From the beginning of time, humans have endeavored to describe the complexities of the body and develop treatments for its infirmities. Scholars of this ongoing and sometimes Sisyphean journey can observe centuries of these efforts in UK Libraries’ magnificent Charles T. Ambrose, M.D. Collection.
The Ambrose Collection contains some of the most important texts in the history of medicine – dating largely from the 16th and 17th centuries – along with substantial collections in 19th century American medical books and classic texts. The nearly 600 books in the collection were generously bequeathed to UK Libraries by Ambrose, who passed away at the age of 89 in 2019.
A Professor in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology, & Molecular Genetics at the UK College of Medicine, Ambrose was a graduate of Johns Hopkins Medical School and a Research Immunologist at Harvard Medical School before coming to Kentucky. His voluminous research ranged from the history of medicine – his primary passion – to cellular immunology, angiogenesis, aging, and Alzheimer's Disease. A brilliant scholar and admired teacher, Ambrose was beloved by his community. His collection remains as a testament to his boundless enthusiasm and keen insights into the history of his discipline.
Amanda Williams, MCL Research & Access Specialist, developed a special relationship with Ambrose, beginning with their first encounter in 2005. “Around that time we transitioned to a digital version of ILLiad,” said Williams. “Already in his 70s, he was long accustomed to filling out forms by hand. So I helped him to find all the research he was looking for.”
Soon Ambrose was visiting Williams almost every day for lunch, bringing lists of articles and other citations for her to track down. As they became fast friends, Williams developed unique insights into Ambrose, his interests, and his collection.
“He wanted his students to be steeped in the history of medicine,” said Williams. “To him, these weren’t artifacts meant to sit on a shelf: they were medical books to be used. So he would bring these beautiful and rare texts to class and pass them around so that his students could see and feel the tradition that they were a part of.”
Ambrose’s home was filled nearly floor to ceiling with his books. Anxious for their safety, the executor of his estate slept at his home until the Libraries was able to secure the collection and transfer them safely to the SCRC. A careful collector, Ambrose kept detailed notes on the provenance of each of the items in his collection and was fastidious with his receipts.
“He was such a fan of the library,” said Williams, “and he had so much loyalty to UK and a tremendous love for the College of Medicine. I loved working with him. He was a huge part of my day, every day. He was very special and I miss him.”
Papers from Ambrose’s most recent research is currently being processed by Williams and will eventually make its way into the Collection.
Ambrose’s interest in collecting rare medical books began during a trip to Geneva, Switzerland in 1996, when he came upon a catalogue of texts available at a nearby bookstore. Over the next 20 years he would become acquainted with rare book dealers in over a dozen cities throughout Europe and several in the United States.
Ambrose’s Rare Medical Book Collection is made up of around 400 volumes. As a whole, it concerns the history of medicine from the 15th century up to the discovery of penicillin in 1928, and focuses primarily on microbiology and infectious diseases. The collection contains 16 works on syphilis dating from 1475; books on cholera, fever, plague, and smallpox from 1501; anatomy and surgery texts from 1532; Arabist medical texts, including books by Averroes and Avicenna; and 17 medical dictionaries published between 1566-1873 that Ambrose purchased to help decipher the many antique words across the collection.
The most noteworthy book in the collection is a second edition of Andreas Vesalius’s text De Humani Corporis Fabrica (On the Fabric of the Human Body), published in 1555 and largely considered the founding text of modern human anatomy. The Fabrica is known for its highly detailed illustrations of human dissections, often in allegorical poses, from woodblock prints attributed to the studio of Titian.
Ambrose was intent on making use of his collection, showcasing key texts in his History of Medicine and History of Microbiology courses. He studied Latin, Greek, and Arabic at UK in the 1990s in order to make better use of his books and published dozens of papers that drew on works in his collection, including original translations.
A small subset of the Ambrose Collection is the Samuel P. Booth Collection. A physician in Arcadia, Indiana in the mid-19th century, Booth purchased 21 calfskin-covered medical books and eight sets of bound medical journals between 1853-1881. The collection contains the major medical texts of the Civil War and Reconstruction periods, the most notable of which is a first American edition of Gray’s Anatomy (1859).
Booth passed his collection to his son Guy, who in turn gave the collection to Ambrose’s father, Dr. Jesse Clements Ambrose, who had begun a medical practice of his own in Arcadia in the 1930s. Ambrose received the collection from his father in 1955 when he graduated from the Johns Hopkins Medical School. He added several other rare 19th century American medical texts to the collection throughout his life, including books by Robley Dunglison, the personal physician to several presidents and the first full-time professor of medicine in the United States.
Ambrose also collected close to 100 volumes of works by classic and noted humanistic authors, along with miscellaneous manuscripts and other rare items.
Notable among these are an illustrated page from the 1462 Fust & Schoeffer Bible, the second book ever printed; letters from notable sixteenth century French Huguenots; a 1609 Papal Bull intended for use by the Bishop of Oporto; and pages from a fifteenth century Dutch Book of Hours and a thirteenth century page of a French Bible.
To find and request the use of rare books, visit our Rare Books Requests Research Guide.
