on display are evidence of the different stages of the surgical repair done on an individual over a series of surgeries. you can see the nature of this soldier's injury prior to repair and then in this case and in the case below you can see how the surgeon was inflating the issue so that to create enough tissue for eventual use to restore that particular structure, in this case the nose or a flap over an injured eye. these then became the teaching models of the mid 20th century before there were ipads and on screen technologies, this was how surgeonsrbcñ of the era wer learning and tracking an individual case as a teaching study. and we compare those to 3-d stereo lit graphic prints,

that's a big word. 3-d stereo lit graphic prints of soldiers injured in the war in iraq. these 3-d casts were done at what was then still walter reed medical center and if you can imagine taking cat scan data and pushing those through a 3-d printer, they provide the surgeon a real world model of that soldier's injuries. these were soldiers injured in the war, survived their injuries, were recovering at walter reed and the surgeons used these models to help plan future injuries. so learn what gone could be recovered or discarded, to plan for the prosthetic that might be used to reshape and protect that soldier's skull and then also found themselves limiting the number of surgeries and decreasing the chances of infection and haste thing the recovery of that service member and restoring some measure of the quality of life that they

deserved. >> the last feature in the exhibit on innovations in military medicine focuses on walter reed, major walter reed. walter reed who is known for his work in the discovery of the transmission of the yellow fever vector identifying that mosquitoes were transmitting yellow fever was actually a curator of the medical museum, this museum's ancestor when he died in 1902. we use this exhibit element to remember the man and his particular legacy and also the institutions that came to honor him, including walter reed army medical center and the walter reed army institute of research. so the exhibit features walter reed's own microscope and the guest books of vip visitors to visited the walter reed general hospital during the era of the

korean war and vietnam war. you can see on the pages of these guest books, vips and celebrities who were visiting the soldiers recovering at the hospital during that time. >> next we are going to go to an exhibit on human anatomy and pathology with a special emphasis on traumatic brain injury. so come along. we are in the second of the three exhibit galleries here at the medical museum. this exhibit gallery focuses broadly on anatomy and pathology. one piece of the exhibit features normal human anatomy. this gives us a chance to show normal human tomorrow cal structures, lungs, kidneys, stomach, brains, hearts, in a condition that shows you what you look like on the inside when you're healthy. these are very unique specimens, therapy served in all manner of states, wet tissue, blast nation and dry mounted specimens, but

the rest of the exhibit gallery focuses on traumatic brain injury and tbi was identified as one of the signature injuries of the wars in iraq or afghanistan and so we focused the rest of this exhibit gallery to give our visitor a chance to understand the nature and functions of the brain, those technologies like these helmets here that help to showcase the protection of the brain, both on the battlefield or on the football field, but the rest of the exhibit gallery gives us a chance to focus on actual human brain specimens showing the graphic nature of real traumatic brain injuries. so you see over and over again on display sectioned or whole brains showing, whether it's a hemorrhage, a stab wound, a gunshot wound or in this particularly unique case here, evidence of a man who was in a

car wreck, did not seek medical attention and died ten days later and the medical examiner found -- as you can see in the specimen on the shelf -- the evidence of a hemorrhage which eventually claimed that man's life. so as you move through the exhibit gallery and as the exhibit progresses we then deal with surgical response to tbis, but that gives us a chance to talk about the historic efforts. on display are two pre columbian peruvian skulls, these are now hundreds and hundreds of years old showing evidence of something called thefanation it's an effort to relieve pressure in the brain. we contrast these two skulls from peru with the skull of a civil war soldier showing essentially the same type of surgical treatment.

we then give the visitor a chance to see the types of tools used. at the end of the exhibit an opportunity to see the types of tools used for modern tpi rehabilitation, which includes, interestingly enough, video games and the important role that service animals play in helping tbi patients recover and go about their daily lives. so we've come to the third of the three exhibit galleries here at the medical museum and we've moved here to an exhibit on biomedical engineering which features this artificial kidney. the kidney here was invented by a dutch physician who developed this technology in nazi occupied holland and the first generation of this device was built using scrap parts from downed german airplanes and left over kitchen utensils. when dr. kolf moved to the

united states he developed this generation of the device and the artificial kidney we have here on display was used at walter reed general hospital. they purchased it because the device they had in use during the time of the korean war had to be shipped to the front to a mass unit and to if you can imagine, a device like this, similar now to what we would use for pretty routine dialysis treatment, was used for similar types of kidney conditions during the korean war and traveled with a mass unit treating soldiers during the war itself. the rest of the exhibit features things that might look familiar to visitors, especially anyone who might have had a knee replacement or hip replacement or a prosthetic inserted in their shoulder. something you don't often see are actual heart valves. so a display of those here gives us a chance to know what it

looks like before it's inserted into you, but compare that to an actual human heart, it's in that wet tissue preparation there, and looking carefully you can see the heart valves carefully inserted into the tissue itself. >> we are now in front of an exhibit on human pathology. for a visitor remember to compare this to an exhibit in another gallery on normal human anatomy. what you see here are actual human specimens showing rare and unique conditions, mostly some genetic and metabolic conditions, including this specimen here, peter clubbingy, who at the time of the spanish american war was diagnosed with a rare and severe form of rheumatoid arthritis and upon a very close examination you will see that his giants are all

fused and where there should be space between his vertebrae, there is no space. another interesting item, part of cluky's specimen is noticing that his teeth and jaw looked like they were opened up. after peter's jaw fused they opened up his teeth there and broke some of his teeth out to that mr. cluky could ingest today foods. this was the only way that he was able to consume anything in those last years of his life. another thing to note about peter cluky's specimen is the contrast between the white remaining natural bone that is in the skeleton and the yellow replica bones. over the course of all of these many decades, peter cluky died in the 1920s, some bones were taken for study so the replicas

were put in place, but that still gives us a chance to see in the knee giants, the spine and the jaw very clearly the fused giants and imagine a little bit about what it might have been like for peter at the >> peter clubbingy lived out the rest of his life sitting up like this or lying on his side and died and willed his remains to the army medical museum so that his body could be studied for science. he has been sitting in various iterations of this museum pretty much just like that in that chair for many decades and he is just part of this exhibit on human pathology, which includes some very unique specimens. examples of things that we don't see very often anymore, including the effects of smallpox, you can see that on

these two feet here. or the effects of lep ross si or he will fan tie a sis or a mega colon, a condition where the colon grew outside of the body. we also feature specimens such as a section of a smoker's lung, an enlarged heart that is sectioned so that you can see the condition of the plaque buildup inside of the heart itself, a unique specimen, a human hair ball on display showing in the shape, urge clee removed from a girl who was 12 years old who went on to live a happy healthy life, but you can see it formed in the shape of a

stomach. another unique specimen is also a section of a lung of a soldier who died of the influenza pandemic that killed 50 million people around the world in 1918 and 1919 and that's just a few of the interesting pathological specimens on display. >> we are now at an exhibit on forensic identification and the sciences involved in determining a positive scientific identification on missing war dead. we start with the story of colonel scharff. in the early 1990s a small piece of bone was found at a crash site. while it was thought to be colonel scharff there was a positive identification because of dna matched from the bone was

matched with dna recovered from love letters that colonel scharff had licked the envelopes of and sent to his wife during the war decades earlier. that dna proved a positive match so that helps tell the story about the role that dna plays today in a modern forensic identification. and includes this early thermo psych clear used to amplify dna recovered from ancient bone materials and as the exhibit goes on we talk about the importance of forensic anthropology, the use of dental evidence and the role of the medical examiner and collateral the arms forces examiner in developing the protocols and practices and procedures in a modern scientific identification bringing home our war dead from wars even long ago. we also feature an interesting

development about the value of data collected during this long process. one thing learned, a lech learned from the wars in iraq and afghanistan is that the -- too many soldiers were -- lives were lost because of the -- not having the right tool to reinflate the lung on a battlefield. so treat a collapsed lung. the medical examiner was able to determine that by adding to the medic's kit a longer pneumothorax needle, the medic in the field had a better chance of being able to quickly reinflate a lung and allow that soldier a chance to get to the next level higher trauma treatment center. so what we have on display, the early models of the pneumothorax needle and that developed based on the data of all those lives

that were lost. the medical museum is home to one of the world's largest collections of micro scopes. it was started in the 1880s by our curator who set about to collect representative examples of the technology at the time. one of those includes this microscope by robert hook, an employee of the royal society, to used this microscope to observe the cell for the first time. this example gives us a chance to talk about the history of science and why it's important to recognize that the -- this one device helps change the nature of observation of the natural world around us and for us this stands as one of the oldest objects in the collection, but also gives us a chance to reflect on one of the most important moments in the history of science in general. finally, we are here in an exhibit that commemorates the history of the army medical

museum and what we now now today as the museum of national health and medicine. on display are a range of artifacts that commemorate or tell interesting stories from different eras of the museum's history. especially of interest are two items related to presidential health. the box on display in the back, looks like a cigar-shaped box. the visitor that comes to the museum can look carefully down through the top. what they would see are mic stone slides and the sectioned biopsied tissue from the throat of president u police ease grant. that tissue is of the cans that are eventually took his life and the pathologist who prepared the slides also put them into this special keepsake box of sorts and it was -- eventually made its way to the museum's hold js and has been part of our display

since this iteration of the museum opened in 2012. it shares some display space with a very interesting anatomical specimen, it's three vertebrae from the lower part of the spine of president james garfield. james gar field shot in july of 1881 while he was going on a train and what you see is the red rot of the path of the bullet. garfield died some three months later not necessarily as a direct result of the bullet that -- path that you see there, but of infection that was caused for the most part by not -- sterile practices not being performed by the physician who was managing his care. you might recall the pathology exhibit that we looked at earlier, which included that human hair ball, the tricobezor

and other specimens of note. in display in that case is also the spleen of the assassin of president james garfield, a man named charles gateaux who was called and tried and executed but it was found later that he was actually dying of malaria, so the spleen actually doesn't say anything about charles gateaux but it is a remarkable specimen showing the effects of malaria on that particular or began. the rest of the exhibit case has many objects on display but a few others of note. standing in the back of the case, the reese's monkey skeleton is of an early american astronaut, her name was able, she flew into space in 1959 and was part of the series of animals that nasa and the space program sent into space to test the early era of the space

program and able unfortunately died shortly after her return from space during a surgery to remove the electrodes that were used to measure her vital signs during her flight in space. along the back wall are four dental tools. these tools are attributed to paul ref veer. paul revere who we know from his midnight ride through the country to warn the colonists about the advancing british forces also did some interesting work as a dn tis and these tools were used by revere and we think were probably related to work that he did on a man named joe warren. he was a colonial leader and fought and died at the battle of bunker hill. as the story was told revere helped identify warren's remains

from a mass grave of those killed in bunker hill and did so because he had done some work on joe warren's jaw and teeth in the years before warren was killed. >> so a unique feature for our visitors who come to the museum here in silver spring is a chance to see through the looking glass as it is into a working museum laboratory. this special lab was equipped to help us prepare and manage the wide range of artifacts in the museum's care. what you see on the counter there now is a set of human remains, anatomical specimens, bones, that are laid out on the counter there and museum staff person doing some lab work in preparation of dealing with some objects in conservation, but we could use this lab to manage

paper materials, other types of tissue or to prepare objects for long-term storage or for exhibit or display. so our last stop on our visit to the medical museum is here in front of one of the museum's storage rooms where we manage our growing 25 million object collection. you can see just a few of the paintings in the museum's holdings here in the row behind me and the large painting there features our -- the museum's founder surgeon general william hammond who founded the museum in 1862. one thing that i personally find important about working here at this museum is the stories that we tell are the stories of america's soldiers, sailers, air men and marine -- and marines. it's important to share the sacrifices that they made for doctors and researchers and

innovators to be able to help convey their stories and glad to be able to share that with visitors who come to see us every day here at the museum. >> this was the second of two programs from our visit to the national museum of health and medicine, the first focused on the museum's civil war collecyoyou can watch all of ou american artifacts programs in their entirety by visiting c-span.oval/history. >> on sunday, october 25th american history tv will feature an oral history project with the former chair of the naacp julian bond who died in august. he talks about his involvement with the student nonviolent coordinating committee in his later political career. one of several oral histories from the yoofrt of virginia exploration in black history project. sunday at 10:00 a.m. eastern on

c-span 3. >> each week american artifacts takes you to museums and historic place toss learn what artifacts reveal about american history. just down pennsylvania safe from the white house is the white house visitor's center which offers a look at how the executive mansion functions, both as an office and a home. we toured the center with curator william all man who shows us the desk franklin roosevelt used while broadca broadcasting his fireside chats and recreational items such as radios and bowling balls for the first families. >> my name is john stand witch and i am the lisa son to the white house and i'd like to we will come you to the white house visitor's center which is located a short walk away from the white house itself. for anyone going on a white house tour it will help them understand what they're seeing and bring much more context and meaning to their visit to the white house. for those who can't go on a

white house tour this is really an experience in its own right as well. so you are here in the white house visitor's center which is theme at clee based around five different themes to understand the white house story. it is a home, so it's obviously home to the first family, it is an office for the president, it also, too, is a stage that we as a nation, we celebrate great events there, obviously state arrivals, events as well take place there like the white house easter egg roll. it is also, too, a park. it is part of a national park and we are proud as a national park service to consider it as such. and also, too, it is a museum pause the white house collection is inside the whitehouse and that helps to tell the story of the first family's connection with the structure and also to the story of our nation alongside it. located directly behind me is a scale model of the whi