February 2021 | Issue 393

Lucy Waldrop, Assistant Director for Medical Center Archives

The stories of African Americans have been historically underrepresented and concealed in archival collections. Researching this history can be difficult. This issue highlights a guide that aims to support this research.

Produced by the Medical Center Archives, Black History at Duke Health introduces researchers to materials documenting the history of African Americans at the Duke University Medical Center. The focus is on navigating resources within the Medical Center Archives. Included are oral histories, archival collections, photographs, audiovisual materials, publications, selected key dates and key figures, and links to recommended digital resources. It is not intended to be a comprehensive bibliography but rather a starting guide for locating research materials.

The Medical Center Library & Archives staff are working remotely and building access is restricted.

How can I get assistance?
You can contact Library staff through our chat function between 9a and 5p, Monday through Friday. Library staff are available to meet with faculty, staff, and students by phone, email, and WebEx or Zoom. Library classes are all held online.

Is the Seeley G. Mudd building accessible?
The building is locked with limited badge access available for Duke Health students, faculty and staff. Duke University ID badge holders and non-Duke individuals do not have access to the building at this time. Because of the fence securing the outdoor plaza in front of the Mudd building, patrons will be required to use one of the main hospital screening locations, such as Duke North or the DMP, as their entry point. All patrons and staff using the facility are expected to follow Duke's policies.

What spaces in the Library are available?
Designated seats in the Medical Center Library & Archives are available for individual reservation, Monday – Friday, from 9a to 4p. Library spaces are not available for access on nights, weekends and holidays.

The seats are located on Level 2R and Level 3 of the Library. Level 1 remains closed. To ensure you will have a place to work, reserve a seat before you arrive. You may make reservations for up to seven hours per day. Once you reserve a seat, you will receive a confirmation email with a code. Bring your phone, tablet or laptop with this reservation confirmation to check in at the Entrance Lobby Desk. For more details on reservable space policies and procedures, please see https://mclibrary.duke.libcal.com/reserve/seats.

How do I reserve a seat?
To reserve a seat, connect to Seat & Space Bookings and follow instructions. From this page, you may make a new reservation, take possession of your reserved seat, and check out when you are ready to leave.

Are computers, printers, scanners, and PIN stations available in the Library?
With the exception of PIN stations, computers, printers, and scanners are not currently available. Three PIN stations are located on Level 2R and may be reserved for up to four hours per day.

Is the Computer Classroom (Rm 104D) available for reservation or drop in use?
The Computer Classroom is currently unavailable for reservations or drop in use. If your program has a need for essential computer-based training that cannot be done remotely, please contact DeShane Watson to discuss options.

Can I make a reservation for Conference Room 212C?
At this time, we are not accepting any reservations for conference rooms. To promote social distancing, Duke is encouraging all faculty, staff, and students to meet via Webex or Zoom. 

Can I get a print book?
Users are not allowed into the stacks or Reading Room to browse and check out print books. Please use our Library Takeout Service to identify, request, and pick up print books from the Medical Center Library and other libraries at Duke. Please note: This process can take up to 7-10 days due to quarantine times and transfers between libraries.

How can I return a book I have borrowed?
Please return books to the book drop located to the left of the Library's front entrance.

Can I make requests for Interlibrary Loan items? 
Interlibrary Loan and Document Delivery Services are delimited during COVID but available to fill routine article requests. Older and more obscure articles may be more difficult to acquire. Book borrowing is limited and may have significant delays.

IIf you are a Duke clinician, faculty, or staff member and have an urgent request for a full-text article(s) related to direct patient care or COVID-19, please alert us in the notes field on the request form.

Please note: Access to Document Delivery/Interlibrary Loan Services is not available to affiliates or to other libraries at this time.

How can I get materials for a class I am teaching?
The Library has strong digital collections for teaching and learning. If you need assistance identifying online materials for a class you are teaching, please reach out to your Library Liaison. If you need to place an item on e-reserve, please see our Course Reserves page.

Can I renew library materials online?
If you need to renew items, you may do that online using your Duke NetID and password. If you have any issues or concerns about renewing library materials, please contact Anu Moorthy, Associate Director for Content & Discovery, 

How long will this last?
We will follow guidance from university and health system leadership on plans, but we do not yet know when regular hours and access will be reinstated.

If you have questions or concerns, please contact Megan von Isenburg, Associate Dean for Library Services & Archives, at megan.vonisenburg@duke.edu. or complete our feeback form.

Designated seats in the Medical Center Library & Archives are now available for individual reservation, Monday – Friday, from 9a to 4p for Duke Health badge holders. To reserve a seat, connect to Seat & Space Bookings and follow instructions. From this page, you may make a new reservation, take possession of your reserved seat, and check out when you are ready to leave.

The seats are located on Level 2R and Level 3 of the Library. Level 1 remains closed. To ensure you will have a place to work, reserve a seat before you arrive. You may make reservations for up to six hours per day. Once you reserve a seat, you will receive a confirmation email with a code. Bring your phone, tablet, or laptop with this reservation confirmation to check in at the Entrance Lobby Desk.

Once you check in at the Entrance Lobby Desk and get your library pass, you will need to also check in at the reserved seat (cubicle, table, study room) within 15 minutes from the reservation start time. Seats that are not claimed will be released.

For more details on reservable space policies and procedures, see https://mclibrary.duke.libcal.com/reserve/seats. For questions regarding other services during this time, please see Library Services & Resources During COVID-19.

The Medical Center Library & Archives annually collects facts, figures, and accomplishments of the Library and staff members and produces an annual snapshot. In this issue we highlight some of the work completed in 2020, a year unlike any other.

Read about the activities of the Medical Center Library & Archives in our recently released 2020 Snapshot!

Karen Barton, Biomedical Research Liaison, Research & Education

Duke users can access Kanopy from their TV and other devices to stream award-winning feature films, short films, documentaries, foreign films, and more for free. Below are some films from Duke's collection that focus on the African-American experience. Descriptions are excerpted from Kanopy.com. Find other video streaming services on the Duke University Libraries Research Databases page.

Race, Power & American Sports
46 mins

Cultural historian Dave Zirin's analysis ranges from the emergence of professional sports in the 1800s to today's commercial media sports spectacles. This analysis shows how athletes of color have posed a direct threat to traditional notions of whiteness, white male authority, and American ideals of masculinity.

An Evening with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater
110 mins

The country's boldest and most exciting dance company brings its distinctive style home to you. It's dazzling, brash and dynamic, yet graceful and poetic.

Souls of Black Girls
52 mins   

This award-winning documentary explores how media images of beauty undercut the self-esteem of African-American women. It includes powerful commentary from rapper and activist Chuck D, actresses Regina King and Jada Pinkett Smith, and others.

Bridging the Divide: Tom Bradley and the Politics of Race 
58 mins

This is a compelling story about Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley — the first African American mayor elected in a major U.S. city with an overwhelmingly white majority. Mayor for 20 years (1973-1993), his extraordinary multiracial coalition redefined Los Angeles, ushered in police reform, and transformed the national dialogue on race, encouraging elections of minority candidates nationwide, including President Barack Obama.

I Am a Man: Black Masculinity in America
57 mins

This award-winning documentary links everyday black men from various socioeconomic backgrounds with some of Black America's most progressive academics, social critics and authors to provide an engaging, candid dialogue on black masculine identity in American culture. It features interviews with bell hooks, Michael Eric Dyson, John Henrick Clarke, Dr. Alvin Poussaint, MC Hammer, and others.

Soul Food Junkies
64 mins

This film offers an absorbing and inspiring look at the cultural politics of food and the complex interplay between identity, taste, power, and health. It features soul food cooks, historians, doctors, and food justice movement activists who are challenging the food industry, creating sustainable gardens, and advocating for better supermarkets, more farmers' markets, and healthier takes on soul food.

Victor Gordon, Associate Director for Administration

The Medical Center Library & Archives Staff Development Committee (Brandi Tuttle, Steph Hendren, Rusty Koontz, Eugene Lofton, and Victor Gordan) volunteered to open the first All Staff zoom meeting of 2021 with an "Out with the Old, In with the New" theme.   

Several days before the meeting, the Committee gathered results from a Qualtrics Survey asking staff to anonymously volunteer information about anything they’d like to leave behind in 2020. A selection of answers were transcribed onto blue sticky notes including election news, working on weekends, masks, racism, illness, and worrying over toilet paper. Victor set up his fire pit on the day of the staff meeting and those things that staff wanted to see left behind were tossed into the fire. It was cathartic to see them go up in smoke and where there's smoke, there's fire. .

Staff had also been asked on the survey to share any silver linings or things they had learned about themselves they hoped to carry into 2021. The meeting  ended with Victor reading a few of those transcribed answers including, "I am more resilient than I thought; I get a lot done working from home; and I thought I was an introvert but it turns out that isn’t true. Of course  Victor was very careful to keep these precious sticky notes away from the fire. 

While the Staff Development Committee thought this was a fun activity and an appropriate way to start the New Year, the Medical Center Library & Archives staff is looking ahead and hoping we will not need to repeat another fire pit catharsis in 12 months!

Lucy Waldrop, Assistant Director for Medical Center Archives

Last summer, Duke University and the School of Medicine took steps to acknowledge and address systematic racism, both within the institutions and across the nation. Emphasis was given to the effects racism has on Black communities and individuals. On June 16, 2020, Duke University held "Living While Black," an all-day symposium bringing together distinguished Black faculty, students, and staff. Speakers discussed the history of race and racism within Duke and the United States, their personal perspectives as Black individuals at Duke, and steps to chart a path toward an equitable, anti-racist future.

Later that day, Dean Mary Klotman, MD, addressed race and racism within the Duke University School of Medicine with "Turning a Moment into a Movement: Dismantling Racism in the Duke University School of Medicine." Klotman acknowledged the grief and anger Black individuals and communities were feeling and vowed that the School would make structural changes to become a more equitable institution.

Following the "Living While Black" symposium, Duke Health created Moments to Movement (M2M), Duke Health’s collective stand against systemic racism and injustice. In the summer of 2020, Duke Health launched a four-part M2M Series on Race and Social Justice which included the following panels: 

• 6/25/2020 - Virtual Leadership Briefing: Black Men @ Duke and in America
• 7/23/2020 - Virtual Leadership Briefing : Black Women @ Duke and in America
• 9/17/2020 - Stand By Me: Allies on Racism and Social Injustice
• 11/12/2020 - Clinicians on Racism and Health Inequities

In addition to the above mentioned series, Virtual Town Halls were held where leaders from the Duke University Health System (DUHS), Duke University School of Nursing (DUSON), and the Duke University School of Medicine (DUSOM) discussed Duke Health’s M2M.

10/20/2020 DUHS M2M Town Hall
Duke Health team members gathered virtually to learn about progress on Moments to Movement. DUHS leaders shared action plans for advancing racial, social and health equity.

This town hall was hosted by A. Eugene Washington, MD, Chancellor for Health Affairs at Duke University and President and CEO of the DUHS. Joining Chancellor Washington were William J. Fulkerson, Jr., MD, DUHS Executive Vice President; John Sampson, MD, PhD, PDC President; Katie Galbraith, MBA, FACHE, Duke Regional Hospital President and Interim Head of Community Health; Rick Shannon, MD, Duke Health Chief Quality Officer; and Rhonda Brandon, DUHS Chief Human Resources Officer and Senior Vice President.

11/2/2020 DUSON M2M Town Hall
DUSON team members highlighted six concrete recommendations for improving racial equity.

Joining Chancellor Eugene Washington for the hour-long discussion were DUSON Dean Marion E. Broome, PhD, RN; DUSON Associate Dean Brigit M. Carter, PhD, RN; and representatives from three of the school's nine racial justice committees.

12/7/2020 DUSOM M2M Town Hall
DUSOM addressed its progress and future plans to dismantle systematic racism and create a more just, diverse, and equitable school and community.

This event was hosted by Chancellor Eugene Washington and moderated by Dean Mary Klotman, MD. Panelists included Coral May, MPA, Director, School of Medicine Human Resources Service Center, Kenyon Railey, MD, Assistant Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health; Judy Seidenstein, Associate Dean and Chief Diversity Officer, Kevin Thomas, MD, Associate Professor of Medicine, and Laine Thomas, PhD, Associate Professor of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics.

A. Eugene Washington, MD, Chancellor for Health Affairs at Duke University and President and CEO, Duke University Health System	Mary E. Klotman, MD, Dean, School of Medicine and Vice Chancellor for Health Affairs at Duke University

For more information, contact Medical Center Archives staff or consult Archives Finding Aids: Office of Creative Services and Marketing Communication Records and the Dean's Office (School of Medicine) Records.

Barbara Dietsch, Electronic Resources & Acquisitions Manager, Content & Discovery

To highlight Black History Month, we are featuring a few books focusing on the African-American experience. Reviews are excerpted from Amazon.com.

African American Folk Healing
Stephanie Mitchem

Folk practices like curing a nosebleed by holding a silver quarter on the back of the neck, treating an earache with sweet oil drops, or wearing plant roots to keep from catching colds, are woven into the fabric of black culture. Within many African American families, these kinds of practices continue today and shape the concepts about healing that are diffused throughout many African American communities.

African American Women Chemists
Jeannette Brown

African-American chemist Jeannette Brown presents a wide-ranging historical introduction to the presence of African-American women in the field of chemistry. This book contains sketches of the lives of some of these women from the earliest pioneers up until the late 1960's when the Civil Rights Acts were passed and greater career opportunities began to emerge.

African American Alternative Medicine: Using Alternative Medicine to Prevent & Control Chronic Diseases 
Eric J. Bailey

This book focuses on the African-American health belief system and the treatment strategies often used and documented. It includes a cultural-historical view of alternative medicine's use within the African American community and shows how important it has been as an integral part of African-American culture.

African American Medicine in Washington, D.C.: Healing the Capital During the Civil War Era
Heather M. Butts and Hugh Florenz Butts

African-American soldiers who were wounded in defense of the Union during the Civil War required African-American nurses, doctors and surgeons to heal them. In the nation's capital, these brave healthcare workers created a medical infrastructure for African Americans by African Americans.

African American Hospitals in North Carolina: 39 Institutional Histories, 1880-1967
Phoebe Ann Pollitt

Thousands of black North Carolinians suffered or died during the Jim Crow era, because they were denied admittance to white-only hospitals. With little money, scant opportunities for professional education, and few white allies, African-American physicians, nurses and other community leaders created their own hospitals, schools, and public health outreach initiatives.

Race and Medicine in Nineteenth- and Early-Twentieth-Century America
Todd L. Savitt 

Historian Todd Savitt presents revised and updated versions of his seminal essays on the medical history of African Americans in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, especially in the South. This collection examines a variety of aspects of African American medical history, including health and illnesses, medical experimentation, early medical schools and medical professionals, and slave life insurance.

Rebecca Williams, Archives Librarian for Research, Outreach, and Education

Duke University Medical Center Archives has been closed to the public since March 13, 2020 due to the ongoing pandemic. While we have been able to consult with patrons remotely and provide digital surrogates of materials, we are pleased to announce that our Archives Reading Room has re-opened for Duke researchers by appointment only. In order to limit the number of people in our building, we have designated Tuesdays and Thursdays as research days. Please contact us to schedule a visit.

In addition to our normal reading room regulations, we will also be following the protocols put in place by Duke to reduce risk of the spread of COVID-19. You can find full details at Duke United. Protocols include wearing a mask, washing your hands, maintaining physical distance, and symptom monitoring.

Staff are available for remote consultation (M-F) via our online request form. We are happy to assist you in locating digital materials for your research and making digital reference copies when possible.

Options for Digital Research

As an alternative to in-person research, we also encourage you to check out the following digital resource options.

MEDSpace
If you’re looking for historic images, our digital repository, MEDSpace, is an excellent place to start. It contains nearly 700 photographs documenting the history of Duke Medicine. You can also find early publications, medical illustrations and artwork, and medical artifacts.

• Historical Images Documenting Duke Health
• Duke Health Historical Collections
• Duke Medical Center Publications

Digitized Intercom
The Intercom, Duke Medicine’s primary news publication from 1953 to 1986, featured information about campus events and construction, faculty and staff news, and articles on medical research and innovations at Duke. The first 25 years of this publication have been digitized, making more than 500 issues available online.

Digital Exhibits
Archives has several digital exhibits about key figures and events in the history of the Medical Center. Some of the topics include the Duke Poison Control Center, Dr. Wilburt C. Davison’s correspondence with Sir William Osler, and women in medicine at Duke (which is currently under reconstruction).

DUMC Archives Blog and Instagram
Updated regularly, our blog and Instagram are the places to go for Archives news, to see materials from our collections, and discover stories about the Medical Center’s history.

Jamie Wylie, Program Director, Duke Office of Research Initiatives

Navigating the research landscape at Duke can be complicated, particularly for faculty, staff, and trainees new to Duke or new to research. Across the institution, there are more than 40 offices, centers, and institutes involved in supporting research endeavors, which can feel overwhelming.  

To help researchers more easily access the information they need, the Duke Office of Research Initiatives has spearheaded the development of a new tool, myRESEARCHpath, which aims to 1) harmonize the location of information available from Duke research support offices and 2) guide users towards requirements, policies, consultations, and helpful resources organized by tasks within the research project life cycle.   

For example, if trainees are generating ideas for research projects, they can navigate to the “Develop the project idea” task page where they will be presented with information about literature reviews, concept reviews, and determining project feasibility. They will also have access to resources from the many groups at Duke that are involved in this step within the research life cycle, such as consultations with the Duke Medical Center Library & Archives and guidance on scientific writing from the Office of Campus Research Development.  

Additional features of myRESEARCHpath include the ability to apply filters based on project inclusions and oversight, utilize a curated search, and connect to the appropriate support office when more personalized assistance is needed.  

The myRESEARCHpath tool can be accessed through the new “Research Path” widget in myRESEARChome. If you would like to schedule a demonstration of myRESEARCHpath for your unit, please contact myRESEARCHpath@duke.edu.

We offer a variety of online classes on research and searching topics every month. All classes are free and offered virtually, though registration through our Website is required. In addition to these classes, you can also request an online session for yourself or a group or schedule an appointment for a research consultation.

Brandi Tuttle, Liaison to Physician Assistant Program, Research & Education

In 2019, the Duke Mobile App Gateway and the Duke Medical Center Library & Archives spearheaded a grant to provide access to digital health devices for use in research, and the Digital Health Device Collection was born. While the collection was in isolation for most of 2020, we are happy to report the devices are now available again to interested Duke researchers, clinicians, and students. They can be borrowed by researchers across Duke Health and Duke University considering devices for their research or clinical needs to facilitate appropriate device selection (data collection, data format, participant comfort, etc.).

We invite researchers to check out a device, give us your thoughts and experiences, suggest a device for purchase, or donate a recently used device to the collection! Currently the collection includes over 30 devices, such as: activity trackers (FitBit and Apple Watch), smart devices (Echo, Google Home, etc), tablets (iPad, Fire, etc), virtual reality (Oculus Go), and vital metric devices (fertility, blood pressure, eeg, ekg, vision, ascultation, etc).

For more information or to check on device availability, see: Digital Health Device Collection.

Note: This project has been funded in whole or in part with Federal funds from the Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health, National Library of Medicine, under cooperative agreement number UG4LM012340.

Karen’s Bio

• Working at Duke University Medical Center Library & Archives since: 2019
• Education: B.A. Communication-Media Production, University of Houston; M.S. Library and Information Science, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
• Current position: Biomedical Research Liaison, Research & Education

Q & A

1.    Describe your current position & what you find most interesting about it.
As the Biomedical Research Liaison Librarian, I primarily teach and provide resources related to literature searching and topics in scholarly communication, such as publishing, data sharing, and research impact. I also serve as a member of and liaison to the IACUC, so I conduct searches for animal alternatives as well as take part in facility inspections among other tasks. The most interesting thing about my job is that I assist researchers from a variety of fields, so I learn something new related to health almost daily.

2.    Describe yourself in three words. Caring, creative, ambitious

3.    What has been your biggest professional challenge?
Being a supervisor in my very first full-time library job was pretty tough because I had to learn how to do my own designated tasks while also overseeing the work of others and learning how to lead.

4.    What do you think is the most interesting issue in libraries & archives today?
The ongoing issue with publishing business models in which subscription fees continue to increase while library budgets often remain the same or decrease is quite interesting.

 5.    What organizations (personal and/or professional) are you involved in? 
MLA (Medical Library Association), MAC/MLA (Mid-Atlantic Chapter of the Medical Library Association), RDAP (Research Data Access and Preservation Association), Writers League of Texas. 

6.    Is there anything about you that others might be surprised to know?
This may not be that surprising, but I have a fraternal twin sister.

7.    What do you do for fun?
I love trying new restaurants, traveling, and doing crossword puzzles. I also write fiction and screenplays. 

8.    What are you most proud of?
I am most proud of all of the meaningful work I have done to help others. 

9.    What do you hope to accomplish in 2021?
Professionally, I would like to complete a book chapter that I am working on for an MLA publication. Personally, I would like to publish a novel.

10.   What is your favorite Website or blog?
Shortoftheweek.com is pretty cool.

Sarah Cantrell, Associate Director for Research & Education and Liaison to Graduate Medical Education, also co-authored the following article: Maheswaranathan M, Cantrell S, Eudy AM, Rogers JL, Clowse MEB, Hastings SN, Bailey SC, "Investigating Health Literacy in Systemic Lupus Erythematosus: A Descriptive Review," Current Allergy and Asthma Reports, 20(12):79-87, 2020.

Samantha Kaplan, Research & Education Librarian and Liaison to the School of Medicine, has authored the following article: "Homeless Patrons Utilize the Library for More than Shelter but Public Library Services Are Not Designed with Them in Mind," Evidence Based Library and Information Practice,15(4):174-175, 2020.

Samantha Kaplan has also co-authored the following article: Moss HA, Wu J, Kaplan SJ, Zafar SY, "The Affordable Care Act's Medicaid Expansion and Impact Along the Cancer-Care Continuum: A Systematic Review," JNCI-Journal of the National Cancer Institute, 112(8):779-791, 2020.

Beverly Murphy, Assistant Director, Communications & Web Content; DUHS Hospital Nursing Liaison, and Past President of the Medical Library Association, began her term in January 2021 as Journal of the Medical Library Association Equity Task Force Liaison representing the African American Medical Librarians Alliance Caucus (AAMLA). In this role, Beverly will work to create more equitable opportunities for the BIPOC community in author, peer reviewer, and editorial roles.

The Medical Center Library & Archives offers online training on a variety of topics. Request an online session for yourself or a group, schedule an appointment for a research consultation, or register for a class.

Duke University Medical Center Library & Archives News is published bimonthly.