Thanks to a generous donation by University of Leeds Professor Catherine Noakes, the Center for the History of Medicine recently added a Wells Air Centrifuge to its museum collection. Harvard School of Public Health Professor William Firth Wells (1886-1963) developed his eponymous centrifuge to collect bacteria from indoor air. Following up on a 1912 study in Massachusetts by H.W Clark and Stephen Gage, Wells and brothers Richard L. and Edward C. Riley took centrifuges like this one into Lowell, Lawrence, Fall River, and New Bedford textile mills to sample the bacterial content of the humidified air circulating throughout the factories. These studies lead Wells to become one of the leading proponents of airborne bacterial infection and air sanitation. Wells’ theories of airborne spread of disease failed to gain scientific traction throughout most of the 20th and early 21st century until they were revisited during the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic. More information on the story of William Firth Wells and his scientific collaborator and wife Mildred Weeks Wells can be found in Carl Zimmer’s 2025 book Air-Borne: The Hidden History of the Life We Breathe.