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Finding Aid for the John Martin Askey, M.D., Papers 1917-1990
413  
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Collection Details
 
Table of contents What's This?
  • Descriptive Summary
  • Access
  • Publication Rights
  • Preferred Citation
  • UCLA Catalog Record ID
  • Acquisition Information
  • Biography
  • Scope and Content
  • Indexing Terms

  • Descriptive Summary

    Title: John Martin Askey, M.D., Papers,
    Date (inclusive): 1917-1990
    Collection number: 413
    Creator: Askey, John Martin 1899-1991
    Extent: 2 document boxes(1 lin. ft.)
    Repository: University of California, Los Angeles. Library.Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library History and Special Collections for the Sciences
    Los Angeles, California 90095-1490
    Abstract: A small collection of papers, mostly from Dr. Askey's retirement years, which include materials concerning his personal life and family, and materials on medical topics which continued to have special interest for him. Dr. Askey was a skilled clinician with extensive professional publications; he was also a graceful writer, and the enclosed transcription of a youthful travel diary describing his time in 1925 as a ship's surgeon is most engaging.
    Physical location: SRLF
    Language of Material: Collection materials in English

    Access

    Collection is open for research.

    Publication Rights

    Property rights in the physical objects belong to the UCLA Biomedical Library. Literary rights, including copyright, are retained by the creators and their heirs. It is the responsibility of the researcher to determine who holds the copyright and pursue the copyright owner or his or her heir for permission to publish if the Biomedical Library does not hold the copyright.

    Preferred Citation

    [Identification of item], John Martin Askey, M.D., Papers (Manuscript collection 413). Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library History and Special Collections for the Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles.

    UCLA Catalog Record ID

    UCLA Catalog Record ID: 6575032 

    Acquisition Information

    Gift of B & L Rootenberg Rare Books, December, 2009.

    Biography

    As a very young man, John Martin Askey (1899-1991) thought he might want to be a journalist; but after graduation from high school in Bellingham, Washington, a short stint as police reporter for a Tacoma newspaper convinced him otherwise. Instead he decided to follow his older brother Vincent into medicine. After a year at the College of Puget Sound and three years at the University of Oregon he entered the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and received his M.D. degree in 1923. He interned at University of Pennsylvania Hospital, spent four months as a ship's surgeon, then again followed his older brother to California, where he received his license to practice medicine in 1925.
    Dr. Askey was board certified in Internal Medicine, and specialized in cardiovascular diseases. In addition to his private practice he joined the clinical teaching staff at the University of Southern California until 1964, when he was named Emeritus Clinical Professor of Medicine. Dr. Askey published widely, and was active in national, state, and regional professional societies. At various times he served as President or Chairman of the Los Angeles County Heart Association, the Los Angeles Society of Internal Medicine, and the California Medical Association General Medicine Section.

    Scope and Content

    These papers came from Dr. Askey's home office and reflect some of the interests of his retirement years. They include reprints of his professional journal publications and a few of his more ephemeral published items, such as letters to the editor. Undoubtedly he authored many more short pieces that are not here; the correspondence and his personal reminiscences make it clear that he liked to write, and was never short of comments.
    The sixty-some page typed transcription of the diary that documents his summer-1925 travels on the training ship "Annapolis" is a well-written, charming, and thoughtful account that reveals a good deal about the young man who wrote it. Since the original diary is not included, one cannot judge how much of the presentation, if any, has been altered by the mind and experience of the older man who transcribed it; but there are occasional explicit retrospections by Dr. Askey in the typed text. He also frequently and vigorously underlined and commented on the text of the clippings and reprints, on both medical and cultural topics, that are included in these papers. The bound volume of medical papers is a rather haphazard compilation: the reprints/tear sheets/photocopies are in only a rough chronological order; items by other authors have been inserted, not always for a discernible reason; additional notes, pages, and comments are sometimes stapled or taped to the text pages. But as in the correspondence, Dr. Askey's underlining and marginalia add interest to the gathered materials.
    The collection is organized into the following series:
    • Series 1. Personal.
    • Series 2. Professional.

    Indexing Terms

    The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the library's online public access catalog.

    Subjects

    Naval Medicine -- Personal Narratives
    Physicians -- California -- Los Angeles -- Archival resources.
    Ship physicians -- Archival resources