Dr. Norman M. Rich, a retired U.S. Army colonel, renowned vascular surgeon and longtime friend and contributor to the National Museum of Health and Medicine, will discuss his own medical museum related to Vietnam War medicine on Tuesday, Feb. 24, during the NMHM’s monthly Medical Museum Science Café.
The discussion, “Vietnam War Medicine: A Look at the Medical Museum, 2nd Surgical Hospital,” will take place at the museum from 6-7 p.m. The discussion is free and open to the public.
Rich, who established his small medical museum while serving as chief of surgery for the Army’s 2nd Surgical Hospital in An Khe, Vietnam, during the war, collected items such as punji sticks (a type of wooden stake made of sharpened bamboo and primarily used in booby traps), bullets, fragments from explosive devices and other objects during his tour of duty at the hospital. He later arranged to donate these and other items to the NMHM.
“My college professors at Stanford University taught me to collect, analyze, execute and review everything I got my hands on,” said Rich. “This resulted in the Army Surgeon General bringing me home for a week in the middle of my tour to present my clinical research to the American Medical Association. I also presented to the Excelsior Surgical Society (World War II surgeons) upon my return.”
When word got around about Rich’s project, he recalls many of his patients being enthusiastic about the idea and happy to help donate whatever items they could. It wasn’t long before he had enough items to start his own medical museum. A boot once worn by a North Vietnamese Soldier and pierced by a steel spike is currently on display at the museum in Silver Spring, Maryland. Today, he continues to donate items to the NMHM with the hope of educating the public further on the evolution of military medicine.
The NMHM’s Medical Museum Science Cafés are a regular series of informal talks that connect the mission of the museum with the public. The NMHM was founded as the Army Medical Museum in 1862 and moved to its new location in Silver Spring, Maryland, in 2012. For more information on this upcoming discussion, call (301) 319-3300 or visit www.medicalmuseum.mil.