2115 Francis Scott Key
University of Maryland
College Park, MD 20742
phone: 301-984-2527
fax: 301-314-9399
Email: jparascandola@verizon.net

            John Parascandola received his B.S. degree in chemistry from Brooklyn College.  He then earned an M.S. degree in biochemistry and a Ph.D. (1968) in the history of science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  After spending a postdoctoral year at Harvard University, Dr. Parascandola returned to Madison to join the Wisconsin faculty in history of science and history of pharmacy.  From 1974-1981 he also served as Director of the American Institute of the History of Pharmacy.  In 1983, he entered on a career of over 20 years of Federal service, first as  Chief of the History of Medicine Division of the National Library of Medicine, and then in 1992 as Public Health Service Historian, a position from which he retired in 2004.  He is currently working as a historical consultant and teaches a course in the history of modern biology (at the Shady Grove campus) for the Department of History of the University of Maryland College Park.
            Dr. Parascandola’s research interests have focused largely on the history of modern biomedical science, the history of drug therapy, and the history of public health in America.  He is the author of The Development of American Pharmacology: John J. Abel and the Shaping of a Discipline (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992), which received the George Urdang Medal of the American Institute of the History of Pharmacy in 1994.  He also has a book in press on Sex, Sin and Science: A History of Syphilis in America (Praeger Publishing, 2008).  His honors include the Sidney M. Edelstein Award for Outstanding Achievement in the History of Chemistry (2002), the Surgeon General’s Medallion (2004), and a Citation of Merit from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (2005).

Return to Faculty Listing

Current Projects: