The Dittrick Medical History Center is comprised of the museum, archives, and collections of rare books, artifacts, and images. The Center originated as part of the Cleveland Medical Library Association (est. 1894) and today functions as an interdisciplinary study center within the College of Arts and Sciences of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio.
Thursday, October 31st, 2013 at 6:00 pm
Lindsey Fitzharris presents Medicine’s Dark Secrets
This Halloween we will host Lindsey Fitzharris, who will discuss her forthcoming documentary film, Medicine’s Dark Secrets. Lindsey has a Ph.D in the History of Medicine from Oxford University, and has spent the past few years in London medical museums, especially St. Bart’s, researching the pathological specimen collections. In the course of this research she became especially intrigued with the question, “whose remains became a specimen?” This led to an exploration of the life and demise of the persons whose remains survive in these collections, and more specifically, what led them to becoming an object of study in a jar of preserving fluid? Unraveling this sad and indisputably peculiar fate takes Fitzharris’s investigation on a curious, unusual path leading to a more full understanding of the medical past, warts and all. The event will be held in the Ford Auditorium (receeption to follow in the Dittrick Museum) Allen Memorial Medical Library, 1000 Euclid Ave., Cleveland OH 44106
