Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( ) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

History of Medicine

About   |  Collections   |  Exhibitions   |  Research Tools   |  Copyright   |  Get Involved   |  Visit   |  Contact

Here Today, Here Tomorrow: Varieties of Medical Ephemera
Here Today, Here Tomorrow: Varieties of Medical Ephemera banner. Here Today, Here Tomorrow is written in brown lettering above Varities of Medical Ephemera written in blue letter. Addiction written in blue lettering below an image of a woman laying in a bed with two children at her side. AIDS written in blue lettering below a red AIDS ribbon Bookplates written in blue lettering below an illustration of a man leaning against a stack of books holding a rod of Asclepius in his left hand. Children written in blue lettering below a color image of a boy sitting in a chair playing doctor on a dog lying on a table while three girls look on. Medical Education written in blue lettering below an illustration of a doctor making patient rounds in a hospital with three students attending. Medicine Show written in blue lettering below a color illustration of the cover of Graphic Scenes Kickapoo Indian Life in the South and West. Public Health written in blue lettering below a diagonal half white half black illustration with a cigarette in the center surrounded by a red circle with a line through it. The bottom right black diagonal has Thank you for not smoking here written in white lettering. Tuberculosis written in blue lettering below a predominantly blue poster with white and yellow lettering. In the center is an illustration of Santa Claus holding a little girl in one arm and an oversized Christmas seal in the other hand. Buy Christmas Seals Fight Tuberculosis is in yellow lettering at the bottom. Women written in blue lettering below a black and white image of a woman standing and taking the pulse of a man sitting in a chair. In the upper left corner are the words The Lady Doctor in black lettering.

William Helfand

William H. Helfand was a consultant to the National Library of Medicine, the Philadelphia Museum of Art and other institutions in areas relating to art and medicine. He held degrees in Chemical Engineering (University of Pennsylvania, 1948), Pharmacy (Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and Science, 1952), and was awarded degrees (h.c.) of Doctor of Humane Letters by the Albany College of Pharmacy, Union University in 1981 and Doctor of Science by the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and Science in 1976. He wrote multiple books including Pharmacy: An Illustrated History (with David Cowen, Harry N. Abrams, 1990), and The Picture of Health, (University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 1991.) He published a number of articles on the history of pharmacy and on prints, caricatures, posters and ephemera relating to pharmacy and medicine in Pharmacy in History, Medical History, Revue d'Histoire de la Pharmacie and other journals. Exhibitions of portions of his collection of prints and ephemera in the fields of medicine and pharmacy have been held many places, including in exhibitions at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the National Library of Medicine. In 1986 he received the Pepys Medal of the Ephemera Society, London, for outstanding contributions in the field of ephemera studies, in 1972 he received the Kremers Award of the American Institute of the History of Pharmacy and in 1989 he received the Urdang Medal for distinguished historical writing from the same organization. In 1987 he retired after more than 33 years as an executive with Merck and Co., the multinational pharmaceutical company.

Last Reviewed: December 10, 2024