When Dr. William Osler became the President of the Faculty in 1896-1897, the organization was in what they thought was going to be their permanent home on Hamilton Court, off of Eutaw Street. Dr. Osler was a well-known book lover, so the first thing he did was investigate the library, which had been formally founded in 1830.
Dr. Osler found the library in appalling condition, with out-dated books in no particular order. There had been a librarian on staff, but apparently, she was not up to the task, and was soon gone.
After consulting his friend, Bernard Steiner who was the head of the Pratt Library, it was suggested that Dr. Osler meet Miss Marcia Crocker Noyes, who worked at the Pratt cataloguing books. Although she didn't know anything about medicine, she had a certain spark, and Dr. Osler thought she'd do just fine.
And she did just fine, working for the Faculty for 50 years, beginning on November 21, 1896 when she was 27 years old. I had never known the date that she was hired until I found some papers which had the date that she started working at the Faculty. She died on November 24, 1946, almost exactly 50 years after she was hired.
As you may know, we are pretty sure that Marcia is still walking the halls of our building... literally! A few months ago, four of us were working on a Saturday finishing setting up the Museum, and were all in one room. We knew no one else was at the office, but we kept hearing footsteps walking up and down the hall. One or another of us would pop their head out to see who it was, and of course, no one was there!
And then a few days later, as we were working late at night to finalize everything for the Museum opening, all of a sudden, the lightweight plastic dropcloth hanging from the walls suddenly started shimmering and billowing, even though there is no air source in the room and no windows. We looked at each other and gasped, and then burst out laughing, figuring that Marcia had come by to check out what we were doing being at the office so late.
Congratulations to Marcia for becoming the first full-time staff member at the Faculty 126 years ago today!
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