Elion-Hitchings Building Virtual Exhibition

Project Components

• Background research on Modernist architecture

• Image and film research

• Writing all web content and coordination with web developer

• Copyediting and proofreading

When United Therapeutics (UT) chose to create an online memorial to the Elion-Hitchings Building in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, UT engaged IMW to develop content for this virtual exhibition.

Under IMW’s direction, the site is organized as a dynamic timeline that reveals the history of the building, with additional stories related to its architect, Paul Rudolph, and its most famous tenants, Gertrude Elion and Dr. George Hitchings. IMW collaborated with Mainland Creative to bring this site to life for the Modernist community, architecture students, and all those interested in the life-saving scientific discoveries made in this historic building.

Research Triangle Park, established in North Carolina in 1959, is the second such research campus in the United States. It occupies nearly 7,000 acres in the Raleigh-Durham area, and is anchored by three research universities: North Carolina State, Duke, and UNC-Chapel Hill.

Records from 1966 show that there were enough tenants in Research Triangle Park to support 700 employees with an annual payroll of $7 million. Average annual family income for RTP employees climbed substantially to $15,000 per year, compared to less than $5,000 for the state as a whole.

Research Triangle Park has grown to become the nation’s largest research park, home to more than 300 corporations that employ 65,000 people.

1982

AZT: A Breakthrough in the Treatment of AIDS

AZT, also known as zidovudine, is classified as a nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor. First developed in the 1960s to treat cancer, scientists shelved it when they found the drug ineffective as a chemotherapy. In the 1980s, however, Gertrude Elion and George Hitchings re-examined AZT’s use to treat a new virus known as AIDS. In March 1987, the FDA approved the use of AZT to treat the AIDS virus after only one study because the rapidly spreading virus needed immediate attention.

While a breakthrough in modern medicine, some activists were frustrated with the cost and availability of the medicine. On April 21, 1989 four ACT UP members barricaded themselves inside an office in the Elion-Hitchings Building, demanding a cut in price for the drug.