Ask a Curator Day

September 1, 2010 is "Ask a Curator Day," a one-time worldwide Question & Answer event on Twitter. Modelled on the successful Follow a Museum event on February 1, 2010, users of Twitter can post questions to participating curators of art, history, science, and other collections at #askacurator. A list of individuals and institutions from over 20 countries available for questions can be viewed here.

Military Medical Photographs Online

The National Museum of Health and Medicine has mounted a growing collection of archival photographic images on Flickr. Grouped at present into 30 different sets, the online images are just a small portion of the Museum’s collection of several hundred-thousand images. More information on the collection is available in a recent Wired Magazine blog posting.

The Museum began as the Army Medical Museum during the Civil War in 1862 and assumed its present name in 1989. It is an element of the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, and its holdings are divided into five main areas: Historical Collections; Anatomical Collections; Otis Historical Archives; Human Developmental Anatomy Center; and the Neuroanatomical Collections.

Located on the campus of the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., the Museum has an active exhibition program and sponsors various events. The Museum also publishes a newsletter, Flesh and Bones, which is available online. A group of Museum employees maintains an unofficial blog, A Repository of Bottled Monsters, with news of Museum activities.

The image above, depicting US Army Nurses serving at the 1st Reserve Hospital in Manila, the Philippines, was obtained from the Museum's Spanish-American War set on Flickr.