Monthly Archives: June 2023

Hello, Summer!

Posted on by
Reply

By Anthony Murisco, Public Engagement Librarian

As we pass the longest day of the year, we arrive at summer!  

We began our celebration of the summer with the annual Museum Mile Festival on Tuesday, June 13th. Each year, all the cultural institutions along 5th Avenue get together to highlight what we have to offer. Think of it as a block party for museums! The stretch starts around 85th Street with The Met and ends at 110th with The Africa Center.  
 
This year the Museum Mile Festival celebrated its 45th anniversary. It also happened to be the 100th birthday of our neighboring institution, The Museum of the City of New York! From where we were set up, we could hear the titular song from the new musical “New York, New York” in observance. 

NYAM’s table was set up outside 103rd Street right across from Central Park. Our set-up highlighted the treasures from our collection with replicas of assorted pamphlets. This included a photo-op with our new skeletal employee. There were plenty of crayons on hand for visitors to engage in sheets from our Color Our Collections coloring books. Sidewalk chalk was on offer to decorate the closed city streets.  

The NYAM Team enjoyed talking with the passers-by. These encounters gave us ideas on how best to invite the community through our doors to engage with our organization. A reminder that throughout the year on the first Monday of every month at 12 pm (holidays excepted), we offer tours of our library highlighting a portion of the collection. While we understand it may not be possible for some to attend, we continue to look for other ways to highlight our rich holdings.  

For some, the Museum Mile Festival is their unofficial kick-off to summer. Others wait for the official start on the day of the summer equinox. Students may celebrate on the last day of classes when their summer vacation starts. 

While not all of us get that traditional summer vacation, the season brings to mind the need for some real relaxation. Whether it be lying by the beach, going for a run in the park, or seeing your favorite baseball team play, we each have our own ideas of what it means to take it easy. It could be a tropical vacation that’s been on your calendar for months, or a day trip you take with friends out East to a winery. One doesn’t have to spend time lamenting a lost youth!  

Some like to relax by swimming. We’ve previously investigated tips and tricks to make your swimming more artful or, the proper scientific form. Others visit different places. Our blog has also shared what happens when the God of love needs some rest and relaxation. It goes to show that if they need it, we do too. 

Here at NYAM, we want to hear how you are spending this leisure time. Send us a postcard detailing what you’ve been up to in your downtime or  some photos or videos (no faces please!) at librarysocial@nyam.org or the New York Academy of Medicine, 1216 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10029 (Attn: Library). We’re excited to see what you are up to!  

Throughout the summer we hope to share with you what others have been doing. We need to recharge once in a while. Your relaxation tips might inspire others! You never know what may lie in your own backyard.  

(Enjoyed the colorful, illustrated images? They come from our William H. Helfand Collection of Pharmaceutical Trade Cards collection which is available to view online!)

May 2023 NYAM Library Wrap-Up

Posted on by
Reply

By Anthony Murisco, Public Engagement Librarian

May brought us flowers and a lot to celebrate on social media!

Throughout the month of May we observed Mental Health Awareness Month. This included sharing information and graphics from the National Alliance on Mental Illness. On May 11, we observed National Children’s Mental Health Awareness Day. Kids often imitate adult behavior. Passing down healthy habits, including ones related to mental health, is imperative!

A colorful illustration of a group of kids. They are in front of a door. One boy is tying roller skates. A blonde haired girl is running to another boy who is riding a fake horse with a cowboy hat.

The popularity of Star Wars continues to this day. Just after the movie’s premiere in the late 1970’s, President Carter and the National Immunization Program asked the film’s two droids, R2-D2 and C-3PO, to star in a campaign promoting immunization. A television commercial and a poster were made for this, with the latter in our collection.

The Star Wars droids are asking parents of Earth to immunize their children in this printed PSA.

School nurses are some of the first healthcare workers that children meet. On May 10th we celebrated them. National School Nurses Day invites us to thank these caregivers. This photograph from Health Work in the Schools by Ernest Bryant Hoag and Lewis M. Terman shows a school nurse in action.

A black and white image. Caption reads "School nurse recording pulse and temperature in an open-air class."

Who better than to help us celebrate Mother’s Day and Women’s Health Week than the Roman goddess of women’s health, Juno. She made her appearance in 1950 at the Cleveland Health Museum, helping to explain how the female body worked.

A photograph of the transparent Juno statue from the side. Juno is a life-size woman.

Do you like foraging for your food? Then you probably celebrated National Mushroom Hunting Day on May 17th. The Field Book of Common Gilled Mushrooms by William S. Thomas helps you identify which you can eat and which you cannot!

A colorful illustration of various mushrooms.

World Goth Day happened on May 22nd. The macabre is at the forefront of this often-misunderstood subculture. We showed off some of the many skeletons in our collection, including this from The Last Will and Testament of Basil Valentine by Basil Valentine.

A skeleton stands on a platform.

One of New York City’s prominent bridges, The Brooklyn Bridge, celebrated its 140th birthday on May 24th. It appears on a card from our William H. Helfand Pharmaceutical Trade Card collection promoting Lydia E. Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound.

The front side of the trading card. A drawing of the "East River Bridge" is front and center with ships sailing around it. Lydia E. Pinkham's Vegetable compound is a featured banner in the middle of the bridge.

International Plastic Free Day on May 25th seeks to have at least one day without single-use plastics. The day usually falls around Memorial Day, a long weekend often spent enjoying picnics, the beach, or hiking, all occasions tempting us to be wasteful. To keep on enjoying, we need to squash the usage of these products.

An illustration of two beach-goers unable to go to the beach. A sign reads "No Bathing. Polluted."

Throughout the month, artists used the hashtag and prompt #MerMay as a creative inspiration signaling mermaids and mermen. Towards the end of the month, we shared another image from the Helfand Trade Card collection, this one featuring the aquatic folk using Ayer’s Hair Vigor to attract sailors.

Four mermaids are applying hair tonic. In the background a fifth mermaid is approaching a ship.

Finally, we are counting down the days until Museum Mile Festival 2023! On Tuesday, June 13th, cultural institutions along Museum Mile on 5th Avenue will be celebrating with extended hours, giveaways, and a look inside the collections. The NYAM Library will be set up at 103rd and 5th—come visit us!

The New York Academy of Medicine Library posts updates like this throughout the week. We can be found online over at Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Check back here or on our social media for more chances for a look inside our collection!

A skeleton sits in a chair. They are surrounded by old books.