Talk:John Shaw Billings

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 27 January 2020 and 14 May 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Cpantelis1, Joseph0618. Peer reviewers: Jsun72, MKichar1.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 23:27, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Wendytsai223, Cmglaser47. Peer reviewers: 23penguin, Jdong15, Slu30, Hty118.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 01:22, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Merge
It has only been proposed for a week, but this merge seems necessary, as it is a duplicate article. I will therefore perform it. Jlittlet 21:04, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Billings was NOT the Father of PHS
Billings, most certainly an important figure of early Public Health, but he should NOT be credited with being the true father of the modern day Public Health Service, now under the Department of Health & Human Services. Billings was a competing figure with Dr. John Maynard Woodworth, who deserves the lions' share of the credit for the creation of the Marine-Hospital Service and the Commissioned Corps, though he would never lived to see the creation of the Corps in 1889. In fact there is speculation that there was "bad blood" which may have lead to Woodworth's untimely demise.

Billings was appointed to a fact finding mission between 1870-1871 to evaluate what was then the "Marine Hospital Fund," which was the loosely controlled hospital system that was under the Department of Treasury. Billings found the Fund to be unacceptable and corrupt. Obviously, Billings would have been the "right man" to take over the then reorganized "Marine Hospital Service" in 1871, but he did not.

Historical accounts in Bess Furman's book as well as those of Assistant Surgeon General Williams (1950's) seem to indicate Billings as someone least likely to help the Marine-Hospital Service. Billings was instrumental in the creation of the National Health Board, which only lasted a few years, but set the foundations of what would be come part of the ever expanding role and mission of the Public Health and Marine-Hospital Service, especially with Quaranatine.

Was he *really* the father of the USPHS?
John Shaw Billings' article calls him the ""father" of the United States Public Health Service," however, this article does not further elaborate on his contribtions to that institution, nor does the article on the USPHS include mention of him. Can someone please include information on his involvement with the USPHS? Thanks. 71.65.52.189 23:41, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

*Creator* of NYPL?
I think it seems like hyperbole to say that Billings created the NYPL. A great number of people were involved. He was certainly very influential and was the first director of the library, but there were a number of philanthropists and lawyers who had to work out a bunch of stuff even before Billings could work his magic. I changed the summary to reflect a more measured tone. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mellen22 (talk • contribs) 20:08, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

ALA Category
I want to put Billings into the category of Category:American Library Association people, but I don't see anything in this article (nor on the first page of a Google search) stating that he was affiliated with the ALA. Does anyone have a reference for this? If not, then we should remove Category:American Library Association. KConWiki (talk) 18:28, 19 August 2012 (UTC)


 * Never mind - I now see that he was president from 1901 - 1902. KConWiki (talk) 02:09, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

Shaw Billings was in love with Eduard Punset?
"Also, he was in love with Eduard Punset and participated in his universe conception". In case that was true, I believe the time lag would have been a little problem. I can not deny this couple would have been funny, though. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.121.188.186 (talk) 09:07, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Websites for Information (Bibliography)
http://www.encyclopedia.com/people/literature-and-arts/libraries-books-and-printing-biographies/john-shaw-billings http://www.nasonline.org/publications/biographical-memoirs/memoir-pdfs/billings-john-s.pdf http://history.amedd.army.mil/biographies/billings.html https://www.asist.org/pioneers/john-shaw-billings/ Wendytsai223 (talk) 18:58, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

Lead of the Article/Personal Life
The lead of the article should mention briefly the significance of his contributions. Why was modernizing the Library of the Surgeon General's Office of the Army important? What lasting impact does it have now? Maybe mention it is still very important in medical information systems today. Mention other lasting legacies in the lead section too.

As for Billings' personal life, some of the following information should be added about Billings childhood. Billings' father emigrated from England and his mother descended from Mayflower settlers. Billings mother enjoyed reading which significantly impacted Billings intellectual pursuits. Furthermore, Billings valued college education and actually told his father he would forego his inheritance to go to college. Billings actually spent a majority of his childhood in the East but eventually moved back to Indiana where he attended college. When Billings was serving in a military hospital in DC during the Civil War, he met and married Katharine Stevens.

A lot of useful information can be found here: http://www.encyclopedia.com/people/literature-and-arts/libraries-books-and-printing-biographies/john-shaw-billings Jdong15 (talk) 22:14, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

I think that the leading section of the article could be more detailed, and include more about Billings' contributions (not just his work on the librarian side) as well as the impact of his work. The biography part of the article follows a clear chronological order, and is pretty easy to follow. Some more information about his personal life can be introduced at the beginning in order for the readers to get some more background information on Billings, thus helping readers to understand him as a person better. In addition, the article is still pretty general, just briefly listing Billing's contributions: he did this, he was this or he was credited for that... A more detailed account on maybe things like what kind of difficulties he encountered, or how he really worked on achieving whatever he did can not only make the section more interesting to read, but also to better illustrate the kind of person Billings was. In general, the article did a good job on citing the sources as well as adding hyperlinks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hty118 (talk • contribs) 05:40, 8 April 2017 (UTC)


 * Before worrying about the lead, sort out the body. That is a mess of duplication, unsourced statements, poor phrasing etc. - Sitush (talk) 08:26, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

Information Regarding Billings' Involvement with JHU
The section that is dedicated to John Shaw Billings' affiliation with Johns Hopkins University can be elaborated upon further. He designed the buildings for prudent and specific reasons. It would be a shame to not include these details as it highlights not only the genius behind John Shaw Billings, but also the care and attention to detail he had in constructing these buildings. Joseph0618 (talk) 21:52, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

I am currently drafting some updates to this article for a WikiEducation class, just to clean up the organization of the article as well as add more relevant information to the article as a whole!Joseph0618 (talk) 01:06, 8 April 2020 (UTC)