Event Highlights the History of MGH on its 200th Birthday

The Friends of the Charlestown Branch Library will host an event on Thursday night, exploring the history of the Massachusetts General Hospital.

Webster Bull, co-author of Something in the Ether: a Bicentennial History of Massachusetts General Hospital, 1811-2011 will lead the event at the Charlestown branch library on Thursday at 7:30 p.m.The event is free and open to the public.

Bull will host a book signing after his discussion. A reception will follow.

Something in the Ether is newly published history of MGH – commissioned to mark the hospital’s 200th anniversary. It's not only a comprehensive narrative about the evolution of an institution, but an examination of the changing face of medicine in American society.

It begins with the vision of two prominent Boston physicians who, in the early 1800s, understood the need for a place where the poor could find care and comfort. The book's eight chapters carry readers through two centuries of medical progress, institutional decisions, changes in practice and powerful and influential personalities.

Massachusetts General Hospital is the original and largest teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School. MGH conducts the largest hospital-based research program in the United States, with an annual research budget of more than $600 million and major research centers in AIDS, cardiovascular research, cancer, computational and integrative biology, cutaneous biology, human genetics, medical imaging, neurodegenerative disorders, regenerative medicine, systems biology, transplantation biology and photomedicine.