THE CSHL ARCHIVES BLOG

The Yeast Collections: Amar Klar and Jeffrey Strathern

2011-12-21T14:53:00.001-05:00

The Amar Klar and Jeffrey Strathern Collections are often referred to as the “Yeast Collection” -- this is in reference to their work on the micro-organism at CSHL in the 1980s.

“The Three Yeastketeers” - an affectionate nickname that Amar Klar (center) coined when he, Jeff Strathern and Jim Hicks began working together at CSHL.

The Amar Klar Collection was my third collection processed under the NHPRC Basic Processing grant. The Collection was in excellent shape and simply needed rehousing. The Collection totaled 11 boxes (1 notebook per box) for 3 linear feet.

Amar J. S. Klar was born in 1947 in Sangrur, India. He received his undergraduate degree in biochemistry (1967) and masters of science in microbiology (1969), both from Punjab Agriculture University, Hissar, India. Dr. Klar then received his Ph.D. in bacteriology at the University of Wisconsin in 1975 and afterwards studied genetics as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of California. In 1978, Dr. Klar joined the staff at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, where he served as director of the Delbruck laboratory from 1985 to 1988. Since 1999, Dr. Klar works at the Center for Cancer Research, National Cancer Institute in Frederick, Maryland. The bulk of this collection refers to his time at CSHL.

Throughout his career, Dr. Klar has been studying the sex life of yeast cells (yeast cells are studied because of their simplicity and because they double in 90 minutes) and he is a leading authority on “handedness” (the distribution of motor skills between the left and right hands).

Dr. Klar at the Frederick Street Fair (Frederick, MD) in 1996 with a solicitation for research subjects.

The Jeffrey Strathern Collection documents the experimental laboratory work performed by Dr. Jeffery N. Strathern during his tenure at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in what was known as the “Yeast Group”. The collection consists of laboratory notebooks which include photographs and audiographs and consists of 10 three ring binders (3 linear feet). This collection, too, was in excellent shape and only needed rehousing.

Jeffrey Strathern obtained his Ph.D. from the Molecular Biology Institute at the University of Oregon in 1977 and then moved to Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory where he became a senior staff member with the Yeast Genetics Laboratory. In 1984, he joined the ABL-Basic Research Program at the National Cancer Institute's Frederick Cancer Research Development Center. In 1999, Dr. Strathern joined the Division of Basic Sciences, also at NCI. In addition to his research duties, Dr. Strathern is a Deputy Director for the NCI-Center for Cancer Research. Dr. Strathern’s research remains centered on aspects of gene regulation and genetic recombination as revealed by studies in yeast.

- Amy Driscoll, Project Archivist

The Charles Yanofsky Collection

2011-12-01T08:25:00.006-05:00

Yanofksy (right) and M. J. Chamberlin (left) at the 1966 CSH Symposium.
The following is another post in our series highlighting the collections that are being processed through the NHPRC Basic Processing Grant.

The Charles Yanofsky Collection was my second collection processed under the NHPRC Basic Processing grant. The Collection is composed of professional and academic related material accrued or produced by Dr. Yanofsky. As Dr. Yanofsky has spent the majority of his career at Stanford University, much of the material references his tenure as Chairman of the Microbiology Department. The collection includes publications, awards, correspondence, laboratory notebooks and photographs from the 1950s until 2005. The collection was in excellent condition and only needed rehousing and reorganization to ensure ease of use.

Dr. Yanofsky was born in 1925 in New York City, New York. He received his undergraduate education at the City College of New York (1948) and obtained a Ph.D. in microbiology in 1951 from Yale University. In 1958, Dr. Yanofsky moved to Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, where he remained for the rest of his career. He became the Morris Herzstein Professor of Biology and Molecular Biology, retiring in 2010. Dr. Yanofsky’s research focused on the control of gene expression, in particular the molecular regulatory mechanisms of bacterial transcription.

The bulk of the collection consists of the awards and advertisements for the many lectures given by Dr. Yanofsky. One of the most prestigious awards was the Lasker Foundation award for medical research which Dr. Yanofsky shared with Seymour Benzer and Sydney Brenner in 1971. The posters and awards are the most interesting items in the collection. They highlight the events, people and institutions that contributed to the many breakthroughs in molecular biology from the 1950s to today. The poster shown here is from the University California at Berkeley Department and Graduate Group in Genetics 1963 lecture series highlighting the three award winners, albeit 8 years early.

- Amy Driscoll, Project Archivist

The Charles Weissmann Biogen Collection

2011-11-08T08:32:00.011-05:00

The Charles Weissmann Biogen Collection is one of the projects being undertaken as part of the NHPRC Basic Processing grant. Per grant parameters, the collection will be processed at the series level, incorporating the approach suggested by Greene and Meissner in More Products, Less Process: Revamping Traditional Archival Processing (American Archivist, Vol 68 (2005) p208-263).

Charles Weissmann was born on October 14, 1931 in Budapest Hungary and obtained his MD in 1956 and Ph.D in Organic Chemistry in 1961 from Zurich University. Dr. Weissmann was director of the Institute for Molecular Biology in Zurich and President of the Roche Research Foundation. In 1978, Charles Weissmann co-founded the biotech company Biogen in Geneva. Dr. Weissmann resigned from the Biogen Science Board in 1986 and the company merged with IDEC in 2003. He is currently Chairman of the Department of Infectology, Scripps Research Institute, Florida.

Dr. Weissmann is perhaps best known for the first cloning and expression of interferon and his contributions to the unraveling of the molecular genetics of neurogenerative prion diseases such as Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. He has received many awards, notably the Warren Alpert Foundation Prize in 2003 for his work with the purification, characterization, and cloning of human interferon-alpha.

When the Weissmann Collection was reviewed prior to processing, it became clear that there were numerous preservation issues that would have to be dealt with. As is often the case with organizational records, the documents were left for years in a damp basement. As a result, almost every document emitted a musty odor and all of the staples, paper clips, and metal binder fasteners were rusty and had to be removed. Additionally, the vast majority of the collection was unfoldered, so rehousing was a necessary step to processing the papers. At the beginning of the processing, there were 57 boxes and 4 three-ring binders outside of the boxes.
Rusted fasteners and other material removed during processing
I began by opening all the boxes and loosely grouping the materials. Although some boxes were labeled, these often proved to be misleading. Files labeled “BIOGEN BOARD DOCUMENTS” often contained research files, patent application and parts of what would become the third series, Science Board documents. I believe that one of the reasons for the disarray is that the documents had been sorted and some removed for litigation as evidenced by notes such as "Documents removed by Jim Haley & Gerald Flattmann→4/18/97" and "BIOGEN v. Genentech/Laroche litigation."

After a few false starts, a final series order was formed:

1. Biogen Patents (1979-1985)
2. Biogen Board of Director Documents (1977-1986)
3. Biogen Science Board Documents (1978-1986)
4. Project Reports (1978-1986)
5. γ (Gamma) Project (1983-1986)
6. Photographs (1986)
7. Research Subject Files (1981-1986)

In the end, 173.5 hours were spent processing this collection (including authoring a finding aid), which had a final total of 57 boxes (24 linear feet). The time was primarily spent on removing rusted staples and creating microfolders to stabilize the documents. The Weissmann Biogen files are now open for research and we hope they will provide a unique insight into the origins the biotechnology industry.

- Amy Driscoll, Project Archivist

The Norton Zinder Collection

2011-11-01T11:44:00.011-04:00

The CSHL Library and Archives has been awarded the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC) Basic Processing Grant, which will allow us to catalog and make available over a dozen collections that we currently house in the archives. This will be the first in a series of posts which will highlight the various collections included in the grant and provide insight into what it actually means to "process" the materials held in our archive.

Norton Zinder at the 1974 CSH Symposium
Initial Report on the Norton Zinder Collection

The Norton Zinder Collection is one of the first collections being worked on as part of the NHPRC Basic Processing grant. The Zinder papers were selected for inclusion in the project because he is an active, prominent scientist in the field of molecular biology, as well as a long-time member of the CSHL community as a former member of the Lab's board. As part of the Basic Processing project our goalhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif is to provide a global audience with access to formerly "hidden" materials. We will accomplish this by applying the "basic processing" approaches suggested by Greene and Meissner in "More Product, Less Process: Revamping Traditional Archival Processing" (American Archivist, Vol 68 (2005) p208-263), which at a bare minimum requires the creation of a catalog record and a brief overview the collection's contents.

Norton Zinder, a New Yorker, received his A.B. degree from Columbia University in 1947 and went on to the University of Wisconsin where he received a PhD in 1952. He returned to New York in 1952 to Rockefeller University (then known as The Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research) as an assistant. At Rockefeller he was appointed an associate in 1955, associate professor in 1958 and professor in 1964, all the while conducting significant research in molecular biology. With that brief introduction, the processing of the contents of Norton Zinder’s Rockefeller University office began.

First, the numerous monographs which were included in the Zinder Collection were inventoried. The 335 books included scientific textbooks, treatises, and collections of research papers presented at various conferences. The volumes ranged in publication dates from 1913 to 2002; the authors include a pantheon of twentieth century geneticist and molecular biologist. His name was neatly handwritten or stamped on the inside cover of his undergraduate textbooks.

Next, the 84 document cases of reprints (republications of scientific articles) was inventoried. The papers provide insight into what Professor Zinder found significant for his professional edification. The reprints were kept in a series of meticulously arranged boxes, which were sorted alphabetically the author's last name. When a paper included multiple authors, Zinder underlined the name under which the reprint would be filed; this arrangement schema was maintained during processing. Over 700 authors are represented in the collection, which are dated from 1931 to 1998. Most are printed in English, although there are a smattering in German and French, as well as an interesting collection of Japanese papers on radiation.

The next report will continue this exploration of the contents of Norton Zinder’s office as was given to CSHL. The lab notebooks and thick black binders await description and a place in the spectrum of this collection.

"There's Never Been a Replacement for Francis Crick"

2011-10-18T11:16:00.006-04:00

Dr. Watson is constantly traversing globe delivering talks on a variety of subjects. He recently spoke at a symposia at CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research, located in Geneva, Switzerland), and while there he was interviewed by Paula Catapano. Topics of discussion include research in physics, the role of scientists in society, the nature of genius, and the current state of cancer research.

Dr. Watson's talk at CERN - "The Discovery of the Double Helix" - is also available online. Check it out via CERN's Document Server (unfortunately the first 20 minutes of the talk are unavailable).

[Source]

New Report on the Challenges of Digital Preservation

2011-09-01T11:08:00.004-04:00

A new report, entitled Puzzling over digital preservation – Identifying traditional
and new skills needed for digital preservation, was recently presented at the IFLA World Library and Information Congress.

Abstract:

Digital preservation is a task requiring library and information science as well as information technology skills. It simultaneously utilizes traditional library skills and requires knowledge from information technology that goes far beyond the traditional roles of library and archive staff. But where does one start when implementing a digital preservation program? What knowledge is needed? What tasks can be covered by existing personnel? Where can one acquire expert knowledge needed? What information resources exist? Can a scalable approach be implemented to gain necessary skills? The paper is based upon a gap analysis conducted by the Leibniz Library Network for Research Information “Goportis”. It describes necessary know-how identified, ranging from digital curation skills needed to evaluate digital data carriers to specialist digital preservation knowledge of file formats needed to describe information with the goal of sustaining accessiblilty over long-term. It shows how central tasks of digital preservation like process description and preservation planning require expert knowledge of traditional librarian and information technology skills as well as new knowledge which is described as digital preservation skills.

The CSHL Library is currently working on its own institutional repository for the preservation of digital media, and the Archives is about to undertake a large scale digitization project of its major collections. Details regarding that project will be released soon. Stay tuned.

[via Digitization 101]

Watson's Evil Twin?

2011-06-21T10:02:00.007-04:00

From the James D. Watson Collection
Above is photograph that appeared in an Australian newspaper in January 1964. When I discovered the clipping I was immediately struck by Watson's unusual facial hair. At the CSHL Archives we have several photographs documenting his brief and ill-advised mustache phase, but a beard? This was entirely new to me.

The article itself is written in an extremely colorful manner, and of course mentions his recently acquired whiskers:

The short, wild, brown beard he wore in Australia is a signpost to his 'innermost self' and it caused people to say 'Haunted' and 'Mephistophelean' as soon as they met him.

Below are two articles from the trip. Click to enlarge.

CSHL Community Garden: Then & Now

2011-06-07T11:41:00.012-04:00

Then (1970s)

Ann Sharp, wife of Nobel laureate Phillip Sharp.

Now (2011)

The Max Perutz Diet

2011-05-19T08:24:00.003-04:00

Today (May 19th) is Max Perutz's birthday. In honor of the famed scientist we present the Max Perutz Diet. Who doesn't love hearty meal of liver and kidneys, with a side of potato bread slathered with your favorite jam? Unless, of course, your favorite jam is plum.

From the James D. Watson Collection

DNA DAY: Flashback to 1953

2011-04-14T14:43:00.009-04:00

James D. Watson presenting the double helix at the 1953 CSH Symposium
Above is James D. Watson, looking rather disheveled in an untucked shirt and shorts, presenting the structure of DNA publicly for the very first time. This historic event took place in June of 1953 in the Bush Auditorium at the Biological Laboratory at Cold Spring Harbor. It was just three months earlier that Watson and Crick finally, after a series of missteps, assembled their famous model. During this time Watson was in close contact with members of the CSH community, especially Max Delbrück and Milislav Demerec, who was then director of the Biological Laboratory.

As noted on our CSHL Symposia Digital Collection, the 1953 Symposium "achieved its mythic quality because of a last minute addition to the program." At the time Delbrück remarked, "The discovery of a structure for DNA proposed by Watson and Crick a few months ago, and the obvious suggestions arising from this structure concerning replication seemed of such relevance to many of the questions to be discussed at this meeting..." that the work had to be included. Below is the letter that Demerec sent to Watson requesting his participation in the Symposium. The letter was sent just 2 days after the publication of Watson and Crick's famous Nature article, "Molecular structure of Nucleic Acids: A Structure for Deoxyribose Nucleic Acid."

Click to Enlarge

National DNA Day is observed annually in April to celebrate both the discovery of the double helix and completion of the Human Genome Project.

Jim and Betty Watson's European Vacation

2011-04-01T08:43:00.012-04:00

"Jim and the Colosseum!"
In the Spring of 1951 James D. Watson was living in Copenhagen pursuing his post-doctoral studies and attempting to sharpen his skills in biochemistry. In The Double Helix, he details a trip to Naples, where he famously met Maurice Wilkins and observed his X-ray diffraction photograph of DNA. Watson also notes how his sister, Elizabeth "Betty" Watson, met up with him in Italy. He was hoping that she and Maurice would hit it off.

"Maurice had noticed that my sister was very pretty, and soon they were eating lunch together. I was immensely pleased. For years I had sullenly watched Elizabeth being pursued by a series of dull nitwits."

Alas, it was not meant to be. Maurice went back to London, while Betty continued to travel Europe -- visiting Paris, the Alps, Germany, Brussels, and finally meeting up with Jim in Copenhagen. The following photographs, from the James D. Watson Collection, document her 1951 trip. Included are Betty's captions, which were written on the verso of the photos. Notice how she highlights both the beauty of her surroundings, and the great destruction caused by the conflict that had so recently wreaked havoc across the continent.

"The Eiffel Tower and 'me'"

"An artist at work. Montmartre, Paris."

"The view from our apt [in Paris]. The old two story building around the street dates back to around 1730. The mound in front is an air-raid shelter, a grim reminder of the past and future."

"The Cathedral and Town Hall in Munich. Both only partially destroyed. Note the gentleman with his very typical leather shorts and white ___ ___ knee socks. Also, colorful suspenders!"

"Florence and the River Arno. The famous Bridge of S___ is still standing, but the others were destroyed during the war. M____, alas because of ___ are the background hills."

"Rome. In the middle are the ruins of the Forum."

"Venice .. the Grand Canal .. The C___ [Rialto] Bridge."

The Double Helix aka Двойная спираль: воспоминания об открытии структуры днк

2011-03-21T14:12:00.005-04:00

Dr. Watson signing an early Russian edition of the TDH in Moscow, June 2010.
The Double Helix was published in 1968 and was immediately hailed for its personal perspective on scientists, their ambitions, and their interrelationships with their peers. At the same the time the book was highly controversial, so much so that Harvard University Press refused to publish the work after protests from both Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins. The best-seller continues to captivate the public to this day, and as such it has been translated into over 20 languages, including Malaysian, Bengali, Estonian, and Hebrew. The Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Library and Archives is home to all of these translations, as well as numerous files related to the publishing of The Double Helix.

James Watson interviewed by Brenda Maddox

2011-03-15T09:23:00.002-04:00

James Watson in conversation with Brenda Maddox by intelligence2

Last week James Watson was interviewed by Brenda Maddox, a noted science historian and biographer of Rosalind Franklin. Watson provides insight, in his typically unabashed fashion, on a variety of topics and personalities, including: cancer (take Advil and avoid sugar), the cost of the Human Genome Project ("Only 3 billion dollars ... nothing!"), religion, President Obama ("A very intelligent man who has absolutely no knowledge of science"), biotechnology, stem cell research, Rosalind Franklin, Francis Crick ("A super-genius"), Maurice Wilkins, Linus Pauling ("He only listened to himself"), the Nobel Prize ("I knew we'd get one instantly"), and his own likability ("I was a social failure until I came into contact with social people" [at graduate school]).

Mrs. Maddox even mentions the recently publicized "lost" Francis Crick letters, but sadly does not credit the CSHL Library and Archives!

Bruce Stillman wins 2010 Horwitz Prize for seminal work on DNA replication

2011-02-11T08:59:00.013-05:00

CSHL Oral History Collection, 2007

The President of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Bruce Stillman, Ph.D., is the co-recipient of the 2010 Louis Gross Horwitz Prize (with Thomas J. Kelly, M.D., Ph.D., the director of the Sloan-Kettering Institute at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York), for his seminal work on DNA replication. The prize is awarded annually for outstanding basic research in the fields of biology or biochemistry.

Above is a clip of Stillman explaining his scientific pursuits from the CSHL Archives Oral History Collection, which contains interviews with over 50 prominent scientists, and documents the history of CSHL as well as the fields of genetics, molecular biology, and biotechnology.

[CSHL Press Release]

Dr. Watson in Moscow

2008-07-14T11:32:00.003-04:00

On July 3rd Dr. Watson spoke at the House of Scientists in Moscow on the subject of DNA and the Brain.

The lecture was packed, as these photos attest.

You can view the full lecture here. More photos:

Dr. Watson, Executive Director of CSHL Library and Archives Mila Pollock, and Dr. Nick Yankovsky, Director of Vavilov Institute of General Genetics, RAS

students lining up

2008-03-11T15:54:00.001-04:00

Reconstructing E.B. Wilson's Dream

On the night before his oral examination for his doctoral degree at Columbia University in 1915, Hermann J. Muller, future Nobel laureate in Physiology and Medicine for his work on x-ray induced mutations in Drosophila, was confronted by his mentor, E.B. Wilson....

Read the full article here.

Q & A: Partha Mitra

2008-03-11T14:01:00.002-04:00

by Clare Clark

As the bio on his website states:

Partha Mitra received his PhD in theoretical physics from Harvard in 1993. He worked in quantitative neuroscience and theoretical engineering at Bell Laboratories from 1993-2003 and as an Assistant Professor in Theoretical Physics at Caltech in 1996 before moving to Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in 2003, where he is currently Crick-Clay Professor of Biomathematics. Dr. Mitra’s research interests span multiple models and scales, combining experimental, theoretical and informatic approaches toward achieving an integrative understanding of complex biological systems, and of neural systems in particular.

The Mitra lab works in close collaboration with research groups at other institutions, including NYU, Caltech, CCNY, and Cornell Medical School, where Dr. Mitra is also an Adjunct Associate Professor. Dr. Mitra is a fellow of the American Physical Society. Dr. Mitra's work has been previously featured in major media outlets including the Economist, and he is the author of Observed Brain Dynamics, recently out from the Oxford University Press.

Partha has performed in Roald Hoffman's "Entertaining Science" series at the Cornelia Street Cafe, and was the organizer of a series of public science lectures at the New York Public Library (Science Soirees at the SIBL).

Dr. Mitra talks about working at CSHL and how he sees himself as a scientist and person.

Where did you first live when you came here?

I lived in Hell's Kitchen (midtown Manhattan, near the waterfront), and still live there.

Who has influenced you most scientifically since you arrived at CSHL?

The person at CSHL who has impacted the direction of my research most has to be Jim Watson. He encouraged me to start a large scale project in neuroanatomy and this forms an important component of my research now.

If you weren’t a scientist, what would be your dream job?

I don't think of myself as a "scientist" - I try to keep my life integrated and not become unidimensional. I also don't like the idea of a job or profession per se - I wouldn't "dream" in those terms so the question does not have very much meaning for me. The pursuit of truth, beauty and joy motivates me and would inform any work that I would really want to do ("dream of").

If you could pick any one scientist in history or presently at work anywhere, who would you want to sit down and have a coffee or a glass of wine with at Blackford bar?

Stretching the question a bit, it would be Aristotle (but of course that would mean learning classical greek first). I'm not sure Blackford would be the right place, perhaps a gymnasium would fit better.

Did you have a scientific mentor?

I had several. My most inspiring mentor was professor Shyamal Sengupta from my undergraduate college, Presidency College in Kolkata. He was one of the most remarkable human beings I have known, combining a high standard of truth and scientific integrity with a warm humanity, never seeking fame or power for himself but dedicating himself to the pursuit of science and educating young researchers. I have met many high profile scientists subsequently in my career I have not again encountered the constellation of personal qualities that made Professor Sengupta so special.

I have also been influenced strongly by my thesis advisor, Bert Halperin at Harvard, who also combines deep scientific knowledge and insights with inspiring personal integrity and humility.

When you walk the campus, is there a building or a view that you admire like for aesthetic or contemplative purposes?

I have always found the view of the harbor very pleasant. I think the best view of the lab is from the other side of the harbor, as you drive in from Huntington.

Is there one word you could use to describe the experience of working at CSHL?

Stimulating.

You can view a list of Dr. Mitra's publications in the CSHL Authors' Publications Database.

You can view the Mitralab's Brain Architecture Project here.

Clare Clark is Archivist at the Cold Spring Harbor Library and Archives.

2008-02-13T14:43:00.001-05:00

Reconstructing E.B. Wilson's Dream

Exploring the H.J. Muller Collection at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Library & Archives

by Anthony Dellureficio

On the night before his oral examination for his doctoral degree at Columbia University in 1915, Hermann J. Muller, future Nobel laureate in Physiology and Medicine for his work on x-ray induced mutations in Drosophila, was confronted by his mentor, E.B. Wilson.

Wilson was the head of the Columbia Biology Department at the time, and, although Muller had spent much of his time at Columbia working in Morgan’s fly lab, it was to Wilson that he turned when he needed help. Muller had already accepted a position at Rice University working with Julian Huxley. In an attempt to calm his nervous student, Wilson related a dream he had 34 years earlier, the night before his oral examination for his doctoral degree at Johns Hopkins University.

As Wilson explained, his dream began with him standing at a podium before a blackboard and behind a set of curtains, anxiously awaiting his oral examination. As the curtains were drawn, his examiners were revealed to him. In the front row of the auditorium sat Thomas Huxley, Ernest Haeckel and Charles Darwin.

Huxley, Haeckel, and Darwin

Wilson began, "I have a very simple thesis to present… I have the solution to the question 'What is life?’"

He picked up a piece of chalk, walked up to the blackboard behind him, and drew a large triangle. He labeled the sides A, B, and C. He then drew a smaller triangle next to it, labeling its sides a, b, and c. He then turned around and exclaimed, "That is the secret of life!" With that, Charles Darwin took off his hat, threw it in the air, and shouted, "Huzzah! You’ve done it, my boy!" All three examiners proceeded to approach the podium to congratulate him.

H.J. Muller recounted the story years later to former students Carl Sagan and Elof Carlson at the Top of the Mark bar in the Mark Hopkins Hotel in San Francisco. (Sagan had worked in Muller's lab in the summer of 1952 while an undergraduate at the University of Chicago, and Carlson was one of Muller's last graduate students at Indiana University.)

Muller remarked that the most astounding thing to him was E.B. Wilson’s intuitive understanding of the underlying importance of complementarity in life. He obviously had no way of knowing that years after his dream, complementary strands of nucleotides would forever change our view of the design of life.

This anecdote was partially reconstructed from the diaries of Elof Carlson, which currently reside in the archives at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. This story has been passed anecdotally from E.B. Wilson to H.J. Muller and again many times since through a long chain of scientists. Fortunately, Elof Carlson had the forethought to write the story as an entry in his diary in 1963. By using archival materials in conjunction with secondary sources, historians are able to unravel the changes which naturally develop as an anecdote is passed down, and to bring out the closest approximation of the original story.

* * *

In 2004, Dr. Elof Axel Carlson, a graduate student of Hermann J. Muller’s at Indiana University, a geneticist, and a historian of genetics, donated his collection of Muller papers to the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Archives.

He began gathering the material in this collection while studying with Muller, although he obtained the bulk of the collection while conducting research for Genes, Radiation and Society, his biography of Muller.

He received materials from Dorothea Muller (the second wife of Muller), from friends and correspondents of Muller, and by copying materials from collections at the Lilly Library at Indiana University and other libraries. He also took some reprints from the Davenport and Demerec reprint collections, currently housed in the Banbury Center at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.

David E. Muller, son of Hermann J. Muller, donated his collection to the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Archives, as well, in April 2005. The collection consists primarily of about 470 items of personal correspondence between 1900 and 1945 collected and saved by David Muller’s mother (Hermann’s first wife), Jessie Marie Jacobs Muller Offermann.

David Muller donated this collection with the letters, photographs, and other material arranged chronologically in binders with numbered post-it notes to accompany each item of correspondence.

These two donations make up the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Archives Hermann J. Muller Collection. Materials in this collection span 1900-1982 and consist of correspondence, manuscripts, reprints, memorabilia, and photographs.

Of particular note is his correspondence with Solomon Levit and Israel Agol, Russian students of his who were executed by the Soviet government during the purge of Western science. Agol had a fascination with cars. He discusses his desire for an American automobile in letters with Muller and Carlos Offermann (the graduate student Muller brought to Russia from Texas).

Included in our collection is a letter from Muller to Offermann requesting supplies for Offermann to bring with him to Russia. After the normal assortment of vials, microscopes, and fly stocks, the list ends with a request for him to ship his V-8 Ford.

The car had to be donated to the state and became property of the Institute for Genetics in Moscow, and Vavilov, director of the institute was fond of bring out the car and saying, "At the Institute for Genetics, for Russians, we have Russia, for Americans, we have America!" Also notable is Muller's correspondence with his first wife and son during Muller’s work in Europe in the 1930s.

The Muller Collection contains manuscripts, some which were published and some which never were. Among the interesting manuscripts in the collection are "Evolution by Mutation," (the John Willard Gibbs Lecture, 1958 which had been thrown in the waste basket by Muller but was salvaged by Elof Carlson one evening after Muller left the lab), and a handwritten notebook for a classical genetics textbook by Muller and Edgar Altenberg from 1912.

The book was not published at the time because Morgan published his own textbook on classical genetics while they were working on theirs. Tucked into the notebook was Muller's NY public library card from 1912. Rather than put the names of the books he checked out, the librarians put the Dewey Decimal number on the back. After a little searching, the books on his card were identified as a book on the origins of American Democracy and Ibsen plays.

The collection contains a nearly full run of Muller reprints including his Dominance of Economics over Eugenics, which derived from a talk he planned to give at the 3rd International Congress of Eugenics, at the American Museum of Natural History.

One of the primary organizers, Charles Davenport (president of the American Eugenics Society and founder of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) invited Muller to speak. After reading Muller's manuscript, however, Davenport significantly shortened the length of time given to Muller.

The ideas Muller laid out for the development of a practical eugenics program differed from those of the American Eugenics Society, particularly his emphasis on "positive eugenics" and the importance of a classless society as a precursor to a eugenics program. "Positive eugenics" was Muller’s theory which promoted the perpetuation of good genes rather than the removal of bad genes from society ("negative eugenics").

There are a number of original personal photographs in the Muller Collection. Of note is a photograph taken by Muller in the 1920s at Erwin Baur's farm near Berlin with handwritten identification by Muller on the front, Prof. Baur's son, Mrs. Baur, Prof. Nachtsheim, Prof. Goldschmidt, Prof. Baur, Dr. von Stein, Dr. H[...], Prof. Altenberg, and with a handwritten note on back, taken at the farm of Germany's best geneticist - Prof. Baur - near Berlin. (All 5 of these German biologists have done excellent work.)

Erwin Baur was a theorist whose Menschliche Erblichkeitslehre and Rassanhygiene, co-authored by Eugen Fischer and Fritz Lenz, contributed to the Nazi eugenics movement. Muller worked on chapters of a manuscript on the history of Drosophila studies for Baur. It was left incomplete upon the death of Baur in 1933. Richard Goldschmidt was a prominent German-born American geneticist. As a Jewish scientist, he was forced to leave Germany by the Nazis.

Anthony Dellureficio is the James D. Watson Special Collections Archivist at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Library and Archives. He is a graduate of Johns Hopkins University with a double major in the History of Science, Medicine & Technology and Italian Literature. He obtained his M.L.S. from the University of Maryland in 2005. He lives in Oyster Bay, New York, and he can be reached here.

MESSAGE FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE COLD SPRING HARBOR LABORATORY LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES

2008-02-08T12:49:00.000-05:00

The Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Library and Archives is a one-of-a-kind repository for the past, present and future of molecular biology, neuroscience, and biotechnology located in historic Cold Spring Harbor, New York. For the last ten years the Library and Archives has been steadily expanding. With the debut of our Library and Archives Newsletter, we hope to bring the history of science to life.

When I worked in Russia, it was extremely difficult to gain access to original documents. In coming to Cold Spring Harbor, my wish was to provide access to as many original documents as possible through the process of digitization.

The Library and Archives has made important acquisitions in recent years that include the papers of three Nobel Laureates - James D. Watson, Sydney Brenner, and Alfred Hershey - and much more. 2008 promises to be an exciting year for our institution, as the collections of Norton Zinder and Charles Weissman are made part of our growing collection. The generous gift from the Genentech has allowed us to undergo a critical expansion that will be completed this year. The support of Genentech has allowed us to recognize this important chapter in the history of science, and bring our many digitized collections into the public sphere.

Our new Library and Archives blog aims to allow our talented archivists to familiarize the non-Cold Spring Harbor community with the breadth and quality of our archives. It's wonderful that those interested in the history of science can visit us electronically as well as here on Long Island. Our contributors will include academics, scientists, and historians from outside our walls, each with their own story to tell.

Together we'll give you a sense of the compelling intellectual environment that is the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. We'll talk to scientists, administrators, and students to give you an idea of what life and work is like on the CSHL campus. This site also provides a window into our many virtual exhibitions. It will be a place where you can find more information about our one-of-a-kind Oral History Project. In addition, you'll be able to access more information on our latest exhibitions, including Honest Jim: James D. Watson, The Writer and Max Delbruck 100: Celebrating His Life and Work.

In our first edition, we tell you about the life of Hermann Muller. We sit down with honored scientist and author Partha Mitra. And we chronicle Jim Watson's fundraising efforts with Playboy magazine. This is the beginning of what will be a regular space where the history of science comes alive.

We want to hear from you. Please send us your feedback on any aspect of our online experience. The continued expansion of the Library and Archives is essential to cementing Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory's prominence as place to document achievement - past, present, and future - in the fields of molecular biology, neuroscience, biotechnology, and genetics. As Jim Watson wrote in our signature book on the day of the Library’s historic groundbreaking, “Forward always.”

Mila Pollock

2008-01-02T10:48:00.000-05:00

A Gift From the Genentech Center Fuels a Renovation

Click here to learn more about the CSHL Archives Advisory Committee.

The historic Carnegie building sits near the water here in Cold Spring Harbor. Constructed in 1905, it was initially lab space for the scientists who began a great tradition of science at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.

More than 100 years later, that same building will be renovated to become the Genentech Center for the History of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology.

Mila Pollock, Executive Director, CSHL Library and Archives said at the groundbreaking that "the Library plays an important role in the student’s learning process. One hundred years ago, scientists conducted research in this building.

"When this expansion is completed, tomorrow’s researchers will be able to rediscover those early days to help them in their research for future discoveries.”

In the meantime, the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Library Archives resides in the similarly historical Osterhout.

2008-01-01T10:14:00.000-05:00

PBS' Nova spoke with our own Dr. Greg Hannon for its segment on RNAi. You can watch the segment here.

2007-12-07T10:33:00.000-05:00

The newest edition of Molecular Biology of the Gene is now available, and you can check it out at the CSHL library.

2007-11-17T14:20:00.000-05:00

Become a friend of the library.

Interact with other friends of the library, including members of the CSHL Archives Advisory Committee.

Experience the full range of research options at our fantastic facility.

Participate in different CSHL projects.

Access the talents of our talented archivists and librarians to dig into the history of science and microbiology.

Engage with the history of science in one of America's oldest and most venerated research institutions.

Attend events celebrating the past, present, and future of cutting-edge research.

Meet with writers and artists interested in the history of science.

Talk to the people who create the history of science and the people who know them best.

Learn how to archive and preserve your own historical materials.

Listen with full access to the fantastic Oral History Archive of the CSHL Library.

The CSHL Archives Advisory Committee

2007-09-17T14:27:00.000-04:00

Bruce Ames, Professor of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Children’s Hospital Oakland Research Institute

Joseph Anderson, Associate Director
AIP Center for the History of Physics

David Botstein, Director and Anthony B. Evnin Professor of Genomics
Lewis-Sigler Institute, Princeton University

Sydney Brenner, Senior Distinguished Fellow of the Crick-Jacobs Center
Salk Institute for Biological Sciences

Elof Carlson, Historian and Professor Emeritus
Stony Brook University

Walter Gilbert, Carl Loeb University Professor
Harvard University

Leroy Hood, President
Institute for Systems Biology

Arnold Levine, Professor
Institute of Advanced Study

Robert Olby, Historian and Research Professor in the History of Philosophy and Science
University of Pittsburgh

Mila Pollock, Executive Director
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Library and Archives

Richard Roberts, Director of Research
New England Biolabs

Megan Sniffen-Marinoff, Archivist
Harvard University

Waclaw Szybalski, Professor Emeritus, McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research
University of Wisconsin-Madison

James Watson
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory

Jan Witkowski, Executive Director, Banbury Center
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory

Norton Zinder, Professor Emeritus
Rockefeller University

James D. Watson Archivist Anthony Dellureficio

2007-03-11T16:32:00.000-04:00

Anthony Dellureficio is the James D. Watson Special Collections Archivist at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Library and Archives. He is a graduate of Johns Hopkins University with a degree in the History of Science, Medicine & Technology and Italian Literature, and received his M.L.S. from the University of Maryland in 2005. He has worked as an archivist for the Medical Archives at Johns Hopkins University and as an historic medical text cataloguer for their Institute of the History of Medicine. In September 2008, he will be enrolled at the University of Manchester in the MSc. programme in the History of Science, Technology and Medicine. His primary interests are in the history of genetics, eugenics, and molecular biology.

2007-03-05T11:48:00.000-05:00

The Creative Fundraising of Jim Watson

by Anthony Dellureficio, Archivist

In May 1968, less than a year after taking up his appointment as Director of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, James D. Watson received a letter on official Playboy letterhead. In their never ending quest to bring quality journalism to their readers, a columnist for Playboy contacted several prominent authors, scientists, and other people he perceived as creative, requesting that they respond to the question, what are the sources of creativity?

The columnist suggested two possible viewpoints: creativity is born from an unhappy childhood and creativity comes from a "core of bone-hard selfishness." Playboy offered $200 for responses which get published in the next issue.

Never one to miss out on an opportunity for lab fundraising, Watson began his response by describing his "not crazy hope" of building an annex to the tumor virus lab to provide space for eating, talking, and thinking.

He continued the letter by getting back to the original question, writing that, "in my experience more than half of all good ideas come when you are forced to think during accidental conversations with someone very bright." He proceeded to ask that Playboy to deviate from their normal business interactions by donating $60,000 to help CSHL achieve the dream of building this interactions center.

Glenn Hefner wrote back to Watson a few days later with his response. "As you say, this would be a new direction for Playboy."

No financial help from Playboy would be sent; however, this correspondence between Watson and Playboy is an indication of the primary focus for the new director of the laboratory. He spent a significant portion of his first director’s report discussing the financial situation of CSHL and his desire to find sources of funding, "since Federal funds for the support of science are much more difficult to find now than at any time in the past decade, and this tight fiscal situation is likely to prevail for some years."

Watson was literally willing to pursue any avenue available, however unlikely, to secure funding for the laboratory.

Through tireless fundraising, Watson was able to continue the financial turn-around which began during the tenure of CSHL director John Cairns. By 1994, when the directorial torch was passed to Bruce Stillman, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory was in a much less tenuous fiscal situation.

Stillman noted that "through the extraordinary efforts of Jim Watson during the last 25 years in redirecting the science, securing an endowment, and expanding the facilities, the status of the Laboratory’s finances and infrastructure now parallels its outstanding history."

Among the fundraising and expansion successes during Watson’s directorship, were the building of the James Laboratory through a donation of John Davenport in 1971 and the development of the Banbury Center, donated by Charles Robertson in 1976.

Under his tutelage, CSHL undertook the building, renovation, or acquisition of Yellow House, Osterhout Cottage, Olney House, Hershey Building, Delbruck Laboratory, Harris Building, Sambrook Laboratory, Grace Auditorium, Cairns Laboratory, Page Laboratory, Dolan DNA Learning Center, Dolan Hall, Hazen Tower, and Beckman Laboratory, though sadly there would never be a CSHL Hugh Hefner Interactions Center.

Even in light of these successes, Watson never lost sight of the real key to a successful future at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory which was that, "only by continuing to do science at its best will we maintain the financial strength needed to allow us to design and maintain buildings that our neighbors can forever take delight in."

Anthony Dellureficio is the James D. Watson Special Collections Archivist at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Library and Archives. He is a graduate of Johns Hopkins University with a double major in the History of Science, Medicine & Technology and Italian Literature. He obtained his M.L.S. from the University of Maryland in 2005. He lives in Oyster Bay, New York, and he can be reached here.

Endnotes

Letter from A.C. Spectorsky to James D. Watson, 22 May 1968. Box 35, Folder 13, Series: Correspondence, James D. Watson Collection, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Archives.

Letter from James D. Watson to A.C. Spectorsky, 17 February 1969. Box 35, Folder 13, Series: Correspondence, James D. Watson Collection, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Archives.

Letter from Glenn L. Hefner to James D. Watson, 21 February 1969. Box 35, Folder 13, Series: Correspondence, James D. Watson Collection, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Archives.

James D. Watson. “Director’s Report.”Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Annual Report 1968 (NY, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, 1969), p. 4.

Bruce Stillman. “Director’s Report.”Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Annual Report 1994 (NY, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, 1995), p. 6.[1] James D. Watson. “Director’s Report.”Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Annual Report 1993 (NY, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, 1994), p. 10.