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Founders and Early Benefactors
Arnold Klebs
Arnold
Carl Klebs, M.D., 1870-1943, in 1933 |
In 1896, after receiving his medical
degree from the University of Basel, Arnold Klebs followed his father, the famous
Swiss bacteriologist Edwin Klebs, to the United States. Cushing and Klebs became acquainted in 1903 when Klebs
was working with William Osler at Johns Hopkins. In America, Klebs practiced
medicine as a sanatorium director and tuberculosis specialist in Citronelle,
Alabama and Chicago and edited a major work on the subject. In 1909, he
returned to his native Switzerland, eventually settling in his villa, Les
Terraces, on Lake Geneva. A historian, bibliographer and humanist, Klebs
specialized in collecting reference works about incunabula, plague tracts,
herbals, books and pamphlets on tuberculosis, and books on inoculation and
vaccination. Although Klebs’ only direct connection with Yale was through his
son-in-law, the Rev. Dr. George Stewart, Cushing convinced his friend to
promise his collections to Yale. Klebs visited New Haven for Cushing’s 70th
birthday party in April 1939, but because of the war and ill health, never got
to see the completed library. |
| Christmas card designed by Klebs and including one of his favorite quotations. |
Christmas
card |
Hieronymus Brunschwig, ca. 1450-ca. 1512.
Distillierbuch der rechten Kunst, von Kreutern, Wurtzeln, Bluen, Samen,
Früchten, vnnd Gethier, ware Beschreibung vnnd Abcontrafaytung, wie man die
Wasser davon bre-nen, distillieren, halten vnd gebrauchen soll, für alle
Gebrechen des gantzen menschlichen Cörpers.
Frankfurt: H. Gülfferichen‚ 1551.
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This 16th century book by the surgeon
Brunschwig on preparation by distillation of all parts of herbs “for all uses of the entire human body” is
an example of an early herbal collected by Arnold Klebs. |
William Douglass, ca. 1700-1752.
A practical essay concerning the small pox.
London: Printed for W. Innys,
1730.
James Jurin, 1684-1750
Account of the Success of Inoculating the Small-pox in Great-Britain, for
the Year 1724.
London: J. Peele, 1725.
Gift of Arnold C. Klebs.
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William
Douglass, a British-born and educated physician living in Boston, one of earliest
Amerian physicians to hold an M.D., championed the use of inoculation for smallpox.
Inoculation had been first used in America by Dr. Zabdiel Boylston in the 1721-22
smallpox epidemic in Boston. In inoculation, a small amount of smallpox pus from
an infected person was injected into the arm of a healthy person to create a
light case of the disease and consequent immunization. Inoculation
was later replaced by Edward Jenner’s cowpox vaccination for smallpox. Klebs
collection of inoculation and early vaccination literature, which formed the
basis for his early bibliography, numbered over 1000 items.
Inoculation, first used in England and America in the 1720s, spawned a huge
and controversial pamphlet literature in Europe and America. Jurin was a British
physician and inoculator who wrote several tracts in favor of the procedure.
Klebs stamped his books instead of using a bookplate.
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Nathaniel Hodges, 1629-1688
Loimologia: or, An Historical Account of the Plague in London in 1665:
with Precautionary Directions Against the Like Contagion. To Which is Added,
an Essay on the Different Causes of Pestilential Diseases, and How They Became Contagious ... By John Quincy, M.D.
London, Printed for E. Bell [etc.] 1721
Gift of Arnold C. Klebs.
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This work has been described as the
best medical record of the Great Plague of London in 1665. Hodges, physician of city of London, performed heroic service
in the epidemic. His book was first translated from Latin into English in
1720. It is one of many works on the plague collected by Klebs. With
coauthors, Klebs edited reprints of early German and French plague tracts. |
| Klebs’ home on Lake Geneva was frequently visited by physician and scientist
travelers. Two wooden panels from Les Terraces with signatures of visitors are
on opposite sides of the entry to the Historical Library offices. |
Charles
Sherrington, Harvey Cushing, William Henry Welch, ---, and John F. Fulton at
Klebs’ home, Les Terraces, in Nyon, Switzerland, September 1931. |
Arnold C. Klebs
Incunabula scientific et medica. Short Title List.
Bruges: The Saint Catherine Press, Ltd., 1937.
Klebs’ own copy.
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This catalog, representing an immense
amount of work, listed all known incunabula on scientific and medical topics.
Klebs was working on a more complete version at the
time of his death.
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