DONATE TO THE ARCHIVAL COLLECTION
THE HYGIENIC LABORATORY (NOW THE NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH) WAS LOCATED AT 25TH AND E STREETS, WASHINGTON, D.C. ON THE GROUNDS OF THE NAVAL OBSERVATORY FROM 1904 TO 1938 WHEN IT WAS MOVED TO ITS CURRENT LOCATION IN BETHESDA, MARYLAND.
Since the establishment of the Hygienic Laboratory in 1887, important materials documenting medical research, discoveries and notable scientists who served at the National Institutes of Health have been lost. Items such as instruments, papers, photographs, and laboratory notebooks that chronicle the history of NIH and its previous incarnations have been lost. The National Archives & Records Administration (NARA) maintains responsibility for the administrative history of NIH in Record Group (RG) 90 and Record Group 443.
However records of every day scientists, clinicians, and staff have been lost due to insufficient resources dedicated to preserving these vital resources. The Office of NIH History actively collects records that document the rich history of NIH, its scientists, and staff.
In the existing NIH records schedule, records from laboratory experiments, such as notebooks, journals, and photographs along with critical and standard reference data documenting research experiments are identified as Reserved. This term, reserved, means that the files are not scheduled for destruction, however, they are also not scheduled for preservation. The Office of History at NIH seeks to preserve these types of materials and provide access for researchers for current and future use.
Please contact the Archivist at history@nih.gov or at 301.496.6610 if you wish to donate materials.
Download Archival Collections Policy (PDF - 12KB)
Download Image Collections Policy (PDF - 12KB)
