Blog Archives

A tiny window into Montreal’s role in the history of reproductive health

Ortho 1 Lapel Pins

La version française suit By Mary Yearl, Head Librarian, Osler Library of the History of Medicine Among the recent arrivals at the Osler Library of the History of Medicine is a set of three lapel pins decorated with an accurately …

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Many Women, Many Voices; Stories from McGill Collections

Guest Contribution by Hannah Deskin. ROAAr launched its recent book Many Women, Many Voices; Stories from McGill Collections with a fanfare, a successful sale, and an excellent turnout on November 8th.  ROAAr–that is the Rare Books & Special Collections, the Osler Library of the …

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McGill at War: Commemorating the Centenary of the End of the First World War

This exhibition commemorates the centenary of the armistice of November 11, 1918, which saw the end of a war which profoundly marked the bodies, minds, and spirits of those who experienced it, both in and out of uniform. The First …

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Book annotations as witness to the Dutch influence in Japan during the Edo period

        During the Edo period, from the mid-17th to the mid-19th century, Japan adopted an isolationist policy. At this time, the only Westerners allowed access to the country were the Dutch, who were permitted to trade from …

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Anatomizing Thomas Rowlandson’s representation of William Hunter’s dissecting room

Guest contributor: Margaret Carlyle, Ph.D. U Chicago, Institute on the Formation of Knowledge 2018 recipient, Dr. Edward H. Bensley Osler Library Research Travel Grant   Thomas Rowlandson’s original watercolour drawing of William Hunter’s (1718–1783) London anatomy school on Great Windmill Street …

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McGill convocation through the years

The tent is up on McGill’s downtown campus and the convocation ceremonies are right around the corner. We’re taking a look back at the university’s convocations through the years with photos from our digitized collection of yearbooks, the McGill University Archives …

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Nicholas Cronk on Voltaire at McGill

AN AMERICAN VOLTAIRE: The J. Patrick Lee Voltaire Collection at McGill By: Nicholas Cronk, Voltaire Foundation, Oxford University (le texte en français suit) Pat Lee, who died in 2006, was a life-enhancing friend as well as a Voltaire enthusiast and …

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Ways of seeing: artistry on display in the Osler’s autumn acquisitions

Figure 3 Studying the senses, from Ducrot’s Cahier d’histoire naturelle, 1835-1837.

La version française suit By Mary Yearl, Head Librarian, Osler Library of the History of Medicine There is something about those eyes. The variety of colour; the sizes that span human stages of growth. Their presence is at once alarmingly …

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The Unknown Unknown: Finding the Jean Drapeau Collection

Photo d’Expo 67 tirée de l’album de photos personnelles de Jean Drapeau.

La version française suit By Chris Lyons, Head Librarian, Rare Books and Special Collections — I think the most exciting part of my job as a rare book librarian is in discovering the “unknown unknowns,” to use Donald Rumsfeld’s turn …

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If These Buildings Could Walk: On a newly acquired Melvin Charney sculpture

Melvin Charney, CITIES ON THE RUN…Three Stragglers, 1999. Aluminium soudé, sablé et laqué. Don de Lilian et Billy Mauer. Collection d’arts visuels de McGill, 2017-055.

La version française suit By Vanessa Di Francesco, Assistant Curator, McGill Visual Arts Collection — The idea that the built environments we inhabit can take on their own lives, acting apart from us or on our behalf, occupies our popular …

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