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“[A] splendid history of the hospital in America... What makes this an important book is that Mr. Rosenberg has managed to tell the story of the hospital as a microcosm of American society... It is remarkable that an institution so central to our society, and to our medical system as the hospital has been for the last 100 years, has had to wait so long for a general historical analysis. It is Mr. Rosenberg’s accomplishment that the wait has been well worth it... Very well written and rich with interpretation, it deserves a wide audience not only among those concerned with medicine but also those with an interest in cities, social welfare and the professions.” — The New York Times
“Charles E. Rosenberg’s long-awaited The Care of Strangers marks a milestone in our understanding of the hospital as a social institution... It should be read by anyone who wants a sophisticated analysis of the forces that have shaped the modern hospital system.” — Washington Post Book World
“Rosenberg, a prize-winning historian, has written a detailed account of what has brought about the spectacular changes through which the hospital became accepted as the repository of medical knowledge and skills... Rosenberg interestingly deals with the main factors that elevated the hospital to its present eminence: medical-technological advances, especially in surgery, differential diagnosis, and drugs; demographic changes, with cities far outpacing rural areas in population; the assertiveness of doctors in promoting the hospital as a source of professional status and education; the widespread emergence of patient private payment and health insurance; the big expansion of federal subsidies for research and patient care... the book... is well-written and convincing... fascinatingly informative.” — The Los Angeles Times
“A splendid contribution to medical history, one that should have a wide appeal to physicians, social scientists, and laypersons.” — Journal of the American Medical Association
“The Care of Strangers unravels an intricate and multifaceted story; it is one worthy of Rosenberg’s unparalleled skills as a historian of medicine... In this book, as in much of Rosenberg’s mature scholarship, an enormous command of the sources matches his powerful integrative vision... This brilliant and ambitious book is the history of American medicine; it defines the field and is likely to organize the efforts of our subdiscipline for the next generation.” — Bulletin of the History of Medicine
“Sociologists, economists, philanthropists, the members of the several health professions — even historians — tend to view hospitals from their own parochial perspectives. All would learn from Charles Rosenberg’s comprehensive view of authority, class relations, technology, and administration in the American hospital from 1800 to modern times. This superb book shows how that unique institution has always been a microcosm of American society.” — Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences
“Rosenberg’s masterful synthesis of the history of the American hospital... offers readers, not simply the story of the development of a central institution of modern life, but an account that is also in many ways a history of the emergence of modern medicine... elegantly written and eminently readable.” — Reviews in American History
“Rosenberg’s study makes a major contribution to the historiography of hospitals in America... This study is an elegantly written book that broadens the history of hospitals and places it squarely within the larger field of American social history... a major contribution not only to the history of medicine but also to the history of institutions and to American social history in general.” — American Historical Review
About the author
Born in New York City in 1936, Charles Ernest Rosenberg graduated with a B.A. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1956 and received his M.A. and PhD degrees from Columbia University in 1957 and 1961. He taught at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1961 until 1963 when he joined the University of Pennsylvania’s faculty, becoming a professor in 1968; he chaired the Department of History in 1974-75 and 1979-83, and the Department of History and Sociology of Science in 1991-95. In 2001, he moved to Harvard University where he has been Professor of the History of Science and Ernest E. Monrad Professor in the Social Sciences. He is now emeritus. Rosenberg was acting chairman of Harvard’s history of science department in 2003–2004.
Rosenberg has written widely on the history of medicine and science; his books include Cholera Years: The United States in 1832, 1849, and 1866, The Trial of the Assassin Guiteau: Psychiatry and Law in the Gilded Age, No Other Gods: On Science and American Social Thought, The Care of Strangers: The Rise of America’s Hospital System, Explaining Epidemics and Our Present Complaint: American Medicine, Then and Now.
He received the William H. Welch Medal of the American Association for the History of Medicine (AAHM) and the George Sarton Medal (for lifetime achievement) from the History of Science Society. He has served as president of the AAHM, of the Society for the Social History of Medicine (UK), on the executive board of the Organization of American Historians and on the council of the History of Science Society and of the AAHM. He has been awarded fellowships by the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, the Guggenheim Foundation, and the Rockefeller Foundation.
