Looking Back on Nancy Martin’s Service at the Media Laboratory

The bureaucracy of Fort Detrick had transitioned from death to life. So said the Washington Post in October 1971, when President Richard M. Nixon converted the Army base’s old biowarfare laboratories into a center for life-saving cancer research. Many observers agreed it was an ambitious, hopeful vision. But what they didn’t know is that representatives from the Department of Defense and the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) had been working on the transition for months.

We’ve seen the return of many things, good and bad, as society has reopened and life has found the so-called new normal. One of those things this year is the flu—and it’s back with a vengeance. Thankfully, it isn’t too late to get vaccinated, and it’s easy for employees at NCI Frederick and Frederick National Laboratory to do so.

NCI’s new director, Monica Bertagnolli, M.D., will be holding her first town hall meeting Wednesday, Dec. 14, at 11:00 a.m. If you want to be there in person, please register by Wednesday, Dec. 7.

NCI has produced a new documentary-style video marking 10 years since it gave the Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research its current name.

At the height of the pandemic in March 2020, employees from across the National Cancer Institute at Frederick and the Frederick National Laboratory joined in the mass exodus from workplaces across the country, going to work from their homes in an effort to slow the spread of SARS-CoV-2. Many FNL employees had never worked remotely, however. They had to rely on the expertise—and patience—of the Enterprise Information Technology (EIT) Directorate to help them transition from working on-site to working from home.