Tape # 10

Dr. M.E. DeBakey
Houston, Texas
8/9~10/72

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with Don Schanche

I just want you to think about that.

Alright.

What I'd like to do--what we really started out to do
the other night and didn't do it--is go back to our bare-
bones narrative, that is our sketching out of the whole
thing I hope in two phases, You brought me up to your

initial contacts with Ben Taub and the resistance you had

from the Houston medical continuum, including the story

about the doctor who called you and told you another doctor
was coming after you with a gun.

Yeah,

I'd like you to carry on with that and describe your part

in building both the Baylor College of Medicine and the

Texas Medical Center.
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Yeah, well...

You were pretty well-grounded on it, now was your
end--what you had to do to get through it?

Well, to go back to my time of arrival here, you have

to in a sense, picture the setting, environment--the

sort of medical setting of Houston. We're talking now

about 1948-'49, because when I arrived here actually
arrived in '48, but you'll recall that at that point in time

I was still working for the Hoover Commission and I

really didn't complete that report until early December

of '48, so that while I moved here in September of '48,

I moved my family, Iwas away most of the time and
working in Washington. So that it was not until after Decem-
ber--end of December--after Christmas of '48. that I

really began to be permanently installed,

Well, now, the medical setting in Houston was really

fairly typical of many fairly large towns that had no

medical school, The hospitals were pretty much community

hospitals, except for the city-county hospital which was
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a charity hospital, Now, the hospitals were run by a
staff which was organized in the usual fashion --divided
into surgery, medicine, obstetrics and gynecology and

soon, Well, almost all the doctors were practicing

private medicine in all the hospitals except the city-

county hospital which was then the Jefferson Davis Hos-
pital. And a large portion of the doctors were general
practitioners really who did a certain amount of surgery.
And as a matter of fact, did a certain amount of obstetrics
and a certain amount of medicine. And what surgery they
got they'd get out of their practice unless the patient

had some more serious problem, like cancer of the lung
or cancer of the colon--maybe an ulcer of the stomach,
And then they would tend to call one of the more well-
trained experienced surgeons. Usually they would help
him on the case, Sothat, it was ina sense dominated by
the general practitioner, And many of the doctors at the
city- county hospital on the staffs there were truly general

practitioners, In fact, most of the men who were on the
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surgical staff there were general practitioners and

tended to work there in order, in a sense, to practice
surgery. To learn surgery. Well, when I first arrived
here, the medical school had no affiliated hospital,

You went through all of that.

Yeah. Well, I'm really trying to set the setting for you
again. Now, that meant I had ina sense to organize a
teaching program for the students without having a service.
I had no clinical service, I had been promised a clinical
service at the Hermann Hospital, but that didn't come
through. And I think I told you...

And I really was getting pretty discouraged about the
situation and it was only after two events took place, which
in a sense were based upon my own initiative. There
wasn't too many to help--worrying about it locally. Except
in a sense the help came through Mr. Ben Taub whenl...
But I took the initiative to go see him and present the
problem and the solution so to speak and the other was the

V.A. Hospital, Now, once that occurred then I had a
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kind of base of operations--a clinical service. So I
could organize and develop a teaching service and
develop a residency program, And then to seek some
full-time staff people who were well-trained. And I
brought one from New Orleans, Dr. Oscar Creech who
later became professor of surgery at Tulane.

How do you spell his name?

C-R-E-E-C-H. Oscar Creech. who was the chief resi-
dent ‘at Tulane, .°.»When he finished his residency the
year I left, he was the senior chief resident. And then
when he completed it, I invited him to come here. Well,
then I began to develop a nucleus of staff, And then we
developed a research laboratory and we got some funds from
the Army. At that time the Army was able to grant funds
and I had a close connection with the Army at that time
and then from the N.1.H.

What was the first research project?

The first research project we got was in peripheral

vascular disease, And then we used..we expanded that
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to include vascular surgery and then the development
of grafts, That's how I developed the laboratory to
actually make grafts in our own laboratory.

Well, all of these events began then to mesh. We had

a clinical service. We had patients to work on. To be

sure, many of them at that time were charity patients or
V.A. patients. But they gave us an opportunity to, in

a sense, begin some clinical investigation. And then I

began to have some referred surgery on my own from
doctors who knew me in New Orleans and who were referring
a case to me and occasionally a case locally. But most

of the doctors locally avoided referring patients to me

because this is a form of economic sanctions. You know~-that's

‘the way they do it. And it was only because of the fact

that I began to do some pioneering work in surgery that
nobody else was doing and I began to get referrals from
out of the state and out of the city. SoI could bypass them,
And even today, ninety-eight per cent of my patients are

from out of Houston, I've had the experience of having
 

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patients referred by doctors locally for conditions that

I'm predominantly known for to refer them even to the
Mayo Clinic and then have the Mayo Clinic doctor tell
them, "Why did you come here, The best man in this

field is Dr. DeBakey right in Houston." Puts the doctor

in an embarrassing situation,

Well, as we began to move forward in all of these phases,
the clinical service, the research, the teaching of students,
the training of residents--you see, I began to organize a
real academic service. And that's how it began. Now

I don't know what, in a sense, you have in mind to go over...
Well, we have two things here that are both--~have become -
quite large and famous. One is the medical school and

the other is the medical center.

Yeah,

The medical school--I know you went through a long period
and I presume a difficult period in getting your points made

there. Now you told me about your initial sort of show-down
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with the Trustees and then you quit and said that you
would not.. That was not too long after you got here.
Yeah. Well, see that occurred within,. I'll tell you when
that occurred. That occurred, let's see, I would say
about February or March--is when that occurred. And
Iwas asked to hold off. He wanted to find out more about
it. He was shocked. So he just couldn't believe all of
this because no one had told him anything like this before.
He thought everything was going fine.

There were other things too. I don't know whether I went
through with you. One was the Medical Center--you've

got to understand this organization--the way it was organized

origianally. There was a Medical Center Board organized.

This Medical Center Board of Trustees or Medical Center
Incorporated was organized as a non-profit corporation,
They owned all the land out here, You see all the land out
here, |

This concept existed before you got here?

Yeah, Yeah. I gave you some papers about that. Didn't

1? Some things that I wrote?
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Not detailing this account. And I didn't find them in

your bibliography notes. At least not in the papers I
duplicated,

Well, I can get you copies of that.

...to then chairman of the Board of Trustees.

In 1951,

Yeah. I'll have to get you a copy of that. There it is.
Tell you what, I'll just give you this thing to read. Would
you like that or...because I can get a copy for you but

I can't get a copy for you unless I take it out of here.

But I can do that tomorrow.

Okay.

Let me...i'l] tell you what I'll do, I'll give you this.

You see, the Medical Center Board, as I say, owned this
land. And their concept of the development of the Medical
Center was largely influenced by one of the doctors by
the name of Bertner who..

Burger?

Bertner, B-E-R-T-N-E-R, Who was a member of the
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DR, DeBAKEY: Board and who was a great stimulus to the organization
of the Medical Center. He was one of the driving forces.
He was a gynecologist here in town, And he had been..
he had trained at the Mayo Clinic and he was tremendously |
impressed with that concept. And his idea was to organize
a medical center with the University of Texas as a part
of the center. It would be in the medical school, To give
sort of prestige to it by having a medical school in the
Center, And to have a clinic. Now the clinic concept was..
There were two things behind his idea, One was that the
clinic could generate money like the Mayo Clinic. They
made a lot of money and they have a foundation, you know.
And the other was to get the University of Texas in here
s0 that you get state money to support the thing. Well,
after they organized the Medical Center Board and they
got this land through M.D. Anderson Foundation. M.D.
Anderson was a cotton broker who was a bachelor--had a
lot of money. And then to the surprise of everybody--

because he was as stingy as he could be apparently during
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his lifetime, left his whole fortune for medical, charitable
purposes, And he left it intrust, so they organized

this Medical Center to use this money. Bought the

land, And then they had the concept that they would give
the land to various types of institutions coming in the
Center, That's how Methodist Hospital came into the
Center, The old Methodist Hospital was an old broken
down building about two miles from here, The way
Baylor got into and incidentally you'll have to--there's

a book by Dr. Moursund on the history of that, I'll get
for you.

I'd like it, because I sure won't be able to find it in

New York.

No. I'll get it--1 have a copy of it,

The way Baylor came in was that on this Medical Center
Board was one of the Trustees of Baylor University. And
he was knowledgable about the troubles Baylor University
Medical School had in Dallas. They were having difficulties

largely financial and it was a pretty third rate school because
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it was organized on the old concept that the clinical

part of the medical school was run by the local doctors,
The school wasn't able to pay them very much, so they
had to practice and make money for themselves. But

this a very poor way to run a medical school, You had

no nucleus of full-time people primarily concerned with
the academic activities in the school. So, when they
found that they were unable to move the University of
Texas from Galveston because it would require a change
in the Constitution of the state.

That was put into the Constitution?

Yes, that's right. And besides they had invested so much
money in Galveston, they just couldn't pack up and leave
it. In the meantime, they had already encouraged the
University of Texas Board of Regents to put a cancer hos-
pital here, And they organized a post-graduate school of
medicim. Again you can see the handwriting on the Mayo
Clinic, It has always had a post-graduate school. So that

the idea... Well, I'm getting a little ahead of my: story.
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When the University of Texas was unable to put a medical
school here because Galveston couldn't move, that's
when Earl Hankamer who was on the Board of Trustees
of the Medical Center and also of Baylor University
said, "Well, we have a medical school that might move
here." You see, And this was not a very palatable thing
to a lot of the doctors here, because they were primarily
University of Texas people. And secondly the Harris
County. Medical Society didn't like the idea--never did
like the idea of having a medical school here. And they
had a big session about it. I don't know whether you can
get the minutes, but this all took place before I got here,
I'm sure I can't.

Well, it would make good reading. Because some of the
doctors told me about it later--who attended the meeting,
And they wanted to vote it down. Vote against having a
medical school come in here,

Why?

Oh, it would create trouble. They would have the town-

gown troubles that every city has that has a medical school.

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And they didn't want that here. You know, they had

things the way they liked it. Didn't want anybody upsetting
the apple cart and creating all kinds of problems. After

I got here, I found out about it and they were right. It

did create... you know. Well, they finally got it through
the Medical Center Board and Mr. Cullen gave them a
million dollars. The Chamber of Commerce gave them

a million dollars, And they moved down here during the
war in the old Sears-Roebuck warehouse. That's where
they set up shop until they built this Cullen Building.

Then they moved into that--the old part of the Baylor
College of Medicine. So, the Medical Center Board still
had the concept of a post-graduate school, When Baylor
came in, Baylor was going to be the undergraduate school,
And one of the first things I gathered when I got here was
this concept.

All of this whole medical center concept predated the war
by a year or so. Didn't it?

Yes, that's right. And that's one reason that I made the

statement that I made in here which you'll read, And
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pointed these things out. The M.D. Anderson cancer
hospital moved right in. WhenI got here, the building

was going up. They hadn't finished building, but it was
going up. And the only building that was completed was

the old Cullen Building and then the Methodist Hospital.

So we had that concept also to in a sense combat because
the..it was their concept that residency training would

be under their supervision, And, of course, I made it
very clear outset that that was out. Any resident of mine
was going to be under my supervision. In other words,

if there was a residency program it was going to be my
program. So you see, I had in a sense to combat a number
of factors which were restrictive to anything that I could do
in developing a good academic service. The attitude of

the local profession which was being threatened by a
residency system which required accreditation which meant
that the staff had to be accredited. And they didn't want

to be put into that position because they couldn't be accredited,
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They weren't trained. They weren't certified, They

had not received certification by the American Board

of Surgery. And the attitude of the University of Texas
M.D. Anderson Cancer Hospital and post-graduate school--
the post~ graduate,-all the post-graduate training was

their program--belonged to them. You see? And here
Iwas, you know, in a sense David with a sling.

Didn't you have any allies? There were other department
chairmen and professors in the school, weren't there?
They paid the same prices you did.

Yes, but you see surgery is a much more precise kind

of activity. The internist and the pediatrician and so on
have a. little different situation, For one thing, the pedia-
trician doesn't have to fight the local doctors because the
pediatricians have in a sense a kind of fence around them,
The doctors in town who were practicing pediatrics will
support pediatrics. They don't give a damn about the rest
of the disciplines. So you know, they have a world of their

own--it's a children's world. The internists sort of get
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along better too, because the patient on an inte..,among
the internists can be seen and handled and so on by

any number of doctors, And they take a much more

philosophical attitude about it. But the surgeon--there's

only one surgeon that can operate on a patient.

Well, the surgeon has to, by his very nature, be more
jealous of his patients,

Exactly. Exactly. So that the problems we faced or I
faced really were in a sense --they were., The objections
that..to my activities came from a number of different
sources. And, ina sense, everybody that was against
me had allies, but ] had none. I had to fight my own battles
ina sense, And even the school couldn't fight any battles
for me because they had no leverage. They had no power.
You see? They had no money. They had no influence.
They had no control of any service,

They were here at the sufferings of the Medical Society.
Exactly. Exactly.

But you did have the support of the President of the

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The dean of the school at that time. Well, yes, but
he was an old man. But awonderful, fine old decent
human being. But, none the less, he was trying to

hold the school together.

‘He had no political plow?

No, he had no political plow. He was well-respected
and a kindly man, but he was really trying to hold the
school together. He had students to consider and so on,
So he wasn't out trying to fight a battle for me.

And at this time Baylor was still tied to the Baptist
Church?

The Baptist Church. So, it also suffered from that.

In a sense, there was an anti- Baylor attitude on the
part of many of the people in town and especially the
Catholics because at that time the Baptists--every time
they'd have a convention, you know, they'd arouse the
ire of the Catholics and some of the other religions.

Because we had some of the old-time Baptists...
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Particularly Southern Baptists.

Oh, yes. You know, they were the hard shell. And
I remember one time, for example, when they had
their meeting here in Houston. We used to.. I remember
we used to really tremble in our boots when we found
out that they were going to have their convention here

in Houston, because we could see all the things that
were going to be done and we'd suffer. And there would

even be editorials in the paper. There was an editor

‘of the Chronicle who was a Catholic, a very strong

Catholic. And boy he'd give them hell. He'd write
it in the editorials, Really, then some times point jabs

at them that were funny. They were funny. They acted

funny.

They used to say that in Atlanta the Baptists would
come in for their convention each one with his Bible
and a ten dollar bill, and they wouldn't break either one
of them,

That's right. Well, the staff..the quality of the faculty

at that time was also something to be desired. You've —
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got to keep in mind, they had moved down here during
the war and..

They had undoubtedly lost staff to the war and probably
lost staff in the move too,

Yes. Well, you see when they moved during the war
what had happened was that what they moved were
primarily the basic science people. Because the clinicians
didn't come with them. You've got to keep in mind that
the clinical services were based in Dallas, These were
practicing doctors, They weren't going to move. So
none of those came, And of the basic science people that
came down, it was the second and third level of basic
science--not the professors. Because immediately after
that, they..the nucleus that was left up there organized
their own medical school, They were pretty upset about
it, And they organized their own private medical school.
What was it called?

It was called the Southwest Medical School,

Did it prosper?
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Well, no. It couldn't. prosper and it didn't. I mean

they suffered the same...

Problems Baylor had.

Yes, exactly. So, but they finally politically exerted
pressure to have the state take them over, And it became
a state school. It's still called Southwestern Medical
School of the University of Texas: But now a..completely
under the domination of the University of Texas. So

that our faculty was pretty second and third rate. They
had gotten a good man to come down to head up pediatrics
before I got here. They had a sort of a mediocre man
come down to head up medicine. And so there was a weak
department of medicine. The other..most of the other

specialties were practicing doctors, And before I arrived,

‘the man who headed the department of surgery was a

practicing doctor here in town. And the teaching, as you
might understand, was pretty mediocre. Most of the
teaching was done in lecture form and the students would

sit in a.,the lecture hall for five hours and one doctor
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would come in after another giving a lecture. Most

of which came out of a textbook. It was pretty third-

rate, Well, I of course changed all that as far as the
teaching was concerned. Began to hold conferences and
demonstrations and then when we got the service at the
V.A. and the Jeff Davis..

Was this only in your department? Surgery?

Yeah. Well, the others finally had to come along. We

set the stage. Students began to complain about the...
Pediatrics then and the pediatrician did that and set up

the services and he got a good many of the local pediatricians
to work with him. They were glad to work with him, And
then later they built the Children's Hospital, So that gave
them another resource, But there was a constant concern
about what I was doing, Both within the medical school
and with the local doctors, Now, as time went on and I
began to build my own service and, ina sense, the students
were attracted to this, And became more and more

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we began to develop our own residents and finally they
began to complete their residency and some of them
stayed here. So they began to support this program,
And more and more the influence was for the specialists
to take over in the hospitals and to be heads of the ser-
vices, You had to be certified. If you were going to be
on the neurosurgical service, you had to be certified.

if you were going to be on the OB-GYN you had to be
certified. If you were going to practice surgery in the
hospital, you've got to be certified, So the general prac-
titioner finally began to be eased out of control.

Was Houston medicine slower than other areas in the

- United States by this time?

No, I don't think so.

Specialty was still fairly rare until the mid fifties.
Yeah, Yeah. You've got to keep in mind that it really
mushroomed after the war. After World War II. No,
I don't think Houston was any different from any other

town where there was not a medical-school. Because
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you've got to keep in mind, what a medical school does
for a community is that it puts into that community
better trained individuals. Secondly, it sets standards,
You see, for the community. And so the average medi-
cal care in our community is higher-~much higher than
you find in other.. communities which don't have a medi-
cal school. And that's why they resist it. That's why
they're threatened by it.

Well, how were you able to continue to exert so much
influence over the entire school and in turn over the
Medical Center.’as the humble professor of surgery?
One department crying in the wilderness.

Well, I think. Yeah, well, as I say..we began to achieve
a certain degree of success in what we were doing. The..
particularly in the sur gery that I was: pioneering in. And
began... They had to recognize in a sense the fact that

I was being recognized elsewhere, No matter what they
said about me locally, my peers elsewhere were saying

the opposite. And when we won the.. When I won the
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highest award, the Senior Service Award, which is

the highest award the A.M.A. gives, the local doctors
who all are members of the A.M. A., you know, had

to recognize the fact that despite the fact that I'm not
popular by the Harris County Medical Society standards.
The very organization that they belong to and support
strongly gave me their highest award. Now what could
they say. You know, "He's a son of a bitch," is all,
behind my back. But in front of me, they had to respect
this, well, as I began to be recognized for the work I
was doing in vascular surgery--cardiovascular surgery,
this became a source of influence that they could not, in
a sense, resist. You see? And Iwas also, for example,
recognized as a speaker everywhere. I was recognized
by the National Institutes of Health for being on their
study section--on the Councils when nobody else was on.
I was the only one at Baylor that was being recognized

nationally.
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Did you quite deliberately make a decision to
publicize yourself and your work as a?
No. No.. If you.. No, no, You don't... I don't

think that you can publicize your work deliberately.

If you do, you do just the opposite. You will immediately

in a sense achieve a kind of hostility and resistance on
the part of your peers, Your peers have to first recog-
nize you for your work. That's what gives you recogni-
tion. Then following that, a certain amount of recogni-
tion comes, let's say, publicly. But it comes because
your peers have recognized you. You know, if you win
the Nobel Prize, it means your peers have recognized you.
Well, then you win public acclaim because of the recogni-
tion given to you by your peers, you see? When you win
the Lasker Award, it's because your peers have first
recognized you. Then it goes into Time magazine,

So the publicity then is a fortuatous result of achievement

rather than a...
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Yeah, when Time magazine, for example, selected

me to be on their cover, they had researched this.

And Iwas amazed how much they knew about me.

They do a lot of research.

They really did. They had done a tremendous...
Sometimes mess it up in the telling, but they do terrific
research work.

Well, that's... Yeah. But they had done a tremendous
amount of research, And I remember when, oh what was
the medical editor?

Gil Camp

Gil, When Gil came down here and I first met him, I
was really amazed by what. . by his knowledge of this
field. And he knew so much about what I had done and
what others had done in this field that it was very easy
talking with him. It ae like talking to your colleague.
And Iwas really amazed at that. Well, but this illustrates
what I'm talking about. I didn't petition Time to get on
their cover,

No, certainly not.
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You know. There's no way you...

You did get criticized soundly by a lot of people for
appearing on the Time cover and for appearing in other
magazines..

Oh, sure,

Letting Life photographers into your surgery...

That's right. Yes. Of course, you get criticized for
that, but also there are people who criticize you for
winning the Lasker Award. There are even people who
say, "Well," you know, "You had to have political pull
to get it.'' But when you also know how it's done and you
know the people you respect--at least the ones J respect--
and this is a point I've often made-- The most important
thing for your own self-esteem is to know that the people
that you respect respect you. I couldn't care less about
what people think that I have no respect for. It doesn't
bother me a damn bit. But it would bother the hell out of
me if the people I respect had developed a disrespect for

me, And in the final analysis that's what really counts,
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Step back now to as you're gradually acquiring respect

for your own work and a certain amount of power here,
People know you do things here, What affect is this

having on the Texas Medical Center and on its growth?
Well, it's having, of course, a great influence on its
growth. You take for example this hospital. They started
out with the idea of building about a 350 bed hospital and
they were worried about whether or not they could fill it.
You know, if they could keep the beds occupied. Well,

as a consequence of the general profession recognizing
the work that we did., were doing in cardiovascular surgery
and getting more and more patients being referred to us
from all over the country and all over the world, it became
increasingly apparent that they would have to expand the
hospital building, They couldn't take care of me and the
other people. SolIwas constantly fighting that here, All
the other doctors practicing in town were critizing me for
using up so many of the beds. Of course, at the same time
they would not give me credit for the fact that their own

practices were increasing because it was spilling over to
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them. Simply because they were associated with me,

they were doing patients referred to them by local doc-
tors around this community and around the state who

were trying to find some way to get their patients cared

for without having to ask me. You see? And so they

were benefiting by this. They constantly benefited by it.
And even after a while, patients are attracted to come

here by the work that I'm doing and get to see other doctors.
It's really extraordinary. So, they had to expand and
increase. «Because of the work I was doing, I was bringing
other people to work with us in the department of surgery,
but working with us. Because of the ability to compete for
the N.I.H. grants and get large sums of money in terms

of a million dollars or more a year for support, I was
developing a larger and larger staff. I had to find places
for them to work. We had to expand the laboratories.
Increase them. Now 1 was setting a standard that others
had to meet. And this standard was being used to compare
other people. The students saw it. Other people saw it,

And so they had to either measure up or get out. And this
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is ina sense the way it was being influenced,

Your function has been more as a pace-setter than

Aves

Yes, yes.

».organizer and..

Exactly. Exactly. Well, an organizer in the sense that

I expanded my own department. And, well about 19..well,
I'm trying to think sol can get these dates for you..but ,
around 1959, '58, '59, something like that --Dr, Moursund
retired, And we had to get anew Dean, And Earl Hankamer,
Judge Townes, and someone else called me downto the...

Judge ‘Townes! office. He was then the Chairman of the

Board, And he wanted to talk to me about the Deanship.

And they said, "Mike, you're the strongest man in the
school, You've done more for the school than anyone else,
We'd like to have you take over the Deanship." And I

told them that I didn't think that I should do this. That I
would strongly advise against my being selected as the

Dean. You know I'm really basically a surgeon, I want
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to still be a surgeon. And you need someone who is

going to be more interested in deaning. You can see
how..

That's an interesting verb in the academic world.

Yeah, And I said, "I'd be glad to help you select some-~-
body." Well, they.. Someone had told them about a

man by the name of Stanley Olson. And sol said, "Yes,

I know Stanley Olson, He's at the University of Illinois

and I think. .'' They wanted me to look into it, and so

they asked me if I would and they wanted to be sure to

get someone I would approve of. So, I did look into it.
Found out who he was and some more about him and so

we invited him down here. I had long sessions with him
and talked to him about all the challenges and problems and
difficulties we were having and so on, And he came down.
Well, we became very close friends and..

Before you go on, what were the challenges and problems
and difficulties at that time?

Well, the ones that I had mentioned a moment ago. We had

no service; we were being crowded by the, in a sense,
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to develop our own academic program by the fact that
we had no money. We had no service. We had the Uni-

versity of Texas post-graduate school to contend with and

the local doctors, And ina sense the school...

The same problems existed...

Yes, exactly. You see. Now, you see my independence

of these problems, in a sense, was my strength in being
able to weather them. And the independence came largely--
they still could have gotten rid of me and they would have
in '5l as a consequence of this memo you'll see, It created
a lot of criticism, particularly by the--certain men on

the Medical Center Board and the University of Texas
people. And I remember, you see, I had directed the
memorandum through the Dean and then it got out. So, it
was a confidential memo,

Someone leaked?

Yeah, deliberately. So when I found out it had leaked and

created so much of a problem, I went to see the Dean.
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I said, "Look, it's not that I care about these criticisms
because I'll be glad to argue about this with anyone. If
there's anything in there that is untrue or there's any
opinion expressed that anybody would want to challenge,

I'll be glad to challenge them. Accept the challenge." —

And then I went to see one of our Board of Trustee members
who had become a patient of mine after I had, you know,
he's the one I had told you about. I went to see him at

his home one Sunday morning and we had quite a nice

‘chat about it and he laughed about it. And he said, 'Well,

Mike," he said, "just disregard it. To hell with them.

If they don't like it, just let them not like it. You don't

have to worry about it." Isaid, "Well, I'm not worrying
about it, frankly. All I want to be sure is that you understand
that what I said there was for the benefit of our Board of
Trustees. And if you want to publish it, it's up to y'all.

You have my permission." Well, apparently it blew over

but, you know, there are still some people who don't like

it even today. Well, the..

 
 

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When Stanley came down, he really came, as he told

me later, because I asked him to come and said I'd
support him, And we did become very good friends,

And we worked together. And he initiated some very
important steps to develop better standards, For one
thing, he recognized that there were certain people in
the school we had to get rid of. They were mediocre.
Not measuring up. And one of these was the professor

of medicine. And he did get rid of him--finally eased
him out. And there were a few others. And he also
recognized that we had to get more money in some way
and we had to get people in the school who could get more
money from the federal government. Because he saw
what I was doing, I was bringing into the medical school
virtually ten percent--fifteen percent of his total budget.
As high as as much as twenty percent on occasions of his
total budget. Well, he thought, ''Well, hell, if DeBakey
can do this..'' And I used to say this to him -- "why in
the hell can't oe of these other fellows do something?"

.

Support the school, And he was aggressive about it and
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he pushed hard and he finally recognized the need to

have more research laboratories, And I kept pushing

him for this--getting money to build more laboratory
space. Built more space for myself and then for him, |

I got the money to build a whole floor, And then we
inititated the concept that we'd build a new building for

the basic science part. And then that's what constitutes
that ‘building. And they were thinking in terms of only

five floors or four floors--just to..

To match the top of the other building,

Yeah, match the top of the other building. And I said,

"It's lack of vision, as far as I'm concerned, I can fill
that space up very quickly. We need a lot more space than
that." Well, as it turned out, they finally got enough money
locally to get a matching grant from the federal government
for those floors.

This was the Jewish community in Houston that contributed
mo st..

Yeah, but I got the Jewish community too. I was the one

who did that through Mr. Ben Taub. Well, that only one
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part of it. We got one from the Jones called the Jones
Building. One from M.D. Anderson. So, I said to him,
"Wonder if...'' -~we were moving along on the plans--
you know, and I kept needling him about it. And I said,

" You know, I still think we ought to build nine floors,

at least. Double this number. Double the size of it,"
And he said, "Mike, we can't do it. We don't have the
money." I said, 'Well, if we go out and get more matching
money, I think we can get the other.'' He said, 'Well,
we've got a time schedule. They're on the fourth floor
now. They're going to be putting up the roof in another
two months," AndI said, "Well, Stan, if I guarantee

the cost...

You mean that building was actually planned as a four
story building’ and was simply... ?

Yes, that's right. That's right. And it came down really
to this. That the delay in the construction would have
cost about $250, 000 if we didn't get the money to build

the additional floors. And that's what had him concerned,
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Where was he going to get $250,000, if he was unable

to get the money to build those other floors. You see?

So I said to him, "Well, look, I will personally guarantee
the $250,000. And if you want, I'll sign a note for it.

But, let me see what I can do to get this money to get the ©
rest of it built.

That would have thrown you into debt, wouldn't it?
Yeah,.,well. Iwas taking a chance, yeah. But I thought..
I had great faith in being able to do it, so much so that

I was willing to take that chance. So, he said, "Alright

if you'll do that." And I said, “Alright, I will,"

So we then went to work and went to Washington and we
went to the local donors, We said, "Look, we can get
matching money to make this a nine story building, if you
will give us the additional funds." And we went to Wash-
ington and talked to the people at the N.I.H. in construction
facility and said, "Look if we can get these, we can justify
it. Here's the justification for the need for this additional
space." I said, "You get the matching money, and we think

we can.. think it will be approved." And we did. We got
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it approved. So I didn't.,it didn't cost me anything,

And that's how we got those additional stories. Doubled
the space.

Referring to what you were saying last night, Dr. Olson
was a professional dean. Right?

Yes, He was a professional dean in the sense that he

was a full-time dean, But he was...

But what I'm getting at is that your idea changed between
the time you were offered the deanship and the time you
finally accepted the place.

Yes, that’s true. I think the change.. I think my concept
of it has changed largely because of my experience. You
see? Secondly, I think that times have changed. In other
words, I don't think you can meet the responsibilities of
the future by being a professional dean, because most
professional deans, as I said a moment ago, think in terms
of five, ten, fifteeen years before. You see? You're

not on the firing line. You're not inthe action. And things

are moving too fast today without. .to be out of the action,
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You've got to be in the action to make wise judgements.
Now, I must say this for Stan Olson though, he was a
much different kind of a professional dean. Because, he

did participate in the clinical teaching. He was an internist

basically and he liked to be in internal medicine, And he

used to make rounds and teach students. So he was an
active participant in that sense. You see what I mean?

So he was not the typical professional dean.

He had not retired from medicine?

That's right. Exactly. Exactly, He was a fine person
and is a fine person. I'm very fond of him, And I think
he did a hell of a lot for this school,

Well was that the water shove for the school, as far as
you're concerned, when they got that building built? Or..?
Well, I think in many respects yes it was, because it

set the stage for the large laboratory research resources,
And as a consequence was able to put us in a position to
get better research people who were able to get more

money to do research, Develop staffs. There's no
 

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-4l-

question about that.

When was that building finished?

T think it was finished in '65, I believe. No wait a minute.
No, it was ‘61. ,

So this school wasn't out of the woods until '61-'62?

Well, it really..wouldn't say... Yeah, I don't think you

could say it was out of the woods then because we were
still having great difficulty meeting our operational costs.
had a deficit every year. And I had the biggest deficit.
In fact, the Dean.. Stanley used to say to me, "Mike,

is there anyway you can operate without a deficit?"

And I said, "No." And he said, "Well, I'm just glad that
you're the only department that operates in a_ deficit.

I'd have a hard time." And I said, "Well, maybe that's
what's the matter with the other departments, They should
be...

Who was making up the deficit?

Me! Me. You know, I'd have a deficit and at the end..
What you mean is the school department would have a
deficit and, but you over-subscribed your deficit every

year and,.
 

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Yeah, In other words, I made enough money to pay
it off each year. I'll never forget when I.. Of course
that's a more detailed story is whenI... I think I told

you some of it, but when the.. When Stanley Olson

was fired and that's a.. really a kind of a blot on our

record at the school because it's a dreadful way to deal
with a human being, in my opinion,

Why was he fired?

Well, what happened was that the Dean, I mean the
Chairman of the Board of Trustees., You've got to
keep in mind we're still under the Baptist domination.
The Chairman of the Board of Trustees was a man by
the name of Earl Hankamer who is really a wonderful
person. And I know that since I've been here we became
very close friends from the time I arrived and became
even closer friends because I operated on his grandson
who was injured. And that's an interesting story which
I'll have to tell you too. Parenthetically. This was still

back in 1950, I guess '49 or '50,

*
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How do you spell Hankamer?

H-A-N-K-A-M-E-R, He's an oil man here, And

his little grandson who was then about three or four
years old--five years was run over by his mother. She
was backing out of the driveway and didn't see the

child in the driveway and ran over him, And they
rushed the child to the hospital. Called the pediatrician

who immediately called one of the local surgeons, And

. they called another surgeon who was supposed to be a

pediatric surgeon, And they couldn't make up their
minds whether to go in..

END SIDE I (A) of TAPE # 10

They were,. They couldn't make up their minds what

to do. And this child was dying--bleeding to death. And
Earl called me. He told me what the situation was. Well,
I rushed over-~-He was at the Hermann Hospital--I rushed
over there and ran into three or four of these doctors.
Which hospital?

Hermann Hospital. .

Hermann.
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And I said, after I had examined the child, that the
child had to be operated on. The child had a ruptured
liver, in my opinion, and was bleeding and was in

shock and was going to die unless something was done.

‘And they said, "Well, we thought the child was too

sick to be operated on." That's one way of putting it,

you see, when you don't want~-when you're scared to
operate and have it..

You don't want to be blamed for it,

Yes, you know, let God take the blame, And I remember
we had just started with steroids. And we had been doing
some experimental work with it in shock. Sol said, "Well,
I think we ought to get some and use it." Well, the doctors
all argued they weren't sure he ought to be operated on
and so on, Sol just put it bluntly to the family. I said,
"Look, this is my opinion and this is what I think ought

to be done.” I said, "These other doctors can't make up
their minds and they're very concerned about it. They
don't think the child can make it through the operation.

And I don't think the child is going to live long unless he is
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operated on,'! Well, they decided to take the bull by

the horns..

This was all within a few hours after the accident?

Yeah, And they asked me. to go ahead. And these

doctors didn't like it a damn bit. And they liked it less

when the child recovered.

Did you do it at Hermann?

Yes, Yes.

And what was it? Was it a ruptured..?

Ruptured liver, yes. We had to resect part of the ruptured
liver to stop the bleeding. The child did beautifully. The
others didn't like it at all, That child's now married and

has a child.

And , of course, I became very close friends with the family.
And they're a wonderful family. And when Earl Hankamer
retired as Chairman of the Board, there was a fellow

by the name of Joe Albritton who is an energetic, ambitious,
shrewd, calculating fellow who has got a Napoleonic complex.
Short fellow, you know. And he was determined to become

the Chairman and he did... And he just started running
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the school with an iron hand. And among the people
that he recognized who he felt was a threat to the
school was me. And he was a maneuvering kind of
conniving fellow. And he started conniving with cer-
tain members of the faculty. And he started including
me inthe conniving. You know, he'd invite them to
his apartment, have dinner with them, Invite me up
there to have dinner with him, I recognized him right
away, you know, as a crook, And I think he sensed the
fact that I recognized him. You know, I guess I have
difficulty in hiding some of my feelings of contempt.

I know that sometimes that people can sense this, especially

a fellow like that, you know. He doesn't trust anybody.

And I knew he didn't trust me and I sure as hell didn't
trust him. And I remember telling--saying something to
Stanley about him. You know, that I didn't trust him.
Stanley Olson was getting increasingly aware of this after

a while. And finally, it came to a show down, He became...
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began to be critical of the way Stan was running the
school. Of the way the funds were being spent. And

so on,

Is this where he zeroed in mostly-~on finances?

Oh, yes, Yeah. And he then suggested... And then

he would connive with other people outside, like the
doctors in town who, of course, had no great love for
Stanley Olson or for me. And some of the local adminis-
trators and the hospitals and so on. Well, finally it
reached the point where Stan realized something had to.
be done and he became increasingly more hostile and
finally sug.. He suggested to Stan that he take a leave of
absense, A kind of sabbatical--allowing Stan to do some
studies that he had in mind doing anyway. So he then
appointed the young Associate Dean who was another
conniver, And he tried to use him asatool. Well, this
fellow was a dishonest man too.

Was Albritton the sort who just liked politics for politics
sake, and power for power's sake. He just liked to

stir them up to make himself feel important?
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Yeah, that's right. That's right. Exactly. He had

kind of ambitions also locally--socially. He was not

in the sort of social set. He wasn't recognized. You
know, he came from the other side of the tracks, so

to speak. Well, Stan,. He told the Board, to show

you the dishonesty of the man, he told the Board that
he--that Stan--had decided to resign, but in the meantime..
But Olson merely thought he was taking a leave of
absense,

Yeah. In the meantime, he went up to New York to

meet Stanley Olson who was coming back from Europe

and he had a long talk with Stanley, And he said, "Stan,
the Board of Trustees feels that you ought to resign.
There's so much dissention in the school, in the Medical
Center about you. That for the good of the school it might
be desirable for you to resign," Stan said, "Well, if the
Board feels this way, certainly.'' Then he came back and
told the Board of Trustees he had a letter of resignation

from Stanley. You see?
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Dirty, dirty pool. Yeah.

Exactly.

That's very cruel.

You see, but this wasn't out then. Stan didn't ask any

of the Board members was it true. He was a little

hurt that some of the Board memberSthat were friends

of his hadn!t.said anything. Well, then this fellow decided
that he would play ball--you know, he was trying to, in

a sense, entrench himself both with the Board and some
members of the faculty. So he called and talked to some
members of the faculty and heads of the department and
said, "Look, Stan resigned and we're going to need to
appoint somebody. I'm going to ask the Associate Dean
to act--I'll help him. And we'll appoint a faculty committee
and a search committee to look for a new Dean,"

Well, this is where he made his mistake. He realized

it later. There were, I think, eight or ten people on the
search committee, including myself--all heads of

departments, Well, Stan's resignation really was kind
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of a jolt to everybody. And many people sensed that
Albritton had really fired him. And they began to be
concerned about the future of the school. And all kinds

of rumors were flying anyway.

But none of you knew exactly what had happened yet?

No, we didn't know at that time. So, we had several
meetings. Discussed the thing. He'd call individual
members down to his apartment to discuss the problems
with him. I went down there several times. Occasionally
with one person or another. Sometimes by myself, And
the next thing that happened was that he decided to appoint
Ray Pruitt. I'm ahead of my story. I'm sorry. I'm
ahead of my story, --

At that point in time, he didn't appoint the search committee,
He sort of was discussing this with a lot of people. And
then he asked Ray Pruitt, who was then professor of

medicine to be the Dean, Ray sort of was one of these

_ truly fine individuals who deliberated intensely about

things like this. And he worried about things, you know,
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-51-

and he had to make a judgement almost with great
intensity as he was thinking about it. But he finally
agreed, He talked to a number of people. Talked to

me and soon, Finally agreed to do it. Well, in the
meantime, this fellow continued to work with the acting
Dean. And the acting Dean was feeding him all kinds of
misinformation or distortions of what was going on and
sort of feeding him information about people he didn't

like on the faculty. So there was a lot of inner-dissention
and distrust in the faculty. This fellow was really boiling
it up all the time. Rumors were flying. All this time,

of course, I was concerned but Iwas so damn busy with
my work and so on that I would disregard it. People would
come and talk to me about it and I would try to reassure them.
And I remember one time when the budget was to be
approved. You see, the budget usually was approved in
July. We're on a fiscal year beginning July 1. Ray came
to see me and he said, "Joe Albritton is very much upset
with the deficit we have of about $550, 000 for next year.

And he won't approve it. He said you've got to be ona
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fiscally responsible budget." And he said, "I don't
know how we can reduce it. We're going to have to

fire a lot of the faculty to reduce it. We can't fire

them. They've got tenure.'' You see, This is the

hard core of how the budget operates. And I said,

"Well, look, historically we've always made up this
deficit. Why can't we go on and find a way to make it
up." I said, "This is the Board of Trustees responsi-
bility. They've got to run the school. Why, otherwise
just close it down." Well, Ray really was such a fine
person--honest and truly decent human being--that he
was agonizing over this and was absolutely miserable,
You know, here he was caught between the situation which
he couldn't control,

This kind of administrative role he was in also was..
Huh?

The role he was in was new to him,

Yeah, Oh, yes. He was a professor of medicine. Well,
then this went on for weeks, The budget still wasn't

approved, Wewere, ina sense, going on the same kind
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of budget situation that the government does, you know,
when it says that we have a continuing resolution, which
means we go on the same budget you've been on.

Well, I think this was around still in November. We

still hadn't gotten a budget approved. So everybody

was so...Had no raises. No new positions. One day

Ray called me up--one evening called me up and he

said, "Joe wants us to meet him at the airport tomorrow
at six thirty. He's going to Los Angeles."' AndI said,
"Why in the hell do we have to meet him at the airport?
He just lives down here. His apartment is right at the
Warwick, Why can't we go meet him there before he goes
to the airport.? Why do we have to drive all the way out to
the airport to meet him to talk about this budget?" And

I said, "Why the hell should I go? I'm not responsible

for it," Well, he said, 'Joe wants to talk with you because
you bring in more money than anybody else in the school,"
"Well,'' 1 said, "I don't know why I have anything to do

with the budget then." He said, "Well, Mike I'm asking

a
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you to come with me.” I said, "Well, Ray, if you put
it that way, I'll go." ButI said, "I resent having to

go because he wants me to gothere. I think this is
pretty unnecessary and is a kind of demonstration of
what he regards as power. I resent it. This is not

a gentlemanly way to deal with people. I think it's
discourteous." He said, "I realize that, Mike." But
he said, "I would appreciate it if you would come with
me,'' AndI said, "Alright, I'll go,!!

Well, we got down to the airport and he had a little rum
that he had gotten from one of the people... He was
very jovial when I arrived and I gave him a...

Started drinking? :

In the morning! You know. And I gave him a dirty look
when I arrived and I didn't smile and I was serious and
grim as hell, And I just said good morning and that was
it. And sat down and didn't say a damn word. And he
said, "Well, I appreciate y'all coming because I want

to talk to you about this budget. I'd like to get it approved.

a
Tape #10

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Then he said, "I need to find a way to resolve the

deficit, " And he said, "Until I can resolve that deficit

I can't recommend its approval by the Board."" AndI
said, What do you want...why do you want me here?
What have I got to do with it?' Well, he said, ''You've
got a lot to do with it."' He said, 'You have one of the
largest budgets in the medical school and you have the
largest income," AndI said, "Well, cut it down then,"
But he said, "I can't do that." I said, "Why can't you?"
I’said, "If you can't approve it, you can do that." And

he said, "No, that would... That wouldn't resolve the
problem," And I said, ‘What do you suggest to resolve
it?! And he saw I was, you know, pretty damn. .
Hard-nosed,

Hard-nosed about it and 1 wasn't giving him an inch. And
I said, "It's your responsibility and the Board's to approve
the budget and if you don't like the budget the way it is,
why don't you change it?"

And he said, ''Well, then there are certain functions that

would have to be wiped out and I'm told they're essential."
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-56-

I said, "What is your suggestion to change it?"

He said, ''Well, I think you can-~you've got to find

more money,"

"That's not my responsibility,"' I said, "I'm only
responsible for running the department of surgery.

If you want, I will cut my budget so that you can approve

it on the basis that the income will meet the outcome--

the outgoing funds,"

"No, '' he said, "then that would effect the other departments,
because much of that income goes to the support of the

other departments, "!

I said, "Well, I'm out of suggestions, What do you suggest?"
Well, he said, "I don't know. ”

I said, "Then, you've got the final responsibility, you're
going to have to make a decision about what to do with it,"!
Well, Ray was getting a little upset with the way I was
dealing with him, And so Ray chirped in and he said, ''Joe,

I think you're going to have to.. You ought to review this

with some idea of trying to find a way either to remove

4
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the deficit or find the money to do it. ' And he was
trying to be, you know, a little more...

Moderate voiced?

Well, yes, and ina little kinder way, so to speak.

Well, we were getting no where, you see,

He said, "Well, I'm going to have to leave now. My
plane's about to take-off,"

And just to test him out, you see, I turned around to
him and said, "Before you go, Joe, let me make a
suggestion, You have made none. Let me make one,

I will personally guarantee half of that deficit, if you
will personally guarantee the other half,' I looked him
straight in the eye. And I could see this really..he didn't
like that a damn bit. And he was flustered and he didn't
know what to say for a moment, He finally said, "Well,
let me think about it.'' And went off on the plane.

And on the way back, Ray Pruitt was really chuckling to

me all the way about what I'd said and whatI did. And
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DR. DeBAKEY:

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I said, "Well, Ray, you know, I told you all the way

going to the airport I resented this bastard doing some-
thing like that. And I don't see... if he weren't such

a gentleman, you know, so inherently and basically a
gentleman, you couldn't put up with this. And I frankly
can't understand how you have that much tolerance, !

Well, he told me later after he met again with Joe that

Joe really told him, "You know, sooner or later, we're
going to have to get rid of DeBakey,"' He said, ‘I find

that he is one of the most unpopular people in the medical
school and I'm afraid that he's one of the reasons that
we're having so much trouble, "!

Well, the interesting thing is that we never heard any more
from him about that budget--proposal, I mean. I asked
Ray. Ray said, "No." And finally, the budget was approved
some time in late November, early December with the
understanding that they may have to use some money that
the Ford Foundation had given Baylor University for the

medical school, I think two million dollars. And they
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had been using the income from this, but they might

have to use some of the capital, He never came up

with a goddamn cent. Never brought a cent to the medical
school either,

How long did he last?

Well, fortunately, not too long, because the school was
getting into, you see, what happened... What precipitated
this situation was that Ray Pruitt resigned,

Ray Pruitt resigned right after that? Or..?

Not long after that.

Because of the Albritton factor?

Yeah. Yeah, he made it clear. He just couldn't take

it any more, really. And the Mayo Clinic had invited him
to come back, so he had an opportunity to get out gracefully.
And he took it right away. And as a consequence, when

he resigned, coming on the heels of the Olson situation,
that's when Albritton put the faculty committee. And that's
when he made his mistake. Because when he did this,

then this faculty committee met on several occasions
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and we talked largely about what the hell was going |

to happen to this medical school.

How long was Pruitt Dean? For about a year?

Yeah, about a year or so, A year and a half, maybe.

And that’s when the committee~-all members-~-unanimously
said to me, "You've got to be the choice. There's nobody
else who can face this man and nobody else can take this
situation any longer, There's going to have to be a
confrontation," They really proposed me to confront him.
You see, it was either going to be him or me. AndI

said very simply to them, I said, "Look, you know that

I don't want to be Dean. You know that I just want to be

a surgeon. And the only way that I'll accept what your
doing is under two conditions. One: That I remain as
head of the department of surgery and be a surgeon,

And two: That you will join with me in working out our pro-
blem together. This means that I'm.. I will suggest a
way by which most of you will have responsibilities--

administrative responsibilities, Now if you'll accept
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-6l-

that, fine. Somebody's going to have to.. We're going

to have to have some associate deans from you. You're
going to have to do not only your job, but associate |

dean. The way I'll do my surgery job and be the dean.

You see,"

Alright, they made their report to Albritton, officially.
And he kept this report a secret for nearly three months
and wouldn't allow it to be known to any other members

of the Board. Finally, some of the people on the faculty
had friends of certain members of the Board, For example,
one of them was very close to one of the ministers,
Another one was very close to a man by the name of
Newton Rayzor. He's since died--a wonderful man.
Another one was close to one of the..close to the..one of
the administrators here who in turn was close to one

of the Board of Trustees. Well, by this time, for example,
certain members of our Board of Trustees at the Metho-

dist Hospital were getting concerned about this, because
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it was effecting the plans and programs here, you see,
And we even discussed ways and means by which we
might organize a new medical school--completely, Or
even get Rice University to organize it. We said, "Look,
we can bring you virtually the whole faculty of Baylor,

if you can do it." Said, "They'll move right out. .And

let Baylor--the Baptists run that empty building, if

they want to." Well, this then got back to some of the

-™members of the Board. So they... Several members

of the Board then just asked for a meeting of the Board,
You see, up to that point, he never called a meeting. He
ran it. And at the formal meetings he would just present

to them what had been done. And this unfortunately had
been the way the Board had been run before.

It's traditional, of course.

Yes, Yes, So, when several of these members got all
this information about what the hell was going on in the
medical school. The situation was about to collapse. They

became concerned, And they had a session, you know,

ae
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sort of a knock-down drag-out session, And they

wanted,. They said to the Chairman, "Look, we
understand that you have a report from the search
committee about who should be Dean." And he denied

it. He said, "No, they haven't given me a report yet."
Well, some of them had gotten copies of the report so

they knew he was lying. And finally they confronted

him with the fact that he had lied. But he said, "Yeah,

he had it and he wanted to think about it some. That

there was a lot of criticism of DeBakey."' He wasn't

sure this was the best thing. And he even had consulted
certain members of the faculty about whether they would
be willing to accept the Deanship, And there were one

or two people he took with him on trips to Los Angeles.
Put them up there for several days. Wined and dined them
and made them feel they were going to be Dean.

Well, they then had a knock-down drag-out session about it.
And finally by one vote, they decided to set up a special
committee of the Board and of the faculty to review the

findings of this search committee, And on this were
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two faculty members and this Associate Dean. So .

you had now another power play. And this Associate

Dean then started hearings and selected certain people

to come and present hearings. And he got two or three

of the people to come up and testify about my moral
character, And that I even had lied about some of my
papers, Well, one of the members of this committee

was this man, Newton Rayzor, who was a lawyer. He
began to get a little concerned about what they were saying.
You see. It was all supposed to be highly confidential,

but there were leaks coming out. So, I began and some

of my friends began to tell me about these things. Sol
called him up one day--Newton Rayzor. First, I called
my lawyer and I said, ‘Look, I'm beginning to be concerned
about what's going on," andI said, "You know, I don't
want to be in this position. I don't give a good goddamn
about being Dean, The only reason I was willing to accept
this was because the search committee wanted it.” But

I said, "The search committee still feels strongly about

if and I'm willing to stand up with them." But I said, "I'm
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not willing to be crucified. And if they're going to

say anything about my moral character.'! I said, "I'm
willing to sue them,'! I said, "I'll sue the whole goddamn
bunch of them, I'll sue them individually and I'll sue

the school," |

So I called, what's his name, called my...they were
good friends. My lawyer and Mr. Newton Rayzor. So
Rayzor called me and asked me if I could come down

to his house one night. Solwent down there, And he
said, "Mike, I just want to ask you one thing. Is there
anything in your moral background that will not stand

up to scrutiny? '' I said, "Well, if there is, I don't know
it."' I said, "I.,Let me put it this way. I'm willing to be
scrutinized morally and in court and you can be assured
of one thing, if I hear that any of this comes out and any
evidence ‘ that they're saying things about my moral character,
I'm going to slap a suit on everybody, including you, if
you're-a part of it."

Well, he said, "I know. Your lawyer just called me and

told me that."' Well, he said, "You've answered my question.
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If anything like this continues, I'm going to join your
lawyer," --in suing them,

Well, it was very interesting, because right after that

he must have said something to them at this session, .
Because, from that point on they all backed down--every
damn one of them, Put their tails between their legs

and ran off, including Joe Albritton. He gave up.

Did he resign at that point?

Yeah, he resigned. He resigned. Newton Rayzor took
over as temporary -Chairman of the Board. Nol guess, that
they asked Orliss Morris to take over, And officially
appointed me. The hearings stopped.

You were put on trial without even knowing you had a trial,
right?

Yeah, I didn't even know this was going on. But, you

see, this was the power play that was taking place between
Joe Albritton and these characters whom he had... They

were foolish enough. It was amazing. It shows you how
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fools people can be. Here's a man who had proven

he couldn't be trusted. And they were trusting him,
believing that he was.. And the interesting thing is that

he was playing them against each other, He had promised
the job to two..to three people. Each one of them thinking
he was going to be the Dean, »

These were such old tricks. unless you spent half your

life living in a Machiavellian world.

Yeah, That's right. You!d think, you know.. And they
trusted him.

Well, it came, obviously as a shock to them. He resigned,
And then they quit the hearings, right after this. Right
after this happened, As soon as they learned that I was
not going to stand by and let them do this.

How long after this was it before you got them out of

the church? Got the school and the church separated

and got the Baptists out?

Well, you'll find the statement that I prepared in there,

But, it wasn't long after that, because you see, right
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after that, I realized we had to do this and I made

this as a public statement. And sent the Board..

I made the statement... Let me see, it's called,

"Current Status of Baylor College of Medicine--Baylor
University College of Medicine." And I did this

purposely because you see, I went back to 1951 when

J again at that point, ] was not Dean of course then, but
Ihad.. And this memorandum which I prepared really

as a white paper, soto speak. I had the title. The subject
was "Current Status of Baylor University College of
Medicine’ in the Texas Medical Center and the Proposed
New Jefferson Davis Hospital,"' And here I used the same
title’: "Current Status of Baylor University College of
Medicine.,so on and so forth." And I started it off by

the statement that Baylor University Colle ge of Medicine
now faces a decisive moment in its history. The jeopardy
of its present predicament makes constructive action urgent.
And that's dated September 1, 1968, which is shortly after
I took over, You see, |

What you were telling me last night about the ranking of

the school--it has been since that date that Baylor has
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come to the top front?

No, not quite, Because, it came out.,

It was well in the works before..

Yeah, before then, Yeah, sure, But you see, I said,
"Baylor College of Medicine is suffering increasingly
from its historically defective organization within the
Texas Medical Center. But the situation is now so

acute that its administrators no longer exert significant
authority or control, Its lack of funds, community support,
and influence in the Medical Center have severely compro-
mised its capacity to arbitrate effectively. The only
practical solution is to remove its identification in the
public's mind as a Baptist responsibility and to re-establish
it as a non-profit institution to permit its fair competition
for funds and resources with all other institutions in the
community and nation, This opportunity can be provided
by the establishment of a new non-profit corporation to
assume ownership and control of the College of Medicine,

The membership of the Board of Trustees of this new

.
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corporation should comprise a board representative

of civic leaders of the community and state who can
provide resources and support for the school comparable
to that of other community institutions. The Baptist
leaders of Texas who conceived the Baylor University
College of Medicine and fostered its growth to its present
position of eminence deserves special commendation."
Commendation--you know, that's patting them on the
back,

But, you might want to talk to a few people about the
story of what happened then, because it is an interesting...
Revolutionary?

Yeah. It’s an interesting kind of description of the dynamics
of people, so to speak. And what happens when they

get involved in a dynamic play for power. This is really
what happened. And I'd be glad to arrange tomorrow for
you to talk with a couple of people.

Who were...?
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Well, Hebbel Hoff would be one of them you should
certainly talk with. I think you ought to talk with

Ted Bowen a bit, because he was involved in it in

a certain way. I think you ought to talk with Joe Melnick,
And I can arrange for that.

They're all still here?

Yeah, they're here,

Let me talk with Hebbel, first and set the stage for you,
if he's in town.

Fine, good,

In each case you have to talk to them first, but I'm

sure they'd be more than happy to..

I think that we pretty well covered that subject.

Uh-huh.

Do you want to go on for a while tonight? Because I have
another long question to ask you, which is going to take
us more than one session anyway. And I need to get
started,

What is that?
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That's to review your own significant inventions,
discoveries and developments in medicine, beginning

with, I guess, the rolling pump, unless you had something

' going before that.

No, I guess the rolling pump would be the first significant
thing.

Uh, I think what I need to do there.. Well, I've got

a few things I can give you. I think I've given you some.
I need to, ina sense, select some articles from my
bibliography. Let me see if I can get those out tomorrow
for you,

Okay.

And then I can stage them for you, you see,

Right. Meanwhile, it would probably help me if you
could just go off the top of your head and site them,

Let me give some thought to it tonight and outline them.
That would be better. I can get.. ThenI can give you
that tomorrow to be looking at. And I think that would

help you to frame the thing in proper reference when we

a
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discuss it. And you can always...
Right. But what I want to do is in each case when
you're talking about developments of technique and
of cooperation is to go back, if you can, to the original
case--for dramatic purposes, if none other, to describe
it pretty fully to me.
Yeah. That's right. Alright.
Well, let's not start it now. You know, at ten thirty.
What I'd like to do is get a fresh start on that, but in
the meantime, I will try to outline it. Sketch the outline
of the developments in steps, so to speak.
Good.
Because, you see, one of the things we need to do here is —
to divide this in a way thatis....

PAUSE
They originated the original idea, It's very difficult, you
know, to in a clinical setting, to start something that is
completely new that nobody else had had anything to do
with in the past, Because, you take even the heart-lung

machine, for example, Dr. Gibbon deserves a great deal

4
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of credit, of course. For pioneering it, working on it
and.. The fact remains that the concept wasn't original,
If you take..look at it from the overall standpoint, very
little of what he did was original, Yet, he brought it

to fruition. You know. And he really deserves the
credit for bringing it to fruition. You see what I mean?
Well, that's true in most significant developments are
perfecting other peoples' ideas,

Absolutely. And I think it is essential for the reader

to understand this or in a sense you don't portray your
role properly, honestly. And I certainly wouldn't want
to do otherwise, That's why I'm saying the background...
That's why it's necessary-~actually for you to see the
papers. So let me sketch this out a little bit. I can do
that tonight or in the morning and get some literature and
some of my articles which will give you..

If you can sight the articles, I can pull them myself.

Oh, I can get the reprints. Most of them,

Some, I'll have to get just the original because I don't

‘

have all the reprints,

Well, your girls over there are very helpful,
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I didn't get a chance to get it out. I've just been so

pushed all day doing the things I had to do. I've got

‘to look for it. It's possible Dr. Hoff may have a copy

of it and you'll see him tomorrow,

You said from twelve to one-thirty, That means he'll
be free during that time. See him any time?

Yeah, You just get there at twelve o'clock.

Let's review your medical accomplishments tonight.
Well, alright. We can sketch it, That's about alll
really have time to do, It'll have to be filled in with
material I can give you.

But, when I.. To begin with, after I had completed my
medical work at Tulane, you see, I started taking my |
training in Charity Hospital. First as an intern, then
under Dr. Ochsner's service. My training in surgery.
During that time, I became interested in the circulation
and worked on blood and wrote a great deal about blood
transfusion and developed a couple of instruments for

performing blood transfusion and got a lot of experience
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with it. And then when I went to work for Dr. Ochsner

I also worked in a laboratory~-research laboratory.

So that I was piddling around, you know, doing experiments
and trying to develop ways and means of setting the
circulation and working on models. Well, then I had

to develop:a pump. And I was interested in blood trans-
fusion, so the idea of pumping blood was one that I was
familiar with. So the roller pump came about because

I wanted a very simple device to pump blood.. And if you
take a tube--a rubber tube--and roll a roller over it,
you'll milk it. Now when you do that, it tends to creep
and I found that this was undesirable in that it traumatized
the blood when you pushed it like that and the tubing crept
along. So I conceived the idea of fixing the tube so that it
couldn't creep. And that led to the roller pump rolling on
a tube that was fixed and couldn't creep, And that's how
the roller pump came about.

This was a simple rubber tube.

‘Yeah. You'll see from the reprints of the description.

4

IT have them,
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Then I went on from there, of course, to continue my
interest in circulation. And for that reason, when I
finished my training at Tulane...

Your interest in circulation was initially inspired by

Dr. Matas?

Well, to some extent, I guess, by Dr. Matas. Matas

is the way we pronounce it. But it just happened that

I was fascinated with the whole concept of circulation
because J was studying it and so on. And Iwas interested
in patients who had circulatory problems. Well, this
led to my going abroad to get some training and some
experience working under Professor Rene Leriche, who
was the great pioneer in vascular surgery in those days.
And he was quite exciting at that time.

When you were aware of the patient need here, were you
conscious of the fact that more patients seemed to have
vascular problems than cardiovascular problems?

Yes. I mean, this was a common thing. People had

trouble walking and they'd lose their legs from lack of

s
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circulation,

One of the things, before you get to Dr. Leriche is

the mechanical geniusness to that roller pump. Did

you.. You messed around with mechanical things?

Yes, Oh, yes. I was.. I'm fascinated with gadgets

and mechanical things and always liked that. You know,

I used to take down the motor in a car whenI was a

boy. Worked on them. Very much like a hot rod. You

know, I'd work on them and take them down and put

them together. And I loved to work in a mechanical shop.
Even make furniture. You know, I liked to do things with

my hands. So working in the laboratory just came

naturally to me. I just loved to do it--and piddle with it.

In other words, I was always fascinated in doing things

with my hands no matter what it was, Drawing, for example.
I loved to draw. Well, then I went to work under Leriche
because he was the pioneer in that field and sort of an
exciting man-~-interesting man. And Dr. Matas knew him
and, of course, Dr. Ochsner knew him and they recommended

him to me. So, before going T got them to write him
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to see if he would offer me a position in his clinic

and he did. Sol hada very interesting and exciting

year with him.

You told me a good bit about that and also about
Heidelburg. While you're mentioning Leriche, you

do an operation that you calla Leriche. It's an aneurysm,
isn't it?

Yeah. No, no, it's a blockage. It's blocked aorta,

And he described this. He even predicted what the right
treatment should be, And that's why it's called the
Leriche syndrome,

Well, it's interesting in a way that two of the men who were
there when Iwas there. One was a fellow by the name of
Kunilin.

How do you spell that?

K-U-N-L-I-N. Jean Kunlin, He was what's called

the chef de clinique. That's like the chief resident, I

got to be very good friends with him--very fond of him,

And we've been friends ever since. And the other fellow
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who was there like I was was what was called an
assistant etranger--foreign assistant, was a man from
Portugal, His name was Sid Dos Santos,

Del Santos?

Dos, D-O-S. Yeah. And that man is the son of the
professor of surgery in Lisbon, Portugal, who was quite
prominent himself--had done the first aortogram of the
aorta, And was a great friend of Leriche's. He used

to come visit Leriche and I used to see him as the father
of this young man and he became very good friends with
me,

Now this fellow, Dos Santos, was the one who originated
the concept of endarterectomy--cleaning out the artery.
With gas,

Yeah. Well, the gas is just a method of doing it, And
Kunlin was the fellow that initiated and developed the idea
of the bypass grafts, Two basic principles of vascular
surgery.

That was quite. a class you were in.
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Yes, that's right. Isn't that interesting, And I, I guess,
would be the one that really did the resection and graft
replacement.

Kunlin was French?

Kunlin was French. He lives in Paris.

Now, when I ame back, I was full of these ideas, you see,
and I was pushing for doing more work in the field of
vascular surgery. Rewrote several papers these: the
sympathectomy and on coronary artery disease and so on.
In the meantime, and going back now to about 19.. I would
say '34,5,6 or 7, I'd have to check on that date--Dr. John
Gibbon had been working in Boston in the research laboratory
of Dr. Churchill, And he was interested in the heart-lung
machine. And he was doing experiments on cats and so
on, And he had developed the idea that he could develop

a pump and an artificial lung to oxygenate blood, And he
was working on this. Well, we both met for the first time
at a meeting, I think, in St. Louis. The was an American

Medical Association meeting, That's why I can get the

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dates on it. And we both had exhibits at this meeting,
scientific exhibits. And Iwas exhibiting my pump and

the way it was used. And he was exhibiting his heart-
lung machine.

Your pump then being used for blood transfusions.

Yeah. So, he was having difficulty with the pumping part
of his» machine. And we met and discussed this and I
said, "Look, why don't youtry this pump? It really
works well,'' And I told him experiments I had done

with it, And he said, "Well, I'd like to.'' I said, ‘Alright,
I'll send you a model,"

What was his problem with pumps? They were breaking
down the blood cells?

Well, yes. And also, the pump that he had was too
complicated. So, see there are all kinds of pumps.
Obviously the simpler the pump is, the better it is.

So I sent him this and it proved to be just the thing he
needed. It solved his problem, And he concentrated then

on the lung part, you see. And he went ahead and developed

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the heart-lung machine, And that's how--and he
described this in one of his articles--how I sent him

the pump and solved it and so on. He gives me credit
for it.

Have you got a copy of that?

Oh, yeah, sure. Well then, when I came back from
Leriche, as I say, I continued to work in this field

and worked at Tulane and at Charity Hospital in New
Orleans and at the Ochsner Clinic until 1942. So there
was about four or five years there that I was working

in this field and beginning to develop work in the field

of thoracic surgery, in cancer of the esophagus, cancer
of the lung. More and more thoracic work, you see.

So, and also we did some sympathectomies for coronary
artery disease, You know, we were getting more and
more involved. Now this is all prior to the war.

Back to your period with Leriche, did you and Kunlin
and Dos Santos like young men will speculate and dream
about the things you might be able to do during your |

4

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Well, not so much what we might be able to do. You
know, when you're at that stage you're interested in

the subject you're working on and you're not really looking
twenty years--twenty years seemed an awful long time
ahead of me. at that age. In twenty years you think

you're going to be an old man and you don't think about
those things. You're really more interested in what
you're doing and sort of having a good time. When we

had any extra time, we went downtown and had dinner

and some beer or we'd take some girls out, or something
of that sort, You know at that stage of your life, you're
involved in more. .in having a good time and enjoying
yourself and so we did a lot of that. We'd go out and
drink beer and talk, of course. But we weren't speculating
about what the future held in vascular surgery very much.
Your interests were more grossly anatomical?

Yeah. That's right. So, the war came along, you see.
And that stopped all of our work in this. .all of my work

in this field, though I still retained my interest in what

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was going on in vascular surgery, And, asa matter

of fact, helped to set up, establish what we call

the Vascular Centers in the Armed Forces-~-in the Army.
And I collected data on vascular injuries--wrote a paper

on it which is sort of a classic actually on vascular

‘injuries now.

"War Injuries."

"War Injuries" that's right. And so...

END SIDE II (B) OF TAPE #10