The 17th annual Medical History Conference will be held Friday, April 28, at Montana State University’s Museum of the Rockies.

The free public event, “Montana from Open Range to Fenced Pastures: Bleed, Blister, and Purge Becomes Scientific Method,” will offer a variety of talks. It runs from 2 to 6 p.m., with a reception to follow. The conference is free, but those planning to attend are asked to RSVP to the WWAMI office by Tuesday, April 25. RSVP emails may be sent to wwami@montana.edu.

The conference is sponsored by the Volney Steele Endowment at the MSU Alumni Foundation and the WWAMI Medical Education Program at MSU.

The schedule is:

2 p.m. – Introduction and welcome by Martin Teintze, director of the MSU WWAMI Medical Education Program.

2:10 p.m. – “Regulating the Variety of Healers in Early Montana: The Establishment of a Board of Medical Examiners” by Todd Savitt, Ph.D.

3 p.m. – “The Diffusion of Medical Science in Montana: Howard Taylor Ricketts and Caroline McGill,” by Pierce Mullen, Ph.D.

3:50-4 p.m. – Break.

4 p.m. – “Montana’s African-Americans and Their Contribution to Community Health and Medicine,” by Ellen Baumler, Ph.D.

4:50 p.m. – “'We Had to Start Treating Them as Human Beings’: Dr. Philip Pallister, Clinical Genetics, and the Montana State Training School, 1940s-1970s,” by Linda Sargent Wood, Ph.D., and with special guest Dr. Philip Pallister.

6 p.m. – End of program and reception.

For more information, visit http://www.montana.edu/ wwami/mhc/2017mhc.html.