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Building 29A

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Building 29A, NIH Division of Biologics Standards Laboratory Annex, is nationally significant for its association with the history of medicine and public health because within the laboratories of Building 29A, the NIH and then FDA staff helped to conquer some of the deadliest infectious diseases. In their regulatory role they had the national responsibility to license vaccines, antitoxins, blood products, and other biologics to ensure their safety and effectiveness. To support this role, they did scientific research which resulted in the development of important standards and even new vaccines.

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Building 29

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Within two years of finishing construction of Building 29, NIH began planning Building 29A as a laboratory annex. NIH's director at the time, Dr. James Shannon, described the quickening pace of vaccine development when he sought to justify to Congress his request for funds for planning Building 29A so soon after Building 29 had been completed. As previously mentioned, the DBS at the time had just established standards governing the production and testing of oral polio vaccines developed by Albert Sabin, the development of measles vaccines was well underway, and a vaccine for infectious hepatitis was thought to be on the horizon. Justifying the request, Shannon stated that, “Although laboratory testing space, including quarters for experimental animals, appeared adequate with the move in 1961 to the new Biologics Standards Building, requirements for new programs in 1962, particularly live polio virus vaccine and measles vaccine have increased considerably” (House Committee on Appropriations, Hearings on H.R. 1916, 87th Congress, 2nd Session, 936). NIH quantified the growth in a prepared statement, stating that, “In the past five or six years the importance of biologics control and its role in the future development of preventive and therapeutic medicines has continually grown until in 1962 the program is approximately three and one-half times larger than when the Congress authorized the construction of the first Biologics Standards Building in 1956” (Senate Committee on Appropriations, Hearings on S. 1514, 87th Congress, 2nd Session, 1962, 474).

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Site Plan of Building 29A showing Air Intake Towers in Parking Lot Median

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NIH Office of Research Facilities 1964

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