The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL (2000-2012) was a research and teaching centre within

University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...

dedicated to the history of medicine. It was created through a grant from the

Wellcome Trust The Wellcome Trust is a charitable foundation focused on health research based in London, in the United Kingdom. It was established in 1936 with legacies from the pharmaceutical magnate Henry Wellcome (founder of one of the predecessors of Glaxo ...

, on the model of othe
Wellcome Trust Centres
as a national and international centre of excellence in its field. As a university department, it was administered by an internal governance committee chaired by the Centre's Director, who was in turn advised by an international committee of external academic specialists in the history of science and medicine; until 2009, the Director reported to the Dean of Life Sciences and a governing committee on which the dean also sat.

History

The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL was a successor organization to the earlier Wellcome Historical Medical Research Library (ca. 1913-1968) and the

Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine The Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine (1968–1999) was a London centre for the study and teaching of medical history. It consisted of the Wellcome Library and an Academic Unit. The former was and is a world-class library collectio ...

(1968-1999). It was succeeded by the

UCL Centre for the History of Medicine The UCL Centre for the History of Medicine (UCLCHM) was an academic research and teaching centre for the history of medicine at University College London (UCL) in London. It succeeded the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL. ...

that itself closed at the end of 2014. The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL (WTCHM) existed from 2000 until the announcement of its closure in 2010, with a winding-up period of two years until 2012. During its existence, the WTCHM received a core grant from the Wellcome Trust, which contributed the chief financial support for its staff and academic programs of research, teaching and public outreach. The WTCHM was academically and administratively part of

University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...

. Physically, it was located in offices in the Wellcome Building at 183 Euston Road, that is owned by the Wellcome Trust, with periods spent at Tavistock Square and Eversholt Street during redecoration of the Wellcome Building in the WTCHM's early years. The last report of the WTCHM was published in 2010.

Directors

* Prof. Harold Cook (2000 to 2009) * Prof.

Sonu Shamdasani Sonu Shamdasani (born 1962) is a London-based author, editor in chief, and professor at University College London. His research and writings focus on Carl Gustav Jung (1875–1961), and cover the history of psychiatry and psychology from the mid-n ...

(acting director, 2010–2012)

Teaching

The WTCHM offered university courses for UCL students at the MA level, and an intercalated BSc in the history of medicine for medical students. It also supervised and examined PhD students. These teaching activities continued the programme that had earlier developed at the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine.

Publications

Staff at the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL edited, published or otherwise supported a number of internationally renowned journals and book series. These included, *
Clio Medica
', a series of research monographs on the history of medicine and health care; published cooperatively with the Dutch publisher Rodopi. *
Sir Henry Wellcome Asian Series
', a series focussed on the history of medicine in Asia and historical sources in

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic languages, Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C ...

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...

and other languages. It is published by

Brill Brill may refer to: Places * Brielle (sometimes "Den Briel"), a town in the western Netherlands * Brill, Buckinghamshire, a village in England * Brill, Cornwall, a small village to the west of Constantine, Cornwall, UK * Brill, Wisconsin, an un ...

. *
Medical History
', a refereed research journal of record, that became an

open access journal Open access (OA) is a set of principles and a range of practices through which research outputs are distributed online, free of access charges or other barriers. With open access strictly defined (according to the 2001 definition), or libre op ...

during its period of governance at the Wellcome Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL. *
Wellcome Witnesses to Twentieth Century Medicine
', transcripts of seminars at which significant figures in 20th-century medicine discuss specific discoveries or events in recent medical history *
New Perspectives in South Asian History
', a series of books on social and economic topics relating to public health and economic development.

The Wellcome Library

The

Wellcome Library The Wellcome Library is founded on the collection formed by Sir Henry Wellcome (1853–1936), whose personal wealth allowed him to create one of the most ambitious collections of the 20th century. Henry Wellcome's interest was the history of med ...

grew out of the personal collecting interests of the businessman and philanthropist

Henry Wellcome Sir Henry Solomon Wellcome (August 21, 1853 – July 25, 1936) was an American pharmaceutical entrepreneur. He founded the pharmaceutical company Burroughs Wellcome & Company with his colleague Silas Burroughs in 1880, which is one of the fo ...

. After his death in 1936, his collections continued to be augmented and were gradually structured into a functioning research library with attached research staff and academic librarians. The library and the research and teaching activities were formally split in 1999, with the creation of a separate library on the one hand, and the WTCHM on the other. From that time, the

has had its own separate history and continues to provide resources in central London for research into medical history and related subjects.

References

External links

Medical Museion Report on closure (April 2010)

More on the closing of the Centre for the History of Medicine (April 2010)

Petition against the closure of the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL (May 2010)
{{authority control Archives in the London Borough of Camden Cultural and educational buildings in London Medical libraries Academic libraries Wellcome Trust Research libraries in the United Kingdom