ASHLEY STALNECKER | Staff WriterLancaster’s medical museum will have a new name, a new site and regular open-to-the-public hours for the first time starting Saturday with its grand opening.
With the mission of protecting and preserving Lancaster County medical history, Lancaster Medical Heritage Museum – located at 410 N. Lime St. in Lancaster city – will include an iron lung from the 1950s polio epidemic, exhibitions on ophthalmology, dentistry, family medicine and pandemics and prevention and a hands-on section to learn the five skills doctors must know.
An exhibit at the Lancaster Medical Heritage Museum displays two life-size figurines. The Lancaster Medical Heritage Museum opens at Lancaster General Health's campus on 410 N. Lime Street in Lancaster City, Dec. 10, 2022.
Museum Executive Director Kim Jovinelli, first hired in March 2021, said the museum’s former location at Burle Business Park in Lancaster city closed in 2020 when COVID-19 restrictions prevented the museum from hosting visitors. Before that, the museum was open by appointment only.
The former location “was really not conducive to grow a museum and we got very lucky with Lancaster General Hospital, who were so gracious in giving us our new location,” Jovinelli said.
The museum’s grand opening is Saturday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. After that, regular hours will be 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday, Wednesday and Friday from Dec. 12 through April 28, when the museum will be open Tuesday through Saturday for the summer.
Admission is free for the month of December.
Jovinelli said the museum has been preparing its exhibits since first moving to its North Lime Street location in January.
“We're stoked to actually be open to the public - it's been a labor of love since 2020,” Jovinelli said.
Both Lancaster General Health and Wellspan Health sponsored the opening and a paid internship program for research.
Formerly known as the Edward Hand Medical Heritage Foundation, the museum was founded in 1982 by the Lancaster City and County Medical Society.
“There's that saying that those who don't study history are doomed to repeat it,” Jovinelli said.
“History needs to be preserved, because if we don't have it, then we don't learn from it. We need to see where we've been to see where we're going.”
