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No man is an island
volume 84
Number
November
American
9
I, 1962
JOUMIof Obstetrics and Gynecology
Transactions
of the Eighty-fifth
Meeting of the I Annual American Gynecological
Society
“No man is an island” Presidential
address
ROBERT
A.
Chicago,
TWENTY-EIGHT
KIMBROUGH,
M.D.
Illinois
years
ago,
the seventh was a beloved and, at times, an irascible Fellow of our group. The first of these was John Goodrich Clark, a member of the Society of Friends, who was born in Indiana in 1867. After 2 years in the preparatory school of Earlham College he was admitted to Ohio Wesleyan University; on completion of his sophomore year he joined a party which surveyed an Indian Reservation in Northern Idaho and, later, a group occupied in laying out the right-of-way of the Utah and Northern Railroad. After these engineering ventures he entered the School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania and was graduated with honors in the Class of 1891. Dr. Clark served internships in the St. Agnes’ and in the Children’s Hospitals in Philadelphia, and in the surgical wards of the Bellevue Hospital in New York. During his medical school days he had become an admirer of Sir William Osler and, while still at Bellevue, he obtained a greatly de-
at its Six-
tieth Annual Meeting, the American Gynecological Society gave me the privilege of presenting a “trial flight” paper. At the following session I had the honor of being alected to Fellowship, an honor which has been exceeded only by your expression of confidence in electing me President of this, our old and revered Society. Please be sure that my appreciation is without measure. The title of my talk is a well-known quotation from John Donne, “No man is an island.” Two thousand years ago Seneca wisely wrote “he who receives a benefit with gratitude repays the first installment on his debt.” Today I propose to pay tribute to those with whom I had my training; six have been Presidents of this Society, and Presented at the Eighty-fifth Annual Meeting of the American Gynecological Society, Hot Springs, Viqinia, May 31-June 2, 1962.
1121
1122
Kimbrough
sired appointment from Osler as a junior resident in internal medicine at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Later in life, he liked to tell medical students: who would ask his advice on planning their careers, of how he had become a gynecologist purely by accident. Through a misunderstanding, Dr. Clark arrived in Baltimore 6 months before there was a vacancy for him, and Osler advised him to spend the intervening time with Howard Kelly because Osler admitted that he had found himself weak in pelvic diagnosis. In spite of not having liked gynecology during his student days, even cutting a number of classes in that subject, his admiration for Oslcr was so great that he agreed to go with Dr. Kelly for a brief period of training. By the time the vacancy occurred on Osler’s service John Clark had become so inseparably attached to gynecology that he was placed in the embarrassing position of having to decline the appointment in medicine. After 5 years with Howard Kelly, he entcred the anatomical laboratory of the University of Leipzig under Professors His and Spalteholx, to continue his investigations of the life history of the corpus luteum. Upon completion of this work he went to the University of Prague where he studied under Professor Chiari. On returning to Baltimore in 1899 he was made an Associate in Gynecology at Johns Hopkins and, later in the same year, he was appointed Professor of Gynecology in the University of Pennsylvania. In 1922. Dr. Clark became the first occupant of the William Goode11 Chair of Gynecology, a position he held until his resignation a short time before his death in 1927. Dr. Clark was an active member of many of the leading medical organizations of this country and was an honorary member of the Edinburgh Obstetrical Society. The esteem in which he was held is shown by the many positions of honor bestowed upon him, the chief of which was the presidency in 1918 of the American Gynecological Society. While still a resident at Johns Hopkins, he performed radical abdominal operations for the treatment of carcinoma of the uterine
cervix, and his first paper on this subject appeared in the Bulletin of thr Johns Hopkins Hospital in 1896, two years before Wertheim published his description of the same procedure. In fact, all of Dr. Clark’s contributions to medical literature reflect originality, a wide range of vision? and a conservatism which was so characteristic of the man. His studies on the corpus luteum received international recognition, and he became one of the leading authorities on radiation therapy as applied to gynecologic problems. Dr. Clark carried these qualities into his role of teacher, where he so combined the faculty of transmitting knowledge with a personal charm that he commanded the devotion and respect of both colleagues and students. Although hc scaled the heights of professional recognition he retained his innate warmth of personality. For those of us who had the privilege of being taught by him and working under his guidance, the memory and beneficial influence of John Goodrich Clark still live. Among those trained by John Clark was Floyd Elwood Keene, who became a close associate both in University affiliations and private practice. Floyd Keene was born in Kewanne, Illinois, in 1881. His early, as well as his premedical education, was acquired in the public schools of Peoria, where the family had moved in 1886. After graduation from the Medical School of the University of Pennsylvania in 1904, he served as intern in the University Hospital before undertaking postgraduate study in Berlin and Vienna. While abroad he paid special attention to cystoscopy and diseases of the urinary tract in women; as a result, upon his return to Philadelphia he became an instructor in gynecology, even though his original training had been in general surgery. He progressed steadily in academic rank until, on the retirement of John Clark in 192i’> he was made the William Goode11 Professor of Gynecology, a position he filled until his untimely death in 1938. During World War I. Dr. Krcnc joined
Volume 84 Number 9
the Base Hospital sponsored by the University of Pennsylvania and saw active service in the Argonne and Verdun sections. While stationed in Chatel-Guyon, he met Martha Bussiere; they were married there in 1919, and returned to Philadelphia the same year. FIoyd Keene’s administration of the ofice of secretary of this society from 1926 to 1930 was marked by fairness, sound judgment, and executive ability; his personal contact with the members left them with such high regard for his professional attainments that he was elected President in 1932, one of the youngest men ever to be honored with this office. As a gynecologist, he was an expert diagnostician, a wise counselor, and a skiIIfu1 surgeon. Indeed, his operations had a finesse and a completeness about them that left little or nothing to be desired. He was, without exception, the most dextrous and meticulous surgeon I have ever known. As a chief he was a veritable martinet, feeling it his duty not to tolerate anything slipshod in the work of his assistants. He was cognizant of the feelings and opinions of others, but had positive convictions of his own which he could present forcefully without leaving a sting. His ability to carry a point without offense in the face of stubborn opposition was outstanding. Floyd Keene’s contributions to the literature of gynecology were not numerous but they were noteworthy. When he wrote he had something of importance to present and this he did in excellent style. Because of his wise insight into medical problems, his writings remain of continuing value. In 1876, the year of the founding of the American Gynecological Society, Charles Camblos Norris was born into an old and illustrious Philadelphia family. He attended Episcopal Academy and the University of Pennsylvania, where he obtained his degree in medicine in 1898. He then served three consecutive one-year terms as a house officer in the Pennsylvania Hospital, the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, and the Johns Hopkins Hospital. In 1901, he returned to Philadelphia to become associated
No
man
is an
island
1123
with John Goodrich Clark as an assistant in gynecology. Shortly following this move, Charles Norris organized a departmental laboratory of pathology, which he directed thereafter over a span of nearly 40 years, and, until the advent of Emil Novak, he was the most frequently consulted gynecologic pathologist in this country. Numerous articles and three books attest to his special interest in gynecologic cancer, tuberculosis, and Neisserian infection. In 1927, Dr. Norris became the first member of the university’s faculty to hold a joint professorship of obstetrics and gynecology and directed the combined department until his retirement in 1941. He was President of this society in 1930. In his professional relationships, Dr. Norris was a self-effacing, good-humored, and generous colleague. He was particularly interested in befriending his younger associates, to whom he gave freely of his time and counsel. In order that his successor would be unhampered after his retirement, it was characteristic that he thereafter divorced himself from professional activities. He continued, however, until his death at the age of 85 to be an avid reader and was well aware of the work and publications of each member of this society. His criticisms remained sound and pertinent but were never bitter. It was his hope, after retirement, to indulge his life-long hobbies of fishing and small-game hunting. When the restrictions of World War II curtailed these activities for a time, he wrote a book entitled Eastern Upland Shooting. To his gratification, the book proved so popular in this country and Great Britain that several printings were required. Dr. Norris had the greatest facility in the usage of written English of any medical ma.n I have known. I shall be forever grateful for what he tried to teach me about the regimentation of words to convey intended thought. Edmund Brown Piper was born in WilIiamsport, Pennsylvania, in 1881. He received his preliminary education in the
1124
Kimbrough
Cheltenham Military Academy, and was graduated from Princeton University in 1902. For the next 5 years he was in business with the Williamsport Water Company and, as a sideline, was a chicken farmer. Deciding to adopt a profession, Edmund Piper entered the Medical School of the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 19 11. Following internship in the University Hospital, he served as Chief Resident Physician for 2 years, and entered the practice of medicine in 1914, with special attention to obstetrics and gynecology; in the same year he received an appointment as Associate in Obstetrics in the School of Medicine. In 1915 he went to France for a year with the University of Pennsylvania Unit of the Ambulance Service. After his return he devoted himself entirely to our specialty: his medical career was interrupted a second time when, in 1917, after the entrance of the United States into the War, he went back to France in command of a Camp Hospital. In May, 1919, he was cited by General Pershing for “exceptional, meritorious, and conspicuous services.” Ned Piper enjoyed telling of the day when he persuaded a line officer to allow him to drill a battalion of soldiers in a rear rest area. After the troops had carried out a number of maneuvers under his orders, the battalion was hopelessly hind part before and practically upside down. Whereupon Edmund Piper stomped off the parade ground shouting, “anyway, I’m the best damned obstetrician in Philadelphia.” At the conclusion of the war he resumed his specialty practice with the energy and ability that secured for him, in an amazingly short time, unusual recognition and opportunity. He became a co-chief of service in the Obstetrical Department of the Pennsylvania Hospital, Obstetrician to the University Hospital, and Professor of Obstetrics in the Schools of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania. In 1922 Edmund Piper published the results of experiments in animals proving the possibility of sterilizing the bloodstream with Mercurochrome in cases of septicemia. After
establishing the proper dosage, the method was successfully applied in human beings. He became a Fellow of this Society in 1924. His inventive genius was evidenced by his axis traction forceps, an outlet forceps, and a modified leg holder which were distinct improvements on older models; his original aftercoming head forceps is generally admitted to be among the most important contributions to the armamentarium of the obstetrician in recent times. In his practical work, he had manual dexterity, good judgment, and imperturbability when confronted with serious emergencies. This brief sketch of Edmund Piper, physician and teacher, does him scant justice without a tribute to the man’s character; his good humor, wit, exuberant vitality, and joy of living made him a delightful companion. Because of a severe degree of aortic stenosis, Ned Piper, from his twelfth year, might have led the life of an invalid. Ignoring the ever-present possibility of sudden death, he ordered his life as he determined it should be: a strenuous existence. full of varied activities. In one of his exploits, he drove his car at furious speed across the continent and back in 7 days, seeming to flaunt defiance at fate for inflicting on him the one defect in an otherwise perfect physique. As were John Clark and Floyd Keene, he was literally addicted to golfj taking great pride in his low handicap, and in winning the wager practically always. He was the soul of loyalty to his friends; his convictions were strong and he was easily angered by what seemed to him unjust or wrong, but he never harbored rancor. He said what he thought without reserve, sometimes unconsciously giving offense by his frank opinions. During the 10 years I spent as his assistant, 6 months rarely passed without my being fired or my resigning. Never did more than 24 hours elapse before I was reinstated or tore up my resignation. During his later years there were distressing attacks of cardiac decompensation, but there was no loss of patience, cquanimity, or courage. He died suddenly ,Jan. 14,
Volume Number
84 9
1935, while apparently improved in health. Norris Wistar Vaux was born in suburban Philadelphia in 1881, within a few months of the birth of Floyd Keene and Edmund Piper. After attending the Delancey School he entered the School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in the class of 1905. He rowed on the varsity crew and, in his senior year, was elected to the Sphinx Senior Society, as one of the 25 outstanding members of his class. During internship in the Pennsylvania Hospital he became so interested in obstetrics that, on completion of his internship, he went to the Rotunda in Dublin for, several months of graduate study. On returning to Philadelphia, Dr. Vaux engaged in general practice with special emphasis on obstetrics for several years before his work, too, was interrupted by World War I. His military career had begun in 1901 when he became a member of the First City Troop of Philadelphia, an organization which he served as honorary surgeon from 1911 until his death. He joined the affiliated unit of the Pennsylvania Hospital in 1917 and served in France with distinction. After 23smonths in the Army he returned to Philadelphia in 1919, confining his work to obstetrics and gynecology. In 1923 he and Edmund Piper became co-chiefs in the Philadelphia Lying-In Charity for the Delivery of Indigent Women in their own Homes and in 1925 he was appointed to the teaching staff in obstetrics in the Jefferson Medical College. He became Professor of Obstetrics at Jefferson in 1936, a position he held until 1947, when he became Professor Emeritus. Norris Vaux was a patrician not only in character but eminently so in appearance; indeed, he was among the most handsome men ever to grace this Society. One night, while vacationing in Cape May, New Jersey, he found it necessary to drive a patient in labor to Philadelphia. The young lady was heard to say many times thereafter, “I
No
man
is an
island
1125
would have a baby every year if only Norris Vaux would drive me from the shore to the hospital.” After serving for 11 years as Director of Obstetrics and Gynecology in the Philadelphia Lying-In Division of the Pennsylvania Hospital, Dr. Vaux retired from active practice in 1947. He then served as Secretary of Health of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania until his resignation was forced by illness in 1951. In this capacity he had the opportunity not only to advance the general projects of his department but also to continue on a more expansive scale his long-time interest in maternal welfare. He was elected to the American Gynecological Society in 1924 and served as President in 1947. Unfortunately, illness prevented his presiding at the meeting during his presidential year. After a series of attacks of coronary thrombosis he died in 1958 at the age of 77. Edward A. Schumann, President in 1945 and 1946, until a few days ago, fully expected to be at this meeting. We miss him. Philip F. Williams, President in 1955, is present here today. For fear of embarrassing him I shall not extol virtues so well known to all of you. On this occasion suffice it to say that serving for years on the same faculty with these two esteemed colleagues has been a source of inspiration. And, now, having paid a meager installment on my indebtedness to the current Fellows of this Society and to my mentors, I cannot refrain from giving you a quotation from Oliver Wendell Holmes which, I like to think, expresses the motivation of us all: “To our great good fortune, in our youth our hearts were touched with fire. It was given us to learn at the outset that life was a profound and passionate thing. . . . While we were permitted to scorn nothing but indifference . . . we have learned that the one and only success which is ours to command is to bring to our work a mighty heart.”
Number
November
American
9
I, 1962
JOUMIof Obstetrics and Gynecology
Transactions
of the Eighty-fifth
Meeting of the I Annual American Gynecological
Society
“No man is an island” Presidential
address
ROBERT
A.
Chicago,
TWENTY-EIGHT
KIMBROUGH,
M.D.
Illinois
years
ago,
the seventh was a beloved and, at times, an irascible Fellow of our group. The first of these was John Goodrich Clark, a member of the Society of Friends, who was born in Indiana in 1867. After 2 years in the preparatory school of Earlham College he was admitted to Ohio Wesleyan University; on completion of his sophomore year he joined a party which surveyed an Indian Reservation in Northern Idaho and, later, a group occupied in laying out the right-of-way of the Utah and Northern Railroad. After these engineering ventures he entered the School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania and was graduated with honors in the Class of 1891. Dr. Clark served internships in the St. Agnes’ and in the Children’s Hospitals in Philadelphia, and in the surgical wards of the Bellevue Hospital in New York. During his medical school days he had become an admirer of Sir William Osler and, while still at Bellevue, he obtained a greatly de-
at its Six-
tieth Annual Meeting, the American Gynecological Society gave me the privilege of presenting a “trial flight” paper. At the following session I had the honor of being alected to Fellowship, an honor which has been exceeded only by your expression of confidence in electing me President of this, our old and revered Society. Please be sure that my appreciation is without measure. The title of my talk is a well-known quotation from John Donne, “No man is an island.” Two thousand years ago Seneca wisely wrote “he who receives a benefit with gratitude repays the first installment on his debt.” Today I propose to pay tribute to those with whom I had my training; six have been Presidents of this Society, and Presented at the Eighty-fifth Annual Meeting of the American Gynecological Society, Hot Springs, Viqinia, May 31-June 2, 1962.
1121
1122
Kimbrough
sired appointment from Osler as a junior resident in internal medicine at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Later in life, he liked to tell medical students: who would ask his advice on planning their careers, of how he had become a gynecologist purely by accident. Through a misunderstanding, Dr. Clark arrived in Baltimore 6 months before there was a vacancy for him, and Osler advised him to spend the intervening time with Howard Kelly because Osler admitted that he had found himself weak in pelvic diagnosis. In spite of not having liked gynecology during his student days, even cutting a number of classes in that subject, his admiration for Oslcr was so great that he agreed to go with Dr. Kelly for a brief period of training. By the time the vacancy occurred on Osler’s service John Clark had become so inseparably attached to gynecology that he was placed in the embarrassing position of having to decline the appointment in medicine. After 5 years with Howard Kelly, he entcred the anatomical laboratory of the University of Leipzig under Professors His and Spalteholx, to continue his investigations of the life history of the corpus luteum. Upon completion of this work he went to the University of Prague where he studied under Professor Chiari. On returning to Baltimore in 1899 he was made an Associate in Gynecology at Johns Hopkins and, later in the same year, he was appointed Professor of Gynecology in the University of Pennsylvania. In 1922. Dr. Clark became the first occupant of the William Goode11 Chair of Gynecology, a position he held until his resignation a short time before his death in 1927. Dr. Clark was an active member of many of the leading medical organizations of this country and was an honorary member of the Edinburgh Obstetrical Society. The esteem in which he was held is shown by the many positions of honor bestowed upon him, the chief of which was the presidency in 1918 of the American Gynecological Society. While still a resident at Johns Hopkins, he performed radical abdominal operations for the treatment of carcinoma of the uterine
cervix, and his first paper on this subject appeared in the Bulletin of thr Johns Hopkins Hospital in 1896, two years before Wertheim published his description of the same procedure. In fact, all of Dr. Clark’s contributions to medical literature reflect originality, a wide range of vision? and a conservatism which was so characteristic of the man. His studies on the corpus luteum received international recognition, and he became one of the leading authorities on radiation therapy as applied to gynecologic problems. Dr. Clark carried these qualities into his role of teacher, where he so combined the faculty of transmitting knowledge with a personal charm that he commanded the devotion and respect of both colleagues and students. Although hc scaled the heights of professional recognition he retained his innate warmth of personality. For those of us who had the privilege of being taught by him and working under his guidance, the memory and beneficial influence of John Goodrich Clark still live. Among those trained by John Clark was Floyd Elwood Keene, who became a close associate both in University affiliations and private practice. Floyd Keene was born in Kewanne, Illinois, in 1881. His early, as well as his premedical education, was acquired in the public schools of Peoria, where the family had moved in 1886. After graduation from the Medical School of the University of Pennsylvania in 1904, he served as intern in the University Hospital before undertaking postgraduate study in Berlin and Vienna. While abroad he paid special attention to cystoscopy and diseases of the urinary tract in women; as a result, upon his return to Philadelphia he became an instructor in gynecology, even though his original training had been in general surgery. He progressed steadily in academic rank until, on the retirement of John Clark in 192i’> he was made the William Goode11 Professor of Gynecology, a position he filled until his untimely death in 1938. During World War I. Dr. Krcnc joined
Volume 84 Number 9
the Base Hospital sponsored by the University of Pennsylvania and saw active service in the Argonne and Verdun sections. While stationed in Chatel-Guyon, he met Martha Bussiere; they were married there in 1919, and returned to Philadelphia the same year. FIoyd Keene’s administration of the ofice of secretary of this society from 1926 to 1930 was marked by fairness, sound judgment, and executive ability; his personal contact with the members left them with such high regard for his professional attainments that he was elected President in 1932, one of the youngest men ever to be honored with this office. As a gynecologist, he was an expert diagnostician, a wise counselor, and a skiIIfu1 surgeon. Indeed, his operations had a finesse and a completeness about them that left little or nothing to be desired. He was, without exception, the most dextrous and meticulous surgeon I have ever known. As a chief he was a veritable martinet, feeling it his duty not to tolerate anything slipshod in the work of his assistants. He was cognizant of the feelings and opinions of others, but had positive convictions of his own which he could present forcefully without leaving a sting. His ability to carry a point without offense in the face of stubborn opposition was outstanding. Floyd Keene’s contributions to the literature of gynecology were not numerous but they were noteworthy. When he wrote he had something of importance to present and this he did in excellent style. Because of his wise insight into medical problems, his writings remain of continuing value. In 1876, the year of the founding of the American Gynecological Society, Charles Camblos Norris was born into an old and illustrious Philadelphia family. He attended Episcopal Academy and the University of Pennsylvania, where he obtained his degree in medicine in 1898. He then served three consecutive one-year terms as a house officer in the Pennsylvania Hospital, the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, and the Johns Hopkins Hospital. In 1901, he returned to Philadelphia to become associated
No
man
is an
island
1123
with John Goodrich Clark as an assistant in gynecology. Shortly following this move, Charles Norris organized a departmental laboratory of pathology, which he directed thereafter over a span of nearly 40 years, and, until the advent of Emil Novak, he was the most frequently consulted gynecologic pathologist in this country. Numerous articles and three books attest to his special interest in gynecologic cancer, tuberculosis, and Neisserian infection. In 1927, Dr. Norris became the first member of the university’s faculty to hold a joint professorship of obstetrics and gynecology and directed the combined department until his retirement in 1941. He was President of this society in 1930. In his professional relationships, Dr. Norris was a self-effacing, good-humored, and generous colleague. He was particularly interested in befriending his younger associates, to whom he gave freely of his time and counsel. In order that his successor would be unhampered after his retirement, it was characteristic that he thereafter divorced himself from professional activities. He continued, however, until his death at the age of 85 to be an avid reader and was well aware of the work and publications of each member of this society. His criticisms remained sound and pertinent but were never bitter. It was his hope, after retirement, to indulge his life-long hobbies of fishing and small-game hunting. When the restrictions of World War II curtailed these activities for a time, he wrote a book entitled Eastern Upland Shooting. To his gratification, the book proved so popular in this country and Great Britain that several printings were required. Dr. Norris had the greatest facility in the usage of written English of any medical ma.n I have known. I shall be forever grateful for what he tried to teach me about the regimentation of words to convey intended thought. Edmund Brown Piper was born in WilIiamsport, Pennsylvania, in 1881. He received his preliminary education in the
1124
Kimbrough
Cheltenham Military Academy, and was graduated from Princeton University in 1902. For the next 5 years he was in business with the Williamsport Water Company and, as a sideline, was a chicken farmer. Deciding to adopt a profession, Edmund Piper entered the Medical School of the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 19 11. Following internship in the University Hospital, he served as Chief Resident Physician for 2 years, and entered the practice of medicine in 1914, with special attention to obstetrics and gynecology; in the same year he received an appointment as Associate in Obstetrics in the School of Medicine. In 1915 he went to France for a year with the University of Pennsylvania Unit of the Ambulance Service. After his return he devoted himself entirely to our specialty: his medical career was interrupted a second time when, in 1917, after the entrance of the United States into the War, he went back to France in command of a Camp Hospital. In May, 1919, he was cited by General Pershing for “exceptional, meritorious, and conspicuous services.” Ned Piper enjoyed telling of the day when he persuaded a line officer to allow him to drill a battalion of soldiers in a rear rest area. After the troops had carried out a number of maneuvers under his orders, the battalion was hopelessly hind part before and practically upside down. Whereupon Edmund Piper stomped off the parade ground shouting, “anyway, I’m the best damned obstetrician in Philadelphia.” At the conclusion of the war he resumed his specialty practice with the energy and ability that secured for him, in an amazingly short time, unusual recognition and opportunity. He became a co-chief of service in the Obstetrical Department of the Pennsylvania Hospital, Obstetrician to the University Hospital, and Professor of Obstetrics in the Schools of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania. In 1922 Edmund Piper published the results of experiments in animals proving the possibility of sterilizing the bloodstream with Mercurochrome in cases of septicemia. After
establishing the proper dosage, the method was successfully applied in human beings. He became a Fellow of this Society in 1924. His inventive genius was evidenced by his axis traction forceps, an outlet forceps, and a modified leg holder which were distinct improvements on older models; his original aftercoming head forceps is generally admitted to be among the most important contributions to the armamentarium of the obstetrician in recent times. In his practical work, he had manual dexterity, good judgment, and imperturbability when confronted with serious emergencies. This brief sketch of Edmund Piper, physician and teacher, does him scant justice without a tribute to the man’s character; his good humor, wit, exuberant vitality, and joy of living made him a delightful companion. Because of a severe degree of aortic stenosis, Ned Piper, from his twelfth year, might have led the life of an invalid. Ignoring the ever-present possibility of sudden death, he ordered his life as he determined it should be: a strenuous existence. full of varied activities. In one of his exploits, he drove his car at furious speed across the continent and back in 7 days, seeming to flaunt defiance at fate for inflicting on him the one defect in an otherwise perfect physique. As were John Clark and Floyd Keene, he was literally addicted to golfj taking great pride in his low handicap, and in winning the wager practically always. He was the soul of loyalty to his friends; his convictions were strong and he was easily angered by what seemed to him unjust or wrong, but he never harbored rancor. He said what he thought without reserve, sometimes unconsciously giving offense by his frank opinions. During the 10 years I spent as his assistant, 6 months rarely passed without my being fired or my resigning. Never did more than 24 hours elapse before I was reinstated or tore up my resignation. During his later years there were distressing attacks of cardiac decompensation, but there was no loss of patience, cquanimity, or courage. He died suddenly ,Jan. 14,
Volume Number
84 9
1935, while apparently improved in health. Norris Wistar Vaux was born in suburban Philadelphia in 1881, within a few months of the birth of Floyd Keene and Edmund Piper. After attending the Delancey School he entered the School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in the class of 1905. He rowed on the varsity crew and, in his senior year, was elected to the Sphinx Senior Society, as one of the 25 outstanding members of his class. During internship in the Pennsylvania Hospital he became so interested in obstetrics that, on completion of his internship, he went to the Rotunda in Dublin for, several months of graduate study. On returning to Philadelphia, Dr. Vaux engaged in general practice with special emphasis on obstetrics for several years before his work, too, was interrupted by World War I. His military career had begun in 1901 when he became a member of the First City Troop of Philadelphia, an organization which he served as honorary surgeon from 1911 until his death. He joined the affiliated unit of the Pennsylvania Hospital in 1917 and served in France with distinction. After 23smonths in the Army he returned to Philadelphia in 1919, confining his work to obstetrics and gynecology. In 1923 he and Edmund Piper became co-chiefs in the Philadelphia Lying-In Charity for the Delivery of Indigent Women in their own Homes and in 1925 he was appointed to the teaching staff in obstetrics in the Jefferson Medical College. He became Professor of Obstetrics at Jefferson in 1936, a position he held until 1947, when he became Professor Emeritus. Norris Vaux was a patrician not only in character but eminently so in appearance; indeed, he was among the most handsome men ever to grace this Society. One night, while vacationing in Cape May, New Jersey, he found it necessary to drive a patient in labor to Philadelphia. The young lady was heard to say many times thereafter, “I
No
man
is an
island
1125
would have a baby every year if only Norris Vaux would drive me from the shore to the hospital.” After serving for 11 years as Director of Obstetrics and Gynecology in the Philadelphia Lying-In Division of the Pennsylvania Hospital, Dr. Vaux retired from active practice in 1947. He then served as Secretary of Health of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania until his resignation was forced by illness in 1951. In this capacity he had the opportunity not only to advance the general projects of his department but also to continue on a more expansive scale his long-time interest in maternal welfare. He was elected to the American Gynecological Society in 1924 and served as President in 1947. Unfortunately, illness prevented his presiding at the meeting during his presidential year. After a series of attacks of coronary thrombosis he died in 1958 at the age of 77. Edward A. Schumann, President in 1945 and 1946, until a few days ago, fully expected to be at this meeting. We miss him. Philip F. Williams, President in 1955, is present here today. For fear of embarrassing him I shall not extol virtues so well known to all of you. On this occasion suffice it to say that serving for years on the same faculty with these two esteemed colleagues has been a source of inspiration. And, now, having paid a meager installment on my indebtedness to the current Fellows of this Society and to my mentors, I cannot refrain from giving you a quotation from Oliver Wendell Holmes which, I like to think, expresses the motivation of us all: “To our great good fortune, in our youth our hearts were touched with fire. It was given us to learn at the outset that life was a profound and passionate thing. . . . While we were permitted to scorn nothing but indifference . . . we have learned that the one and only success which is ours to command is to bring to our work a mighty heart.”