Phila. animal group's archives finds home at Temple

The National Academies' Institute of Medicine issued a landmark report recently concluding that the use of chimpanzees for invasive medical research is "largely unnecessary."

Animal welfare groups, like the Humane Society of the United States, hailed the report as an important step toward passage of federal legislation ending the use of primates in research labs and placing the remaining 1,000 chimps - like 53-year-old Flo pictured above - living in six U.S. labs in sanctuaries where they can live out their lives in peace.

Those fighting to ban primates in research labs owe a debt to Caroline Earle White, a Philadelphia Quaker, who in 1883 founded the first group to advocate against animal experimentation.

Now the rich archives of the American Anti-Vivisection Society (AAVS) has found a new home at Temple University.

The collection, now part of Temple's Urban Archives, contains materials dating back more than a century, including its original charter, early photographs, hand written letters, board meeting minutes, correspondence, press clippings, audio visual materials, as well as its periodical which has been in circulation since 1892.

AAVS said it donated the materials to Temple to help increase accessibility to the information, while ensuring the ongoing preservation of materials.

The AAVS, based in Jenkintown, still works to end the use of animals in lab research, it educates children and the general public on animal welfare issues and awards grants to researchers using non-animal methods.