We are undertaking this conference as part of regional and national efforts to note the two-hundredth anniversary of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Local enthusiasts insist that the expedition actually started in Philadelphia, since President Jefferson dispatched Meriwether Lewis here to provision the team and, equally importantly, to spend time with regional scientists and doctors. Philadelphia is thus the site of a number of commemorative events, including:

• an exhibit on health aspects of the expedition that opened in the College of Physician’s exhibition gallery in February 2003 and will remain on display through 2006,
• the annual meeting of the national Lewis and Clark Heritage Trail Foundation in August 2003, and
• the official Lewis & Clark National Touring Exhibition, which will open at the Academy of Natural Sciences on November 6, 2004.

Prof. Barbara Oberg of Princeton University (Editor of The Papers of Thomas Jefferson), will give the keynote address: “In the Service of Science: Thomas Jefferson in the Nation's Capital”; Prof. Charles Rosenberg of Harvard University will present concluding remarks on health and medicine in the United States in 1804. The event will begin with the keynote talk and a subscription dinner on Thursday evening, November 4, 2004; continue with a total of eight sessions on Friday and Saturday, November 5 and 6; and conclude with a reception on Saturday evening. The McNeil Center will organize the Friday afternoon session as part of its regular seminar series. Parallel to the McNeil Center Seminar we will present a popular session on health care without doctors on the expedition and in Philadelphia.

This conference will be of interest to historians, physicians and the general public and will result in a volume of collected papers that will be published by the American Philosophical Society.