What is the Warren Anatomical Museum?
The Warren Anatomical Museum was the gift of Dr. John Collins Warren. Like many physicians of his day, Dr. Warren collected interesting and unusual anatomical specimens. He began collecting materials as early as 1799 and expanded his collection to assist in the teaching of medical students. When he resigned his professorship in 1847, most of the collection was presented to Harvard with an endowment of $ 5,000 to support its preservation. The collection, known as the Warren Anatomical Museum, continued to grow as physicians like Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes contributed specimens. When the the Museum opened for study in 1847, it was housed in a large room on North Grove Street in Boston. The collection was first opened to the public at this location in 1861. In 1883, the Museum moved with the Medical School to Boylston Street, and again in 1906, to the Longwood campus, where it occupied the upper floors of Gordon Hall until 1998. In 2000, the Countway Library’s Center for the History of Med
