the present Army Medical Library and Museum Building." The new building was to be put up in the District of Columbia, on a site to be chosen after consultation with the National Capital Park and Planning Commission, and subject to approval by the National Park Service. The total cost of the new building was not to exceed $3,750,000, but the bill carried no appropriation for this or any other amount.14[1]
The dream of a new building had persisted ever since Col. William O. Owen's time as Curator, and even before. In earlier days, the dream was for a building on the Washington Mall; in more recent times, as the great Army Medical Center developed around the Walter Reed General Hospital, the favored site had come to be one in the vicinity where, indeed, additional lands had been purchased for the purpose of housing the Museum and Library.
This point of view was vigorously and thoughtfully presented by Dr. Howard T. Karsner in letters to congressional and executive department leaders. Writing in his capacity as secretary of the American Association of Pathologists and Bacteriologists, and as chairman of the National Research Council's committee on the American Registry of Pathology, Dr. Karsner declared that even in their present state the Museum and Library "have proved of the greatest value to the medical profession of the United States" as "living, active, useful collections rather than mere repositories. Numerous medical research projects would have been sadly handicapped had it not been for the library and museum. The same would be true of the future if the work of these institutions were in any way limited."
As to cost, Dr. Karsner said that "These great institutions" were operated at a "relatively much smaller cost than could be expected in any other circumstances." His familiarity with the Library and the Museum and his extensive experience in university work convinced him that no possible combination with other national libraries and museums, unless they were of identical objectives, would result in any further economy, while it was his opinion that any such combination would lead to "deterioration of the collections and of their usefulness."
The doctor strongly favored the Walter Reed site, feeling that it would form a highly desirable adjunct to the work of the hospital and would aid and improve the teaching in the Army Medical School and associated schools already located in the Walter Reed area.
- ↑ 14 H.R. 10455, approved 15 June 1938, Public Law Number 611, chapter 384, U.S. Statutes at Large, 75th Congress, 3d session, 1938, volume 52, p. 684.
