Saranac Lake Laboratory Museum - Part 1

My sister was visiting and we only had two days together, so we wanted to make them productive. The forecast for day two of her visit was for heavy rain, so we drove down to Saranac Lake to see the Laboratory Museum, site of the famous "fresh air cure" for tuberculosis and much research into the disease:

The building houses the original lab, its furniture and lab equipment. What was not original was reproduced as accurately as possible:

Scientific instruments of the day:

My sister peered into Dr. Trudeau's personal office:

Gary Trudeau, creator of the comic "Doonesbury," is Dr. Trudeau's grandson. Many famous people, including Robert Louis Stevenson, came here for the cure:

The Institute operated from the late 1800s through the early 1900s, sometimes treating 400 patients at once and embracing 50-100 local homes with porches where the patients could spend their days getting fresh air:

I didn't catch on at first, but my sister pointed out the window to the next house. It was exactly what the photo on the sign showed, and the porch where Dr. Trudeau took his own fresh air cure:

This photo, the sign said, was taken in 1897, three years after the lab opened. Clearly it was later colorized and looked exactly as the room looks today. See the next picture for more information:

This refers to the above photo and how the place was designed. The walls were all white glazed bricks:

We got to look into a microscope at tuberculosis bacteria. At the end of our tour, we saw plush tuberculosis germs were for sale as toys or souvenirs:

The Trudeau Sanatorium, the first successful one in the U.S., came to include 50 buildings around the town of Saranac Lake, NY:

Tuberculosis was once common in this country and it took much research to find a real cure. I'll post Part 2 of our museum tour tomorrow: