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This oral history was conducted with Dr. Robert M. Califf on June 11, 2007 by Jessica Roseberry. Transcript is available.
Duration: 01:06:53
In the June 11, 2007 interview, Califf, then the vice chancellor for clinical research and the director of Duke Translational Medicine Institute, discusses how he got into the field of cardiology, his work at the cardiology databank, early days of computing, medical school at Duke University, experiences working at Duke, and the evolution of the databank into the Duke Clinical Research Institute (DCRI). Includes a master CD and a use CD.

This oral history interview was conducted with Rebecca Clayton on March 15, 2007 by Rebecca Clayton.
Duration: 01:02:26
Clayton discusses beginning work as the secretary for Dr. Grace Kerby, in 1960; being pregnant and delivering her first child; there being no maternity leave policy; her care for Dr. Kerby after Kerby's retirement; Dr. Kerby's attention to detail; Dr. Kerby's very private nature; other elements of Dr. Kerby's character; Dr. Kerby's dedication to her work; Dr. Kerby's work on house staff schedules and Clayton's assistance to Kerby in this work; Dr. Kerby's assistance to then-Department of Medicine chair, Dr. Eugene Stead; Bess Cebe, Dr. Stead's assistant; Clayton's close relationship with Dr. Kerby; the interactions of secretaries in the department; Dr. Kerby's materials that Clayton has; Dr. Kerby upon retirement; Clayton's workload under Dr. Kerby; equipment Clayton used at the time; the proportion of work dedicated to house staff schedules; Dr. Kerby's privacy about her own schedule; and Clayton's previous work. Includes a master CD, a use CD, and a transcript.

This oral history interview was conducted with Dr. Kathleen Clem on June 27, 2007 by Jessica Roseberry.
Duration: 01:15:32
Clem discusses her desire to become an emergency physician; her background as a nurse; her family background; Loma Linda University; starting one of the first international emergency medical fellowships in the country (at Loma Linda); coming to North Carolina; her desire to improve Duke's Division of Emergency Medicine; becoming division chief of Emergency Medicine; having to fire many of the current faculty in the division to ensure the division was staffed by personnel trained to higher standards; recruiting new faculty; the development of the residency program in the division as crucial and her achievement of that goal in 1993; completely renovating the division's physical space; her goals in renovating the space; women's often circuitous careers; her own circuitous career; the importance of embracing the diversity of career experiences; Duke's support of her career path; the difficulties of being a female leader of the Division of Emergency Medicine within the male-dominated Department of Surgery; doing things that were "uniquely feminine"; changing the culture in Emergency Medicine; impacting the Department of Surgery; overcoming the difficulties of being a female leader; maintaining her integrity; her hard work to get changes made to the division; her allies; the female surgeons in the department; the types of patients who access emergency medicine at Duke; overcrowding in emergency departments; Duke's renovation and expansion as part of the solution to overcrowding; the state of Division of Emergency Medicine when she first arrived; educating Duke about what emergency medicine physicians are supposed to do; the role of emergency medicine physicians; why Emergency Medicine is currently a division and not a department, as she would hope it would be; the percentage of her time spent as administrator and career sacrifices she made to be an administrator; the Faculty Women's Committee; topics the committee has dealt with; the women at Duke who inspire her; the exhibit honoring women undertaken by Faculty Women's Committee; other women; embracing the circuitous career paths of women within her division; why women have more circuitous career paths; importance of mentorship; her past and current mentors; her own methods of balancing work and family; the change in culture at Duke in support of families; the differences between nurses and physicians in emergency medicine; collaboration with nursing; the issues of patient flow in emergency medicine; the rapid nature of decision-making in emergency medicine; her book, "Emergent Field Medicine"; and the current state of the Division of Emergency Medicine. The transcription of this interview was made possible by a grant from the Josiah Charles Trent Memorial Foundation. Includes 2 master CDs, 2 use CDs, and a transcript.

This oral history interview was conducted with Dr. Sheila J. Counce-Nicklas on June 21, 2007 by Jessica Roseberry.
Duration: 1:46:03
Dr. Counce-Nicklas discusses her background; her love of science and of learning; her interest in how things work; her Fulbright scholarship to Edinburgh; her professor suggesting she get a PhD instead of diploma at Edinburgh; studying sex-linked lethal chromosomes in fruit flies; the advantage of being a female in working with males; asking for a promotion in the Duke Department of Anatomy; her reputation in Europe; coming to Duke; other women at Duke: Dr. Lois Pounds, Dr. Jo Rae Wright, Dr. Nell Cant, Dr. Rebecca H. Buckley; women during the time period of late 1960s and early 1970s; the necessity of self-assurance for these women; her husband's work in Duke's Department of Zoology; being the lone woman in the department; not being treated much differently; her continued research on sex-linked lethal chromosomes in fruit flies; this research not enabling her to see the way that the sexes develop, as she had hoped; Duke's increasing emphasis on competing in the research arena; changes in the Department of Anatomy; her research being rewarding; her major contribution as being a two-volume work on insect development; her reputation in Europe as an important factor in her promotion; support from colleagues; the solitary nature of working in the laboratory; the work of other members of the department; teaching; Dr. Montrose Moses; service on Academic Council; the necessity of fairness in appointments; mentors; mentorship; the freedom to explore in her work at Duke; the necessity of grants in research; sharing the workload at home with her husband, Bruce Nicklas; the Promotions and Tenure Committee; the move in the field toward cell and molecular biology; the change in the Department of Anatomy under a new chair; Duke's academic reputation; the increase in the number of women since she first arrived; women in the basic sciences; and being outspoken. The transcription of this interview was made possible by a grant from the Josiah Charles Trent Memorial Foundation. Includes 2 master CDs, 2 use CDs, and a transcript.

This oral history was conducted with Dr. Fred A. Crawford on May 22, 2019 by Taylor Patterson as part of the Dr. David Sabiston Oral History Project. Transcript is available.
Duration: 00:49:09
During the interview, Crawford discusses his early life and education, his experience at Duke University and Duke University School of Medicine, working for Dr. Will C. Sealy, memories of Dr. David and Agnes Sabiston, his residency, leaving his residency at Duke to serve in the Army during the Vietnam War, and his career after Duke at the University of Mississippi and the Medical University of South Carolina as a thoracic surgeon.
Digital files include transcript (.DOCX), interview (.MP3), consent form (.PDF), keywords and summary (DOCX), and Bagger files (.TXT).

This oral history interview was conducted with Kim Q. Dau on October 19, 2022 by Josephine McRobbie as part of the Duke Midwifery Service and Durham Maternal Health Oral History Project, which was funded by The Josiah Charles Trent Memorial Foundation Endowment Fund.
Duration: 00:39:58
During the interview, Dau discusses her background and education; the impact Amy MacDonald had on her as a guest lecturer during Dau's House Course as an undergraduate at Duke University and her subsequent career as a midwife; Dau's interest in Vietnamese and other non-Western medicine practices; her first post-graduate job as a staff midwife in Duke Midwifery Service; the Centering Pregnancy modality including training, later work with the program at Durham County Health Department, and the influence of Margy Hutchison and Rebekah Kaplan's Centering Pregnancy program work had on her; Dau's reflections on power, exchange, healthcare as a partnership, and working in a relational way with people of different backgrounds from one's own; her move back to San Francisco and the pandemic "pause" on many Centering programs; Dau's work in the education and training of midwifery students; learning from midwives; partnerships with other practitioners; and reflections on Duke and how midwifery has and can be incorporated into large medical institutions. Digital files include interview metadata and transcript (PDF), interview with stereo (WAV), interview with mono (MP3), consent form (PDF), an image (JPG), and TXT files.

This oral history interview was conducted with Dr. Elizabeth R. DeLong on October 21, 2010 by Jessica Roseberry.
Duration: 00:45:39
Dr. DeLong discusses similarities and differences between working at a clinical research organization (Quintiles) and an academic research organization (Duke Medical Center); some collaborative projects between the Department of Biostatistics and other Duke departments; the importance of biostatistics to medical practice and medical research; the extent to which people in an academic institution are aware of the importance of statistics in their own work; the importance of having training in doing statistical work; master's versus PhD statisticians; the Duke Clinical Research Institute's emphasis on collaboration between medical investigators and statisticians; working with partners to make sure they set up their studies correctly; outcomes research versus clinical trials; equipoise; the importance of equipoise; personalized medicine; the accuracy of predictions in personalized medicine; bioinformatics; the importance of the department being accepted by other outside departments and groups; growth of the department; being a female in the sciences; her own background; mentors; Dean Nancy Andrews; whether she brings something different to the table as a female department chair; and the future of the department. Includes a master CD, a use CD, and a transcript.

This oral history interview was conducted with Dr. Don E. Detmer on February 2, 2022 by Dr. Konstantinos Economopoulos as part of the Dr. David Sabiston Oral History Project.

Duration: 01:16:29

During the interview, Detmer discusses his early life, education, his medical training, individuals who shaped him along the way during his career, how he came to Duke for the third year of his surgical residency, memories of Sabiston, Sabiston's rigid belief system, his interest in health policy, how he went into administration and medical informatics, different positions he held over the years, and his work with the Duke Physician Assistant Program. Digital files include transcript (DOCX), interview (MP4 and M4A), and consent form (PDF).

This oral history interview was conducted with Dr. William C. DeVries on August 20, 2019 by Emily Stewart as part of the Dr. David Sabiston Oral History Project.
Duration: 00:50:35
During the interview, DeVries discusses his education; work at the University of Utah School of Medicine with Dr. Willem Kolff on the artificial heart; how Kolff "loaned" him to Sabiston for his surgical residency at Duke; his surgical residency at Duke; memories of Sabiston including the time Sabiston sent him home because he dressed in the dark and accidentally put on different colored socks; learning about the importance of the pursuit of excellence of Sabsiton; building the cardiac surgery program at the University of Utah and VA Hospital; putting artificial hearts in animals; first patient to receive an artificial heart and the media frenzy; his move to Louisville, Kentucky, to work on artificial hearts at Humana; and other career related memories.
Digital files include transcript (.DOCX), interview (.MP3), and consent form (.PDF).

This oral history interview was conducted with William J. Donelan on March 10, 2020 by Emily Stewart as part of the Dr. David Sabiston Oral History Project.
Duration: 00:49:39
During the interview, Donelan discusses his early life; educational background; his professional career path at Duke, where he started in 1969 as an insurance office supervisor in the medical private diagnostic clinic; the business administration side Duke's transformation into a premier academic hospital; the growth of Duke University Medical Center; the early days of Duke Hospital North; becoming Chief Operating Officer of Duke University Hospital; his relationship Sabiston; how Sabiston tried to recruit him as the business manager for the Department of Surgery; and Sabiston's legacy at Duke. Digital files include transcript (.DOCX), interview (.MP3), and consent form (.PDF).

This oral history interview was conducted with Dr. James M. Douglas on February 1, 2022 by Konstantinos Economopoulos as part of the Dr. David Sabiston Oral History Project.

Duration: 00:33:05

During the interview, Douglas discusses his early life; education; why wanted to become a surgeon; his interest in music; how he came to complete his residency at Duke; what it was like to be the first African American to complete a surgery residency at Duke; what it was like to be a surgery resident under Sabiston including Sabiston's militaristic discipline and the different way he treated medical students from surgery residents--especially the surgery chief resident; the overall experience of being a surgery intern at Duke; Sabiston's incredible work ethic; what Sabiston taught Douglas; and other memories of Sabiston. Digital files include transcript (DOCX), interview (M4A), and consent form (PDF).

This oral history interview was conducted with Dr. Robert (Bob) P. Drucker on April 22, 2022 by Josephine McRobbie.

Duration: 01:29:39 (MP3); 01:29:47 (WAV)

During the interview, Drucker discusses his background, work as an advisory dean, the impact of COVID-19 on medical education, and his experiences working in pediatrics and pediatric infectious diseases. The themes of this interview includes pediatrics, medical education, and careers in medicine. Digital files include interview metadata and transcript (PDF), interview with stereo (WAV), interview with mono (MP3), consent form (PDF), and TXT files.

This oral history interview was conducted with Jane S. Richardson on November 9, 2007 by Jessica Roseberry as part of the Women in Duke Medicine Oral History Exhibit.
Duration: 01:16:22
Jane S. Richardson discusses her background; her interest in astronomy; her interest in philosophy; working in the same lab where her husband, David Richardson, was getting his PhD; in 1969, the laboratory solving the structure of the Staphylococcal nuclease, the tenth protein structure to be determined; her enjoyment of being unknown; working as a technician in the laboratory; what the structure of a protein might tell about that protein; solving the crystal structure of copper/zinc superoxide dismutase at Duke; learning about the geometry of the active site of this enzyme; the significance of knowing the structure of proteins; X-ray crystallography as the technique used then and still used to solve protein structures; the current worldwide Protein Data Bank, which stores about fifty thousand protein structures; her work as a technician; working on computer models of proteins as early as 1960s; current work of the Richardson lab: building tools for determining and analyzing RNA structure; all-atom contact analysis; other people at Duke currently actively working on protein structure, although not the Richardson lab; Jane Richardson being most noted for ribbon drawings of proteins; ribbon drawings outlining the schematics of all known protein structures in 1980; she and her husband not being able to be in the same department due to nepotism rule at the time; creating a uniform set of conventions for the protein ribbon drawings; the freedom to do this work because she was "invisible"; Duke giving her tenure when she became a member of the National Academy of Sciences; common structures depicted in the ribbon drawings; subjectivity of representing protein structures because she outlined the conventions of the drawings; the ubiquitous nature of the ribbon drawings due to computer graphics; current use of the same conventions; her original method of drawing on top of a computer printout of a very simplified protein structure; the laboratory's invention of Kinemages, one of the first molecular graphics systems available on personal computers; the current size of the laboratory; Duke in the 1970s; Dr. Robert Hill; women as being "on the edges" of the department; her own unusual career track; not getting a PhD; this fact embarrassing the university once she became well-known; receiving a MacArthur Fellowship because of the ribbon drawings; her own circuitous route as being useful; the collaborative nature of her work with her husband; the difficulty in current scientific culture of collaborating, since the tenure emphasis is on receiving credit for something; change in the nepotism rule; pairs of scientists; the connectivity of the current field due to computers; pressure as one result of connectivity; and her enjoyment of having many female colleagues currently. The transcription of this interview was made possible by a grant from the Josiah Charles Trent Memorial Foundation. Includes 1 master CD, 1 use CD, and 1 transcript.

This oral history interview was conducted with Dr. Frances K. Widmann on November 28, 2007 by Jessica Roseberry as part of the Women in Duke Medicine Oral History Exhibit.
Duration: 01:11:53
Frances K. Widmann discusses her background; her parents as physicians; marrying a physician; her mother as a female physician; her own interest in pathology; her work synthesizing the work of others in the "Technical Manual of the American Association of Blood Banks" and "Standards of the American Association of Blood Banks"; the importance to the field of these two volumes; medical school at Case Western Reserve; only small differences in the treatment between her and male medical students; coming to Chapel Hill in 1961 because of the availability of household help for families; being paid less than male members of the Department of Pathology at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; coming to Duke in 1971; working at the Durham Veterans Administration (VA) Hospital as director of the blood bank; the relationship between the Durham Veterans Administration Hospital and Duke Hospital; the centralized nature of Durham Veterans Administration Hospital's laboratories as opposed to Duke's laboratories; running a blood bank; the necessity of testing for certain antibodies in the blood; the difference in patient population at the VA Hospital and at Duke Hospital; her residency years; household help; organizing her schedule to be with her family during her residency years; the chair of Duke's Department of Pathology gaining newfound respect for her work during his own illness; other women in the Durham Veterans Administration Hospital; the use of male-centered language in Department of Pathology at times; and the desire for medical culture to allow more freedom for non-work-related activities. The transcription of this interview was made possible by a grant from the Josiah Charles Trent Memorial Foundation. Includes 1 master CD, 1 use CD, and 1 transcript.

Major subjects in this interview include Dr. Meriweather's experiences integrating the Duke University School of Medicine.

Dr. Fridovich speaks about his arrival in Duke University's Department of Biochemistry in 1952; Dr. Bernheim's reputation at the time for having discovered the amine oxidase; Dr. Bernheim's reputation for good teaching; Dr. Bernheim's reputation for writing abstracts for the publication Chemical Abstracts; the importance of Dr. Bernheim's discovery at the time; Dr. Bernheim's book, A Sky of My Own, about flying; Dr. Bernheim's interest in outdoor activities; the Bernheims housing an English child during World War II; the few women on the faculty; Dr. Bernheim's husband, Dr. Frederick Bernheim, and both of them being highly regarded scientifically; the founding chair of the department, Dr. William Perlzweig; women in the department over time; the field of biochemistry moving beyond Dr. Bernheim's discovery; Dr. Bernheim's donation of land to the Eno River Association; the physical space of the Department of Biochemistry upon his arrival; the growth of the department; Dr. Bernheim focusing more on teaching than research in her later years; Dr. Bernheim as always being called Molly, not Mary; flying as being important to Dr. Bernheim; the equipment that was used in the department in the 1950s; the equipment Dr. Bernheim might have used in her earliest years of research; Dr. Rebecca Buckley; national attention on Dr. Bernheim for her discovery; Dr. Bernheim's modesty; and the fading of that attention over the years.

This oral history interview was conducted with Dr. Catherine M. Wilfert on August 25, 2006 by Jessica Roseberry as part of the Women in Duke Medicine Oral History Exhibit.
Duration: 1:29:32
Wilfert discusses family support; her decision to become a physician; her medical degree from Harvard; the atmosphere for women at Harvard; the differences between the Harvard and Duke campuses; scientific collaborations on Duke campus; people in Department of Pediatrics; working with Dr. Rebecca Buckley on Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever cases; practicalities of working in the lab; the welcoming nature of the Duke Pediatrics Department towards women; the names of important women in the medical center; her husband, Dr. Samuel Katz; the direction of Department of Pediatrics under Dr. Katz's leadership; institutional support for the Department of Pediatrics; differences between pediatric medicine and internal (adult) medicine; physicians' reactions to first hearing about AIDS in the 1980s; patients' deaths due to AIDS; Duke's involvement in clinical trials to treat AIDS; Dr. Dani Bolognesi; her own involvement in giving AZT to mothers; the dramatic reduction of newborn AIDS patients due to AZT use by infected mothers; publicity of the initial trial; controversies of the Thailand trial; her personal stand about early international trials with AZT; the entities responsible for international AZT trials; differences between treating patients in the United States and in developing countries; the dramatic decrease in newborn AIDS patients in United States; difficulties of treating AIDS patients in developing countries; the necessity of treating AIDS patients in developing countries, even by imperfect means; her personal passion for the cause of treating AIDS patients in developing countries; her work for the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation; her retirement from Duke; the foundational support for her work; the need for financial support in the cause of fighting AIDS; countries on which she focuses the most; her travel schedule; working with national governments of developing countries; the status of pediatric AIDS in the United States; specific cases (not identified by name) that stand out to her; others who are in the fight against AIDS; what Westerners should know about the AIDS struggle in the developing world; dissatisfaction with current system of medical care delivery in the United States; her role as chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases; and interactions with Dr. Katz as chief under his chairmanship. The transcription of this interview was made possible by a grant from the Josiah Charles Trent Memorial Foundation. Includes 2 master CDs, 2 use CDs, and 1 transcript.

This oral history interview was conducted with Dr. Hilda P. Willett on May 21, 2007 by Jessica Roseberry as part of the Women in Duke Medicine Oral History Exhibit
Duration: 01:53:21
Hilda P. Willett discusses her background; her siblings; her parents' emphasis on education; the lack of funding for higher education; scholarship; Georgia State College for Women; Dr. James Stokes's encouragement for further education; other career choices for women (teaching); the lack of finances for graduate school; Dr. David Tillerson (D. T.) Smith (chair of Duke Department of Microbiology); doing tuberculosis research for Dr. Smith; attaining the first PhD in the Department of Microbiology (1949); her faculty position in the department; the advancement of male members of department to full professorship; the resistance by male members of department that she become a full professor; Dr. Smith's protest of this unfair situation; the appointment, promotion, and tenure committee within her department; her own research on the tubercle bacillus; her discovery of why isoniazid worked; the new chairman of department; her small laboratory; her ceasing of research due to wishes of new chair; the directorship of graduate studies for the department; the awareness of lower salaries for women; women in clinical departments aware of this discrepancy; Mary Poston's role in the department; Mary Poston as the only female in the department; Dr. Willett as the only female in the department; name changes to the department; focus changes of the department due to scientific advancements; Dr. Joe Nevins; Mary Poston's clinical laboratory; having more women on main campus than in the medical center; her husband as a private practitioner in the community; her husband's help with the household; hiring help to take care of her children; her husband's practice in Raleigh; her commute; teaching; assigning lectures as course director; her own social strengths and weaknesses; research funded by the National Tuberculosis Association; presenting at conferences; her fear of flying; elaboration on her own research; Dr. Wolfgang Joklik's reliance on her; the character of Dr. Smith; Dr. Norman Conant; her major contributions in research; editorial contributions to editions of "Zinsser's Microbiology"; the largeness of the task of serving as co-editor of "Zinsser's Microbiology"; her parents; working during her college years; and working with graduate students. The transcription of this interview was made possible by a grant from the Josiah Charles Trent Memorial Foundation. Includes 2 master CDs, 2 use CDs, and 1 transcript.

This oral history interview was conducted with Doris Howell on November 12, 2007 by Jessica Roseberry.
Duration: 01:01:00
Dr. Doris Howell discusses her early background; medical school at McGill University; positive treatment in medical school; her initial desire to go into the field of psychiatry; her choice to go into pediatrics; the characterization of pediatric work; her internship at Children's Memorial Hospital in Montreal, Canada; her residency at Duke; the difference between styles of training in Canada and the United States; her more rigid style due to Canadian training; Dr. Bill DeMaria convincing her to change her style; her fellowship at Harvard with Dr. Lou Diamond; her field of pediatric hematology; the large numbers of leukemia patients in her work at Duke; growing the division to take care of these patients; being the only trained pediatric hematologist between Washington, New Orleans, and Miami; the immense patient load; training residents and fellows; many fellows being Middle Eastern; becoming the chair of Pediatrics at the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania; being concerned about all-women's medical college; Dr. Susan Dees as a role model; pediatrics as a field easier for women to enter during her time; her positive treatment at Duke; awards; convincing the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania to become coeducational; being only female chair of pediatrics nationally; working briefly at the Association of American Medical Colleges; becoming the temporary chair of the Department of Family and Preventive Medicine at the University of California, San Diego; the difficulty of being a chair in a field you have not trained in; her return to the field of pediatrics; the development of San Diego Hospice; San Diego Hospice as being an all-purpose hospice for all ages; staying involved; building a research fund for women's health; the difference between women's health issues and men's health issues; her working philosophy; not having biological children but caring for her patients; being engaged several times but being a female physician as complicating the relationships; her decision to stay single and commit her time to pediatric care; her advice to young female medical students; and her contentment with the life she has led. The transcription of this interview was made possible by a grant from the Josiah Charles Trent Memorial Foundation.