Nathalie Wheaton, Archivist at Rush University Medical Center Archives, assisted Brenna Farrell in her work on a recent Radiolab episode. 

The episode, “Poison Control,” explores the history and function of poison control centers.

The first poison control center in the United States was developed in 1953, led by pharmacist Louis Gdalman, at St. Luke’s Hospital, a predecessor hospital of Rush University Medical Center.

You can learn more about Louis Gdalman and the origins of poison control centers in this blog post Nathalie contributed to the Rush InPerson blog:

https://rushinperson.rush.edu/2018/08/13/life-saving-poison-control-centers-have-origins-at-rush

To listen to the Radiolab episode:

https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/poison-control

Viatorian Community Archivist (Clerics of St. Viator) Joan Sweeney sends this summary of Archon Day, led by the Archon Users Collaborative: Archon Day 2018 was held at Denison University in Granville, Ohio, on June 29 with participants from institutions in Illinois, Minnesota, Kansas, and Ohio. Next year we hope to enable participation from Archon users outside the Midwest by hosting a virtual meeting. Archon users hail from New York, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and other states from the West and the South.

The purpose of the meeting was to discuss the future viability of Archon, the availability of alternative tools; their utility for Archon users in particular; and the Archon Users Collaborative future work in 3-5 years.

The group formed teams focusing on research, code development, and user community communication. Each team has specific objectives and welcomes new team members.

Ideas that were generated include:

- Explore updating Archon code to work with PHP 7, building off what Calvin College has already completed.

- Hold Archon Day 2019 virtually and work on communication to get others outside of the Midwest actively involved.

- Create a comprehensive directory of Archon users to include international institutions for posting on our website.

- Find partners and look for funding for future development.

For the full meeting report and for more information, visit http://archonusers.blogspot.com.

Morgen MacIntosh Hodgetts, Special Collections Instruction Librarian at DePaul University, co-authored "Teaching the Teacher: Primary Source Instruction in American and Canadian Archives Graduate Programs," published in the Spring/Summer 2018 issue of American Archivist. Read it here: http://americanarchivist.org/doi/full/10.17723/0360-9081-81.1.188. 

Are you publishing, presenting, organizing, or otherwise working on something professionally awesome? Let us know about it! Email info@chicagoarchivists.org or the co-chairs of the Outreach and Member Engagement Subcommittee: Brittan Nannenga (brittan.nannenga@northwestern.edu) and Jill Waycie (j-waycie@northwestern.edu).