Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
One of the wonderful things about having enjoyed a long career in ophthalmology has been the opportunity of meeting several great men along the way.
According to Longfellow’s poem, this reminds us of the sublimity of great enterprises. And that’s inspiring. But it’s also exciting just to be in their presence. I’ve been extremely fortunate to have met such men. We don’t have the space to describe their greatness here, but most have links online that I’ve included.
They say that gratitude is not only philosophically appropriate but good for us psychologically. I am certainly grateful for having interacted with these great men, who were all generous with their time, their thoughts, and help.
So, I will take advantage of this forum to show my gratitude for these encounters. I’m listing the 10 greatest men I’ve gotten to know, chronologically, with just a couple of words as to who they were. To limit the list, and not incur undue embarrassment, I won’t include the wonderful giants/colleagues who are still living today.
- Elvio H. Sadun, MD, PhD. Great father; great scientist; great man. Obviously, he was my father. And he was director of the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research in Washington, D.C. But h.is contributions to humanity were extensive, including working as an U.S. Army intelligence officer who took the incredible risk of going behind enemy lines in WWII, to arrange the coordinated overnight surrender of 1,000 ships of the Italian Navy in Malta. Fathers are inspirational anyway. But as I came to see many important individuals treating my father with amazing respect and appreciation, I realized two things: 1) Amazing things are possible; 2) He set the bar too high for me to compete, so I just had to be my own man.
- Hans-Lukas Teuber, PhD. Chairman of psychology/cognitive neuroscience at MIT. I was just an obscure undergraduate who somehow got his own little lab to do research in this department. I was shocked to discover that Teuber had been carefully observing me, and my life changed when he arranged for me to be accepted as a PhD student, without my ever having made application. Teuber continued to go to great lengths to support me after I left MIT. What motivates a topmost authority to notice and help someone several levels below him? How did he change my attitude? Don’t be surprised that someone is watching.
- Salvador Luria, PhD. Nobel Laureate and Chairman of Microbiology at MIT. I was a freshman student, hiding in a large audience of about 250 in an introductory lecture at MIT, because I was warned by my father that Luria had been a rival of my father for my mother’s affection about 1940. When he finished the lecture, Dr. Luria called out for me, by name, to stay behind. I might have been petrified, but he was nothing but warm, disarming and gracious. Better yet, years later and after his Nobel Prize, I ran into him at Woods Hole where he was literally on his knees learning a new technique from my graduate student friend. Luria was humbling himself on many levels because all he cared about were great ideas. What did I take away? Vanity is silly; big ideas matter.
- George Wald, PhD. Nobel laureate at Harvard. For a summer, George was my neighbor, and he often came over, sometimes with groupies tagging along, as we used to make crepe desserts together. He was glad that I was going to get an MD in addition to a PhD. He regretted that he hadn’t. Even a Nobel Prize couldn’t compensate, he said, for the simple pleasure of administering to a patient and feeling the human connection. He said that an MD’s work is always undone when the patient gets sick again or dies. But for a moment, at least, a human connection forms and as social animals, we feel that deeply. What did I learn? Glory is great, but helping people is better.
- Ephraim Friedman, MD. Ophthalmologist, Einstein dean and “czar” at Massachusetts Eye and Ear. Dr. Friedman called me in to the dean’s office while I was in medical school. I thought I was in trouble. But he had just read my thesis and wanted to make some suggestions on my career development. In one conversation, he completely upended my thoughts on strategies and arranged for me to take a six-week external rotation with Dr. David Cogan and thereby expose myself to neuro-ophthalmology, a subspecialty field I had never even heard of before Dr. Friedman explained that it was the ideal field for me to get into. The take-home lesson here was that sometimes we have guardian angels and that some of the most important opportunities of our lives come to us by serendipity.
- David Cogan, MD. Neuro-ophthalmologist and chair of ophthalmology at Harvard. Dr. Cogan went from being the chair of ophthalmology at Harvard to running a neuro-ophthalmology program at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda. He was a scholar and a gentleman in the best tradition of the concept. Quiet, but very deep in his thinking, he always paused to answer a question. His eyes glittered when he asked me a question knowing that I was about to see a mystery. He taught me three things: Neuro-ophthalmology is great, that neuro-ophthalmology was just the right field for me, and that being inquisitive is the best foundation for work and play.
- Richard Feynman, PhD. Nobel laureate at the California Institute of Technology. After I received my MD and my PhD, I did as Friedman suggested pursuing an internship in medicine while moonlighting as a post-doc at Caltech (neuroscience). This brought me into close contact with the legendary Nobel winning physicist, Feynman. He was bigger than life. Cocky, flamboyant, provocative and interested in the grand, he intimidated many. But he also distained titles, protocols and propriety. This endeared him to the post-docs who flocked to his side. He entertained us all. Feynman taught me that big ideas elevate us.
- Steve Ryan, MD. Ophthalmologist and founder of the Doheny Eye Institute. I met Steve while I was on the faculty at Harvard (MEE). In 1984, he recruited me from 3,000 miles away by challenging me with the idea that though my job at Harvard was great, I could change the shape of my institute more at Doheny/USC. Steve was building a world class institute from nothing and convinced me that his vision, the money he had raised, and the resources around were important, but the people he was bringing in mattered more. He taught me that bricks and mortar don’t make a great program. People and culture do.
- Linus Pauling, PhD. Twice a Nobel laureate. Pauling had already left Caltech when I was there, but he was then at Stanford. I ran into him at a symposium in San Francisco about 1988, and we were both speakers. We had fun as dinner companions at the faculty dinner and, instigated by Pauling, maybe too raucous. Then he proposed that we both take the next day off as we weren’t scheduled to lecture. He said that playing hooky was a delicious experience. I had hoped we would discuss his science, but instead Pauling talked about the big problems of the world. He was particularly concerned that we would blow ourselves up with nuclear weapons. Pauling, taught me that there was something good about strong convictions. That even though issues were sometimes very complex, you had to be bold with your stand.
- Fidel Castro. About 10 years after I arrived at Doheny, I was asked by two international agencies to lead a mission to investigate an epidemic of blindness in Cuba. I had already established a reputation for my research into diseases of the optic nerve, which this epidemic was. On my arrival I was greeted personally by Fidel Castro who met with me every night to go over my team’s findings. Castro had a command of people that wasn’t just based on power and intimidation (though that played a role too). By understanding the science, the work and people, he was an exceptional motivator. He did many bad things, for sure. But he was also very thoughtful. We also had conversations about such things as the Cuban Missile Crisis, and he had several regrets. I thought he was sincere when he related to me what he learned, “I was right about Cuban sovereignty but I was wrong to bring us to the brink of nuclear war. People are more important than ideology or creed.”
So, this is my list of men who unexpectedly gifted me along the way. How is it possible that I had the good fortune to meet so many amazing people? I think I’ve lived a “Forrest Gump” life. Part of that is one thread often connects you to another. But one of the points of the Longfellow quote above is that greatness teaches us that greatness is approachable, so we stand close and sometimes in the way. The long and short of it is that my professional life has been filled with the most remarkable people who guided me, entertained me, taught me and, perhaps most importantly, inspired me.
Each of these people are amazing. They all had elements that were larger than life. It was almost magical. They elevated those around them. They generated energy and excitement. They showed enthusiasm and joy that stems from understanding. And that joy becomes contagious. Many people wanted to be around them. People remembered them well. When they died, their institutions kept their legacy. They were cool.