The history of influenza has been examined from different perspectives. Much attention has been given to the works of the Rockefeller Foundation and the Medical Research Council, and to the relationship between these two institutions. The objective of this research is to adopt a transnational approach to investigate Rockefeller Archive Center sources in a manner complementary to the uncatalogued material of the National Institute for Medical Research, held at the Wellcome Library, and recreate the scientific framework in which influenza research developed between the 1930s and the 1940s. The research will be extended to the WHO’s World Influenza Center, based inside the British facilities, and sources of Alexander Langmuir and Donald Henderson, held at the Johns Hopkins University Chesney Archives, who were key players in surveillance of communicable diseases. These series will be used to analyze to what extent that original framework influenced influenza surveillance during the first three decades after World War II.