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

Page 27 text:

Robert D. Campo, Ph.D. Each biochemistry laboratory was followed by a conference.” usually directed by Dr. Hamilton, at which mainly arithmetic was emphasized. Although there were several useful sessions—including some early attempts to teach us acid-base chemistry—more typical (except more entertaining) was the afternoon Lennie Lipid hooked his Bunsen burner to the air outlet and tried to light it: as with most of our biochemistry lab days nothing much happened. The morning lectures were also mainly uneventful, but there were some exceptions. Dr. Gerald Litwack presented a rigorous and well-organized series on enzyme kinetics, during which we saw real calculus on the 316 blackboard for the first and only time. The problem was that after one week. Dr. Litwack had left at least two-thirds of the class hopelessly behind him. Though it may with much justification be asserted that the story of lipid synthesis is not one of great inherent drama. Dr. Pieringer proved a clear and able lecturer on this topic. Additionally, a variety of other biochemistry department members provided plentiful lectures and laboratory conferences, most neither strikingly good nor awful. Robert C. Baldridge, Ph. D. Raymond E. Knauff, Ph.D.

Page 26 text:

 Gerald Litwack, Ph.D. Ronald A. Pioringer. Ph.D. Leonard Norcia. Ph.D.

Page 28 text:

What a deep docility we displayed in those days-actually showing up in Room 316 for endless early-morning lectures, hour-after-hour, six days a week! Even the room itself seemed to suggest that we stay home. Though a handsomely constructed hall, 316 possessed hard, brutal chairs with wobbly, dangling writing-arms. Early in the semester, the frigid room well reflected the unwelcome Philadelphia winter outside, except that it was usually colder and at least no snow got in. And if we brought along a cup of coffee-first to warm the hands, then hopefully to keep the head awake—stern signs assured us that this was verboten. The P.A. system never worked right as long as we knew it: for one stretch of several months it accurately and uninterruptedly hummed at 120 hert2. Next it developed the talent of turning itself off at random times, effectively though arbitrarily censoring all comers. And of course, like shoddy P.A. systems everywhere, it knew how to feedback, and apparently enjoyed doing it. Poor old 316 almost died one weekend our sophomore year, when a steampipe ruptured, scorching and soaking the place, as well as sterilizing and bleaching Russell Conwell and the other hosts of forgotten worthies whose portraits occupied the walls. It was finally dismantled late in 1969, the new building having by then been fully “phased in. Sharing the whimsical 316 microphone and the intricate lab schedule with biochemistry was another large army of lecturers, the Physiology Department, a group mainly accomplished in cardiovascular research. The chief—Dr. Morton J. Oppenheimer—is noted for his research efforts with famous Temple luminaries Ernest Spiegel and Temple Fay, for his clarity in teaching, and supposedly for a hyperactive temper. Legend says that attacks of the latter have in the dim past propelled uncooperative dogs and intimidated medical students out the fourth-floor windows, but these may be only apocryphal flights of fancy-at least we never saw examples of these mythical outbursts. In fact, we didn't see much of “Oppie at all, which was too bad, because his few lectures and laboratory demonstrations revealed a learned physiologist with a facile teaching style. That neuromuscular demonstration with the storage oscilloscope and sidekick Tom was extremely well-done lit actually tours, as a kind of travelling road-show, to other area medical schools and colleges). Who did we see a lot of? Dr. Guido Ascanio murdered volume conduction theory, then proceeded to lecture rather vaguely on the CNS, relying (as most of the class did), on the material in Selkurt's paperback. Dr. Jan Levitt, actually a bright and pleasant woman outside the lecture hall, proved uncomfortable and tedious in front of Morton J. Oppenheimer, M. D. Chairman of the Department of Physiology i