The Wangensteen Historical Library of Biology and Medicine has partnered with colleagues across the Libraries and the University to advance three strategic initiatives, thanks to internal funding from the Libraries. 

Each of these projects tell the story of the global reach and impact of this renowned collection, and the expertise that makes the collection shine. 

Chitsu enclosures protect global health collection

The Wangensteen has been working for over a decade to bring in global voices that tell the story of health, including a growing collection of Chinese, Japanese, and Korean materials. Today, the library holds the most significant collection of these materials in the United States outside the National Library of Medicine. 

Historical East Asian texts require extra support from a chitsu, a traditional custom enclosure, in order to be properly shelved and cared for long term. 

“Traditionally-constructed texts in East Asia are different from their European counterparts in a few significant ways,” said Emily Beck, associate curator. “The paper is often thinner and made from different plant material than European paper. Also, bound texts typically have thin, flexible paper coverings rather than hard cardboard or wood boards that are more typical in European books.”

Through a partnership with the Libraries’ conservation and preservation department and its director, Mary Miller, these custom enclosures will ensure the long-term preservation of these unique and rare materials, which are already being used to support teaching in classes from the History of Medicine Program and other programs across campus.

Three examples of chitsu enclosures. Typically, Japanese chitsu are blue. The book in the red chitsu is a recent 1885 acquisition from Vietnam.

3D scanning and printing enables experiential learning with early modern Japanese pharmaceutical woodblocks 

The Wangensteen has recently acquired a set of 90+ Japanese pharmaceutical woodblocks. These woodblocks were used by medicine and pharmaceutical merchants in the late Edo period (1603-1868). The woodblock texts include medicines’ names, location, and/or pharmacy.

The woodblocks not only show the development of medicine in Japan, they also preserve the history of East Asian printing, design, and typography, and reflect the life of Japanese people. But these woodblocks are delicate, limiting their use.

“We’d love to invite students to participate in making woodblock prints,” said Curator Lois Hendrickson. “Due to their delicacy, we cannot use the original woodblocks to print.  With 3D scanning and printing, we can revive the woodblocks through users’ engagement with the 3D print replicas.”

Made possible through a partnership with Libraries colleagues Emerson Ironstone and Shuqi Ye, along with University partner, LATIS, this pilot project will use 3D scanning and printing technologies to create replicas of 15 woodblocks for use in teaching and learning, allowing both the pharmaceutical history and technology of the past to be part of today’s hands-on learning opportunities.  

A sampling of five Japanese pharmaceutical woodblocks that are being 3D scanned and printed for use.

International engagement builds community advancing standards for digitization of moveable books 

The Wangensteen, along with Libraries partners, are leading efforts to develop international standards for the digitization of moveable books like the flap anatomy, where layers of paper can be moved to reveal parts of the tooth and ear.  

As you can imagine, these types of moveable books are very delicate, making their access through digitization even more important. It is an issue that is of interest to broad audiences worldwide, and the funding will help continue to build a robust community of national and international digital collections practitioners, curators, and web developers interested in the problems this project seeks to address.

“We are excited to gain membership in the International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF), the standards community for digitization, so we can continue to advance this global conversation,” said Beck.

Beck will also join colleague Theresa Berger to present at the IIIF conference this year. Colleague Scott Lawan also joins the conversation, bringing his deep technical expertise. They are also going to bring their learning back to their Libraries colleagues, with two workshops on IIIF annotations and developing a how-to manual to create consistencies in metadata, which will be a great opportunity for those involved in digitization work.

Example of a moveable book, a flap anatomy from the Wangensteen Historical Library. Witkowski, G.-J. (1878). Human anatomy and physiology. Bailliere, Tindall & Cox.