issued a memorandum of
instructions to be followed by collectors of drugs and urged them to
give detailed and accurate information regarding acquired specimens so
that they might be "more than mere museum curiosities." In addition, in
1883, he prepared a brief manual of classification of the _materia
medica_ collection in the Museum as well as a useful, detailed catalog
of informational labels of the individual objects on exhibition. The
unpublished catalog is still the property of the Smithsonian Institution
Archives, Division of Medical Sciences' Library.

It was Dr. Flint's ambition to obtain a comprehensive, worldwide
collection of all substances used as remedies. Then, in order to
identify drugs from foreign countries, he tried to collect illustrated
works on medical botany and printed pharmacopoeias of all nations having
them. He rightly defined an official pharmacopoeia as "a book containing
directions for the identification and preparation of medicines prepared
and issued with the sanction of a government or organized and
authorized medical and pharmaceutical societies. Its purpose is to
establish uniformity in the nomenclature of remedies and in the
character and potency of the pharmaceutical preparations. It is enacted
by legislation, and thus becomes binding on all who prepare drugs or
sell them for medication." By soliciting the help of various American
consuls and Navy officers abroad, about 16 such official pharmacopoeias
were collected, making an almost complete international representation
of all available, official, drug standards. With these sources of
information, Dr. Flint compiled and arranged an international list of
_materia medica_ specimens, indicating the authorized preparations of
each. By so doing, the first curator of this Section took the initiative
at least in proposing and, to some extent acting, on the preparation of
an international pharmacopoeia of drugs used in existing authorized
formularies giving "official synonyms, and tables showing the
constituents and comparative strength of all preparations."[6] This
undertaking is of special importance in the history of American
pharmacy, since it was probably the first attempt of its kind in the
United States.[7] In addition, colored plates and photographs of
medicinal plants were collected, forming the nucleus of the Division's
current collection of pictorial and photographic material related to the
history of the health field.

Dr. Flin