The Consortium for History of Science, Technology and Medicine has now launched. The Consortium is the new national organization that has grown from the Philadelphia Area Center for the History of Science (PACHS). The Consortium encompasses 19 institutions, from Washington, D.C., through New Haven, Connecticut, as well as Kansas City and Toronto, with NYAM as one of its two New York hubs (Columbia University is the other).

The Consortium fosters research, study, and public engagement with the history of science, technology, and medicine. It supports a combined fellowship program, where awardees can work at any of the member’s institutions, now including NYAM. More information about the fellowship program can be found here. And it maintains an integrated library catalog, pulling together records from all of the Consortium partners, so that researchers can easily find the holdings of all the member institutions.

The Consortium also produces professional and public events in history. Particularly exciting for the Center is our new role in helping to run the working group for the history of medicine and health. This is one of 10 working groups set up for convening discussions. Starting up on January 16, at 3:30, the first topic is “Ebola in Historical Context,” with presenters James Colgrove of Columbia’s Mailman School of Public Health and Shobana Shankar of Stony Brook University, both at the New York Academy of Medicine; and David Barnes of the University of Pennsylvania, who will join us from Philadelphia.

To participate, one can come to NYAM, to the consortium offices in Philadelphia—which are patched together electronically—or by videoconference from elsewhere. For further details and to join, contact any one of the conveners, Nancy Tomes of Stony Book University, Keith Wailoo of Princeton, and Paul Theerman of NYAM. More information can be found at the working group website.