Harvard Library System Launches Online Collection On Disease as Part of Larger Digitization Program

The Harvard University Library (HUL) is continuing its efforts to make University collections more digitally accessible, recently launching a new online library collection entitled, “Contagion: Historical Views of Diseases and Epidemics.”

The compilation is the newest addition to the Library’s Open Collections Program, an initiative begun in 2002 to digitize the University’s books, photographs, and other historical artifacts and make them accessible to individuals around the world, including people not affiliated with Harvard.

The program—led by HUL Associate Director Barbara S. Graham and archivist Megan Sniffin-Marinoff—catalogs material based on subject matter and historical content. Sniffin-Marinoff described the plan as a counterpart to the Google Books project, which is working with HUL to digitize all of Harvard’s shelved books and manuscripts.

Prior projects digitized as part of the Open Collections Program include “Women Working, 1800-1930” and “Immigration to the United States, 1789-1930.”

The documents in “Contagion” shed light on the history of several important diseases, such as syphilis from the 15th century to today.

“Each of the nine diseases that [are] represented here [is] still with us today,” Sniffin-Marinoff said. “I think the intent is for us to provide some historical context for these.”

According to Sniffin-Marinoff, the next addition to the Open Collections Program will focus on exploration and discovery in the 19th century.