Doctor X and the Bibliography

The dustover tells the story

I'm taking a break from all the other things that are pulling at my time to "play" with the Bibliography for a while.  This sort of play is relaxing at the same time it holds my interest and provides the occasional challenge.  Right now, I am challenged to complete the inventory of NYSEC's Adler Study and decide which volumes should be added to the Bibliography.  So far I have not managed to recruit any volunteers to help with the task of converting the photos taken by Amy Schwarz and Danny Hansen (heroic volunteers themselves!) into bibliographic entries for the inventory.  So now, as a means of relaxing (really!), I'm doing it myself.

Aside from all the reasons why NYSEC (and the Ethical Culture Movement at large) might want an inventory of that collection, there are a number of other tasks to be performed, not only to protect and preserve it, but also to share it with members and interested scholars.  One task, in the not too distant future, will be to identify within the larger collection, those books which are "core."  That would include those written by Ethical Culture "thought leaders":  Society leaders, of course, but also members, writing about Ethical Culture itself and reflecting Ethical Culture in their writing (or other creations) on other topics.  This "core" will need extra protection, I believe, and will likely be moved to a new location within the Study where there will be less deterioration caused by sunlight.  I would also, of course, want to add these "core" items to the Bibliography.

One puzzle that occurs as I work my way through the full collection (I am only on the third of ten bookcases right now) is the occasional appearance of novels.   Were these of some interest for their ethical perspective?  Did a lecturer use them as a resource for a Sunday platform?  Were they written by a member of the Society?  Did they just "sneak in" to this rather special collection by accident?

I encountered the first of these novels in Bookcase A.  The title is Intern, and it was written by Dr. X, clearly a pseudonym.  A little searching on the internet provides the author's real name:  Alan E. Nourse.  Nourse, to my knowledge, is not an Ethical Culture leader.  A little more research revealed Nourse to be a science fiction writer who was also an MD, at least explaining the title.

A little more research pulls up Matthew Wisniok's Engineers for Change:  Competing Visions of Technology in 1960s America due to a footnote listing Nourse and his book:  So You Want to Be an Engineer?  I had been trying to make a connection between Nourse and NYSEC (or any Ethical Culture Society), and, sure enough, NYSEC was also mentioned (sorta) in Wisniok's book.  Chapter 1, page 1:  Protesters at the 1971 Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) International Convention in New York City gathered at Columbus Circle to protest the keynote speaker (David Packard, cf. Hewlett-Packard).  

Denied a booth inside the Convention, the dissident engineers worked to direct “ productive and creative people” to their counterconference a few blocks away at the Ethical Culture Society Hall. Those who made the trek discussed how to turn “ necrophilic” technologies into “ humane ” ones in a new organization called the Committee for Social Responsibility in Engineering (CSRE).

I can't tell you how much I hope NYSEC was a party to the development of CSRE!  

On the other hand, I'm still trying to figure out Nourse.  None of the other searches puts him in New York, so I can't make the connection that he was ever a member of NYSEC without considerably more research.  I was just about to think I'd have to read the book, when I found an image online that provided the needed enlightenment.  The dustcover tells it all:

The week-by-week diary of a young doctor during his year of hospital internship.  Frank, sometimes shocking, and completely honest, it is the first inside account of modern medical and hospital practice that has ever been . . . 

Oh!  Not actually a novel, I now consider this book a "source" for someone's lecture and will not add it to the Bibliography. 

Another novel, from Bookcase C, turns out to be "core."  Elizabeth Gertrude Stern wrote A Marriage Was Made in 1928.  A bit of searching turns up the fact that, in 1928 at least, Stern was a member of the Philadelphia Ethical Society.  That same search turned up more about her very interesting corpus of work that focused on the experience of cultural transition for immigrant families, women's roles in a time of social change, and family relationships.  I've added it to the Bibliography as a primary source.

The question of whether a source is primary or secondary is itself a troublesome one.  I added Stern's book because she was an ECS member, and I think that we must consider, in such works, whether and to what degree Ethical Culture might be an influence on the underlying philosophy which might inform or be expressed in such works.  That Stern eventually became a member of the Society of Friends, presumably leaving PES, makes that decision more complicated.  More research is needed to determine, if possible, what that decision meant to her alignment with EC and whether this or any other of her work should be included in the "core."  Interest in her presence, even if only temporarily, in the "core" might well spark more research into the history of the relationship between Ethical Culture and those who leave Judaism in America.