One of my fondest childhood memories is participating in treasure hunts. Someone would hide gifts and treats around the house and yard, and I would follow the clues and riddles to find my small treasures. I loved the thrill of the hunt and the excitement of solving each clue to uncover the hidden rewards.
I felt a bit of that childhood excitement the first time I stumbled across the Clendening History of Medicine Library at my place of employment. As an educator at the University of Kansas Medical Center, I found the library one day on my way back to my office from a meeting. I was captivated by an event displayed in the window: a collection of nurses’ uniforms from various years.
How it all started.
The Clendening Library is truly a hidden treasure that everyone interested in medical history—or even art and antiquities—should explore. In 1904, after graduating from the University of Kansas Medical Center’s medical school, Dr. Logan Clendening began a pilgrimage to collect historical medical books. Dr. Clendening started collecting books and medical artifacts while in his postgraduate training at the University of Edinburgh. When he married Dorothy Scott Hixon in 1914, the partnership became a passion project for the young couple.
Dr. Logan Clendening personal life.
Today, the library boasts a collection of more than 50,000 volumes, with 10,000 considered rare. Some of these texts date back to the 1400s, including artifacts that supported Dr. Clendening’s own medical writing and research. In his day, Dr. Clendening was a celebrity in Kansas City. He was a bestselling author of books on health and the human body and a syndicated health columnist. Through the publication of his first book, Modern Methods of Treatment, in 1924, Clendening became friends with H. L. Mencken . He appeared in society pages and hosted lavish parties for colleagues and the press.
In his later years, he and his wife became estranged, partly due to Logan’s history of philandering. Rumor has it that some of his medical students spotted him at a baseball game with a young woman who was not his wife. They jeered to get his attention, but he ignored them. The next day, he told those same students, “You did not see me.”
When Dr. Clendening died by suicide at the age of 60, his wife—who donated his entire collection to KUMC—refused to release any of his personal records or documents, which were eventually lost to history. He might have become a forgotten figure if not for the legacy of the collection he started and its preservation in this library.
Amazing collection available for viewing.
When I visited the library for this article, I was able to witness the vast collection of rare documents and books, amazing artwork and diagrams, and antiquities that have grown into an impressive collection of medical history. For instance, I saw the intricate, captivating diagrams in Andreas Vesalius’s (1514–1564) first edition of Fabrica. Vesalius was 29 when he published this text in 1543, which combines science, art, and typography in one volume. It provided a detailed description of human anatomy that was pivotal at the time.
In addition, I viewed a Roman surgical set that Logan Clendening purchased from an antiquities dealer around the 1930s. The human figurines, dating from around 1700, are made from ivory and ebony and depict anatomical mannequins made in workshops across Europe. Also on display was the death mask of Horace Wells, a dentist from Hartford, Connecticut, credited by many as the discoverer of anesthesia. Wells advocated the use of nitrous oxide as an anesthetic, and his initial use of nitrous oxide eventually led to the use of ether.
Two final treasures include a pre-Civil War amputation kit made for the Mexican-American War, circa 1848, and a microscope from 1730 made by Edmund Culpeper, a renowned London craftsman of microscopes during that period. Finally, there was an old 19th-century textbook that might seem run-of-the-mill but has one of the largest bookworm holes our librarians have ever seen—showing just how much damage a small creature can do to rare books.
Library details.
The library is open to the public and offers tours by request. They have ongoing exhibits, a lecture series, and even a summer fellowship for budding librarians or antiquities scholars. Because the library is located on KUMC university property, checking the website for hours and parking information is recommended. If you visit, I know you won’t be disappointed. KUMC Clendening Library website.
