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Rebecca Barry

Rebecca Rego Barry

Rebecca Rego Barry is the author of Rare Books Uncovered: True Stories of Fantastic Finds in Unlikely Places and the editor of Fine Books & Collections magazine. She writes about books and history for SlateLit Hub, and elsewhere.

Couney incubator

Coney Island’s Incubator Babies

Yes, you read that right.
Lydia Pinkham products

Was Lydia E. Pinkham the Queen of Quackery?

She developed an immensely popular, if questionably effective, herbal remedy for “female complaints.” Pioneer in alternative medicine or...?
Audiobooks

Is Audio Really the Future of the Book?

The upsurge in audiobooks and podcasts illustrates our heightened interest in digital storytelling, but does listening really count as reading?
Boston City Hospital operating theater, circa 1890, by A. H. Folsom (d. 1926) of Roxbury

Inside the Operating Theater: Early Surgery as Spectacle

Director Steven Soderbergh’s historical drama series, The Knick, brings viewers inside a New York City hospital’s operating room ...
Paganini's Bloodletting Kit 
Courtesy of Schubertiade Music & Arts

The Vampire Virtuoso? Paganini’s Bloodletting Kit Is for Sale

Paganini's personal bloodletting kit contains three domed-shape glasses with brass twist spouts and a brass scarification (scraping) tool.