Dr. Joel A. Klein is the Molina Curator for the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences at the Huntington Library in San Marino. He stewards the library’s collections on medicines and those sciences, which have a relationship to medicine, especially prior the nineteenth century. As an historian of early-modern science and medicine he specializes in the cultural, intellectual, and social history of chemistry and medicine from the fourteenth century forward.
Dr. Klein described the many things offered to visitors at the Huntington Library. There is vast array of gardens including the Chinese, Japanese and Desert Gardens. The Huntington’s art collections focus on European art from the 15th to the early 20th century. It is the home of one of the most distinguished collections of late 18th- and early 19th-century British paintings. The Library also features rare books including a Gutenberg Bible and Audubon’s Birds of America. There are over 9 million manuscripts in the collection.
Dr. Klein works with the medical collection, which includes hundreds of books printed before 1500. There are early books on anatomy and surgery. Some of the world’s very first x-ray images are in the collection as well many volumes on historical medical procedures. Dr. Klein is working on a “History of Medicine” course, which he hopes, will be used as part of the curriculum in Med Schools. He encourages us all to visit the Huntington Library to enjoy its vast array of offerings.