Eloge: Joseph Needham, 9 December 1900-24 March 1995

cades. In the opinion of one colleague, it "defined the model by which American medical historians have come to approach their craft." After a brief stint at the Johns Hopkins Institute of the History of Medicine, where he came under the tutelage of Owsei Temkin, he returned to Wisconsin for two years. In 1963 he moved to the University of Pennsylvania, where he has remained ever since. During his time there he has directed nearly three dozen dissertations in the history of American science and medicine, making him one of the most productive, if not the most productive, graduate advisors in the field. He has written, in addition to The Cholera Years, five major books and edited numerous others. His monumental history of American hospitals, The Care of Strangers (1987), elevated medical history to new heights and attracted new audiences. One awed reviewer described it as "too good to be true"; the Pulitzer Prize committee voted it one of the top three books in history to. appear in 1987. Throughout his writings Charles Rosenberg has convincingly demonstrated the interdependence of the history of science, the history of medicine, and the history of American culture. His insistence on situating medical developments within their cultural context and on exploring connections between ideas and institutions has helped to tear down the artificial barrier that an older generation had erected between internal and external history. His exploration of such factors as religion, sex, and public policy has helped to expand the territory claimed by a new generation of historians of science and medicine. More than anyone else, he has moved medicine from the periphery of the historical enterprise to a position much nearer the center. Around the world he is recognized as the leading medical historian of the late twentieth century. His honors are legion: a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship, two Guggenheim Fellowships, a Rockefeller Humanities Fellowship, membership in the Institute of Medicine and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the presidencies of the Society for the Social History of Medicine and the American Association for the History of Medicine, and the William H. Welch Medal. Early in his career Charles Rosenberg saw the wisdom of joining the History of Science Society. In the 1970s he served on the Society's Council and on the Isis Advisory Board; in the late 1980s, as Editor of Isis and a member of the Executive Committee. In recognition of his outstanding contributions to the history of science, as a disciplinary bridge-builder, teacher, scholar, and leader of this Society, we proudly award him the Sarton Medal for 1995.