Bert Myers and Joel Grossman Myers

Bert Myers collection of art photographs

Dr. Bert Myers, a retired academic physician and full-time artist living in New Orleans, has authored two publications which are held in our Louisiana Collection: Inner Beauty of Nature, X-ray Photography; and Festival of Fins, a Public Art Display in New Orleans, Louisiana, 208 Fish Photographs. In the Manuscripts Department, there is also an archival collection (Manuscripts Collection 906) of 315 of his photographic prints, 1,792 slides and 35 glass holograms created and donated by Dr. Myers. He is best known for his work with x-ray and high contrast images of elegant natural and manmade subjects, in both color and black & white. Dean Benjamin Sachs of Tulane University School of Medicine asked Dr. Myers to donate images for the new building on S. Robertson St., several of which have been installed-- two of them measure 4 x 6 feet. For more information about Dr. Myers’ publications and photographic techniques, and to see many of these uniquely creative images, see his web site, and visit Special Collections in Jones Hall.

Grossman-Myers family papers

Dr. Myers’ wife, Joel Grossman Myers, is a New Orleans native who served as a past president of the League of Women Voters in New Orleans, and has worked on political campaigns, economic research and civic causes. She received her master’s degree from Tulane in 1971. In 1990, she donated to Special Collections the large (11 linear feet) Grossman-Myers family papers (Manuscripts Collection 909), covering the lives of her own immediate family as well as original historical documents dating back to 1897. The collection consists of correspondence, photographs, certificates, genealogical tables, legal documents, clippings, ledgers, essays, poems, scripts and other writings. Of special interest are World War II papers of her father, Louis Eugene Grossman (1898-1962) with a condolence letter signed by President John F. Kennedy; papers relating to her grandfather, Emile Kahn; great-grandfather, Simon Abraham, and many other family members. Dr. Bert Myers and Joel Grossman Myers have been married since 1954.


See the Howard-Tilton Memorial Library online catalog and the WorldCat database for information about these and other manuscripts collections held by Tulane University.

Captions: “giant tun, tonna galea” and “leaf of rice paper plant, tetrapanax papyriferus”, x-rays by Bert Myers. Do not reproduce.

Posted by Susanna Powers