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

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ogy museum for slide projection. It was warm and dark. We tried to see what the prof was pointing out on the slide, and. after awhile, watched the patterns that cigarette smoke, floating languidly upward in the beam of light, made on the screen; then, imperceptibly, our heads fell to our shoulders. We spent the first few weeks in complete confusion. We were confounded by strange cells and patterns that appeared under the microscope. I he pace of the course was so fast we were sure we'd never he able to keep up, let alone catch up. Each lecture, in itself, provided a small hook to learn. Then there was Boyd to furnish details and the green gross manual that, by adding more material, munaged to correlate it more, too. It began to appear that pathology must be learned in systems— which seemed to be the only way to remember all the possibilities. The staff helped us study at night. They gave us a quiz every Saturday morning, sometimes written, sometimes gross, sometimes micro. Concerning quizzes, there was always something of a rivalry between the staff and the class. A kind of out-guessing contest. It required very little imagination on our part to picture them, huddled in a Machcthian group, picking out questions or specimens for us. It was easy to imagine their saying. “No. they know all about that, let’s ask them something else!” Two days a week we had oral “discussion groups, intimate little affairs with one of the profs. The Chief, it seemed, would never take “1 don’t know” for an answer. If he were getting no results, he’d ask leading questions until he finally got an answer. Occasionally he had to admit defeat though, and ask the next man in the alphabet. We took our quizzes with I)r. Aegerter in his office, perched on stools or relaxed, more or less, in stiff green chairs. If The Chief lost patience with us. he only rarely showed it. He’d smile pleasantly the whole time we were being stupid, never showing anger or disappointment. W e left those sessions knowing more pathology and feeling that, somehow. The Chief always was pushed for time. Dr. Gault's quiz hours were fascinating for the fiendish questions he asked, and for the equally fascinating answers he got. e could always tell, by the expression on his face, that the next one was going to he a fooler. He’d have an inward grin that seemed to make his black hair blacker, that made us remember the way a cat toys with a mouse. He’d sit there, contentedly, puffing on a cigar, listening to the answer. Then, just when you thought. “By golly. I've got him this time!” Dr. Gault would repeat the same question ami say. “Now, suppose you answer that one.” But we liked Snuffy ; we liked the way he sucked little black tablets to soothe his voice; we liked the way he laughed with us when he could have laughed at us. The youngster on the senior staff. Dr. Pietro-iuongo, remained slightly more uloof from us than the others. His contact with us was strictly professional. Not that he wasn’t friendly—he was, hut in a restrained, yankee way. There was Left: Stunton, Siekerl. Stewart . . . llu sulfur granule is pathognomonic. Center: Dr. Augustus R. IVule. Ill . . . In tipped u off. liighi: Dr. Earnest E. Aegerter. Professor of Patholog) . . . Saturday night movies are out! 23

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improvement: we went from cracked-pot resonance to Dupuy Iren’s contracture. But something new was added as we discovered Episcopal and Jewish Hospitals. Each Wednesday afternoon found eager groups of sophomores converging on real live patients. White coats sprouted conspicuous stethoscopes, flash lights, and other medical paraphernalia. Diagnostic points were shown in amazing profusion, with the constant admonition that. “Once you see. hear, and or feel this, you'll never forget it. Dr. Giambalvo presented a rather frightening introduction to surgery, with his piquant expressions—“buttermilk pus. and “wait till it turns black, then whack it off. We learned minor surgery our junior year. Dr. Quindlen started us on the rough road to the delivery room, namely, obstetrics. His lectures were sure to be full of laughs—jokes, tales, personalized mannikin demonstrations using a vest for a uterus. Tall, soft-spoken, red-headed Dr. Thomas Durant began our series on medicine. His gentlemanly mien inspired a universal respect for him as a person, and his well-organized lectures established a respect for him as a teacher. Suddenly, there was a blurred impression of exam on exam, and, almost before we knew it, we were on the third and last lap of our sophomore year. We ran headlong into pathology one morning in late winter when Dr. Aegerter appeared before us to talk about the changes in tissues incurred by physical disease. He rushed vigorously through the hour, missing not a detail. Then, while we tried to rub life and health back into our cramped and exhausted hands, he suggested that we hurry right up to microscopic lab. There we were presented with a terrifying list of four hundred twenty-nine slides, and a schedule that gave us something different to do each hour. We began to feel that maybe Dr. Aegerter had been right when he'd said. “You won't be able to go to the movies on Saturday nights while you're taking pathology. Maybe he hadn’t meant that as a joke, after all. Our first autopsy was one of the events of the year. Goalless, we raced across the street to the morgue in the basement of the Brown Building. It is a gloomy place—one bright light over the table holding the body; a bunsen burner and a galvanized tub overflowing with water, a rubber sponge half sinking in it; grey-white sheets shuddering over the door to the outside: dark shadows in the corner by the ice box that holds four shrouded humans. We wondered what manner of men could do this sort of thing; but, as the autopsy began, a tone of scientific investigation was set so that soon we were aware only of a consuminglv-deep interest in the case before us. Before the hour was over, two men dressed in black appeared from behind the sheets to announce that we were holding them up; we were behind schedule, as usual. Who were they to interrupt so rudely? The next hour we rushed back to the pathol- Left: Dr. Eleanor Steele . . . the hack row moved. Center: Dr. George E. Mark, Jr. ... a long hour. Right: Dr. Gioacchino P. Giambalvo . . . waits until it turns hlack. 22

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Bottom, left: Fraatz, Schilling. Forman. Effingcr prepare for a gross palliolog quiz. Bottom, center: Dr. Aegerter ... pushed for time. Bottom, right: Dr. Anthony L. Pietro!u-ongo . . . slightly aloof. Bight, center: Miscrcndino and Middle-ton consult with Dr- Pent-Bight. of an something a little disturbing, during those quizzes, in .he way he’d look out the door, signal or wave to someone in the corridor, and still know exactly where our answers had been wrong. . Pathology pushed gustily into spring. While the temptation to L e out in the sun grew daily, so did the number of slides and museum specimens. Dr. Peale seemed to sense our desire to go riding on the Wissahickon or to pitch ball on Ontario Street; and somehow, without mentioning it, he compensated us for it. But then. Dr. Peale could always help us with a difficult problem or keep us from feeling that all this work was futile. Subtly he proved to us that pathology, as Dr. Aegerter had promised, is the bridge between the pre-clinical and the clinical years. Me made us see that pathology is necessary to the practice of medicine. He helped us enjoy learning it. Spring rains and finals settled on us in Philadelphia. The last slides had been learned, the last museum specimens memorized, and the la t words written for the sophomore year. There were only two years to go! 24