one would hope. Fortunately, The Winkler Center for the History of Health Professions’ NEH-funded project to digitize many of Dr. Sabin’s papers has now reached researchers around the globe. Several months ago, the project attracted the delighted attention of Dr. Harshavardhan, a vaccinologist in India, and the exchange of information since has been enlightening for both sides.

Continue reading

UC Libraries to Host a Series of Talks on Digital Humanities Nov. 17-18

Lee Skallerup Bessette

Lee Skallerup Bessette

Lee Skallerup Bessette will explore the what, why and how of digital humanities.

What is digital humanities? How does it relate to my work?

Join the University of Cincinnati Libraries November 17 and 18 for a series of talks by Lee Skallerup Bessette exploring the topic of digital humanities.

Continue reading

Albert Sabin: An Incredible Cincinnatian

By:  Iman Said, Archives & Rare Books Intern for 2014-2015

Albert SabinHello again! The past few weeks, I have written about student life at UC and various aspects of campus that provide students with a well-rounded college experience. But UC is just one part of a huge community of Cincinnatians. Much of the work that is done on campus by our students, faculty, and staff have a significant impact on the entire city, and even the entire country. Being a student at UC makes it easy to forget that our CCM graduates go on to be Broadway stars, our MBA graduates are CEOs, and our medical students create new medicines and practices. These students succeed because of the outstanding faculty and staff who work for the university, many of whom actually have their own impact on the community. Continue reading

The Albert B. Sabin Digitization Project: Spreading the Word

At the recent 2013 Society of American Archivists’ annual meeting in New Orleans, Louisiana, I presented a poster on the final results of the Albert B. Sabin digitization project. Several archivists stopped by to discuss the poster, particularly because they were curious about the way project staff handled documents that contained sensitive information. Many of those that stopped by were at archives in similar positions as the Winkler Center, trying to figure out the best way to balance privacy and access. Continue reading