Browse Exhibits (2 total)

Originally exhibited February 1, 2016 – July 1, 2016
The Elizabeth Perkins Prothro Galleries

Introduction

This exhibition celebrates the recent acquisition by Bridwell Library of the Ruth and Lyle Sellers Medical Collection, transferred to Southern Methodist University from Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas in 2015. The collection of six hundred printed books and manuscripts was assembled by Dr. Lyle M. Sellers (1894–1964), Chief of the Otolaryngology Department at the Baylor Medical Center from 1946 to 1963 where the volumes were originally donated in 1963. In 2001, for purposes of improved preservation, one-hundred of the rarest manuscripts and early printed books were placed on long-term deposit at Bridwell Library, where they have been researched, cataloged, exhibited, and made available for study by SMU students, faculty, local researchers, and visiting scholars. With the 2015 transfer, Bridwell Library is the sole owner and caretaker of the collection.

One of the finest private libraries ever created in Dallas, the Ruth and Lyle Sellers Medical Collection includes works in the fields of early medicine and science, natural history, religious ceremony and private devotion, and nineteenth-century English and American literature. In highlighting selections from each of these collecting areas, Bridwell Library honors Dr. Sellers and his vision for a collection of rare books and manuscripts "believing that proper educational progress rests upon belief in God and knowledge of the arts and sciences – my personal library has been developed as an expression of my goal and guidance of the complete, modern physician.”