Temple University School of Medicine - Skull Yearbook (Philadelphia, PA)

Page 28 text:

JOHN A. KOI MER. M l). BRCTERIOLOGV, immunoLOGV, MID PflRflSITOLOGV It was on the third of January, 1944 that Dr. John A. Kolmer dramatically introduced us to ihe subject bacteriology. With his right hand waving vigorously through the ether, his left hand tucked behind him and his head bobbing in emphasis, he informed the assemblage that bacteria arc just a bunch of old bugs, and gentlemen, to be respected but not feared. Our class appreciated the sound teaching principles demonstrated by the revered Father John, and the keen interest which he took in our problems. Dr. Amadeo Bondi, Jr. and Dr. Earle H. Spaulding added a plethora of technical details to an already fast growing collection of lecture notes and kept us constantly busy in the laboratory making smears and cultures and looking at queer creatures under the microscope. Most of us never became quite as proficient as our instructors in recognizing the wee beasties, but we were at least able to recognize Koch's bacillus or the spirochete on dark field, especially if the slide happened to be already labeled. Dr. Bondi's lecture on Brucellosis and its relationship to male potency factor tickled our communal funny bone, but Dr. Spaulding’s exhibition of the rabbit innoculated with Clostridium welchi completely pulverized our sense of olfaction. Bacteriology was appropriately terminated by a test of our ability to identify unknown specimens. Many a vest button popped when a stu-

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Dr. Young presented the gastrointestinal tract to ns in all its glory and gave us many wise words on its function and the importance of fluoroscopy in locating its lesions. Dr. Blady discoursed upon the larynx and neck and the salivary glands to us in an interesting lecture on the use pi X-ray in the diagnosis of disease in these regions. Dr. Bird, who spent most of his time with us behind a red eye shield, demonstrated many fractures and dislocations to us in our sections in orthopedics. Dr. Roesler held our interest with his demonstrations of the heart and mediastinum, the ahorta, the veeuah enhva, the ezophagoose and the ahorlic stenoze.es. He also dropped pearls of philosophic wisdom anticipatory of his subsequent lectures in cardiology. The junior members of the department. Dr. Robbins and Dr. Fisher, were always ready to help us in studying films in the hospital, and their patience and willingness to explain made it a pleasure to go into the viewing room in quest of information. The climax was capped in the senior X-ray conferences, when the residents picked the cases with a view of stumping the chief, and the rest of us tried to outguess Dr. Weiss and Dr. Soloff. These exercises served to crystallize the results of the roentgenologic teaching to which we had been subjected since our earliest days in the study of medic ine.

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■dent was notified that all his deductions had been correct. Our course in Clinical Immunology was introduced by Dr. Kolmer with the words, '‘Gentlemen, I wish to teach you that the following is the truth, and it is the truth which I would have you prattice. The lectures in this course treated of the use ol all the important methods and agents used in the diagnosis, prevention and therapy of infectious diseases. Dr. kolmer’s pack of cards was the master of our destinies during those days, and the poor unfortunates who occupied the front row shook in their boots before the professor’s withering lire. Parasitology took us on a Cook’s tour of many strange and wondrous lands. We went to India to study Leishmania donovani, to China to pursue the Shistosoma japonicum, to the South Pacific in search of the plasmodium. Despite stool examinations, the study of Parasitology proved most fascinating, especially so. since we had the benefit of Dr. Gault’s vast experience and knowledge. He not only stimulated our interest in the course, but his inimitable sense of humor spurred us to new heights of parasitologic effort. This was the substance of mu studies of the living agents of disease and out enjoyment of the study of these subjects is a tribute to the splendid men in this department. 25