Clarke, Dr Edwin MD, FRCP (1919-1996)

The following is an interim description which may change when detailed cataloguing takes place in future.

Personal papers and correspondence of Edwin Clarke including material relating to his education in England and America, c.1930-1946; his military service and career as a neurologist, 1946-1958; work at John's Hopkins and Yale University, 1961-1963; the history of medicine sub-department at University College London, 1960s; and work at the Wellcome Historical Medical Museum and Library, 1958-1979.

Also includes personal correspondence, 1943-1971; reprints relating to neurology, 1942-1958; reprints relating to medical history, 1961-1977; and a draft and notes for an unpublished manuscript entitled Academic Medical History in Britain; The Role of the Wellcome Trust.

c.1930-c.1996

17 boxes, 1 folder

The archives were given to the library at Wellcome Collection by the family of Dr Clarke in May 1996.

Edwin Sisterton Clarke was born in Felling-on-Tyne in 1919, and educated at Jarrow Central School and Durham University's Medical School in Newcastle. In 1943 he was funded by the Rockefeller Foundation to complete his studies in America. As a result he graduated MB Durham in 1945 and MD Chicago in 1946. In 1946 he spent two years with the Royal Amry Medical Corps as a neurological specialist in Oxford. He obtained the MRCP in 1949 and MD Durham in 1954.

Clarke then worked at the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases and the postgraduate school where he became consultant neurologist and lecturer in 1955. In 1958 Clarke left this position to become assistant secretary to the Wellcome Trust. From this point on the rest of his career was spent working in the history of medicine. Between 1960-1963 Clarke went to America first as an assistant professor at John's Hopkins Hospital Medical School, and then as associate professor of the history of medicine at Yale University.

In 1963 he returned to London as Medical Historian to the Wellcome Historical Medical Museum and Library. Following this in 1966 he moved to University College London (UCL) and developed the sub-department of the history of medicine, becoming its head. In 1973 Clarke succeeded Noel Poynter as Director of the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, where he was able to develop closer links with the academic community particularly through collaboration with the sub-department in the history of medicine at UCL. He retired in 1979.

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