The Duke University Medical Center Archives is happy to announce that the Intercom is now online.
Duke Medicine’s primary news publication from 1953 to 1986, the Intercom featured information about campus construction and events, faculty and staff news, facts and figures, and articles about medical research and innovations at Duke. The Archives collaborated with the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center on this project, who digitized the first 25 years of the publication, making more than 500 issues available online. They can be accessed via MEDSpace, the Duke Medicine digital repository, or through DigitalNC.
As a document of the Medical Center’s history and progress, the Intercom is a personal favorite for us at the Archives. It’s a great way to find a wide variety of information, and we often use it to verify dates, locate biographical information about employees or students, and get details about growth and changes at the Medical Center. It's helped us answer many patron questions, including the opening of Duke’s first pediatric intensive care unit and finding information about the evolution of computers and technology on campus. While Duke is the focus, the publication also reveals broader trends in medicine, healthcare, and research in the U.S. during the latter half of the 20th century, making it an excellent resource for scholars and students.
The digitized issues have been organized by year, allowing users to browse or quickly search several issues at once. In addition to viewing issues online, users also may download them as PDFs or jpegs. The Intercom provides a valuable window into the daily functions and development the Medical Center, and we are excited to provide increased access to this important publication.