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Ann Thorac Surg 2007;83:1916-1917
© 2007 The Society of Thoracic Surgeons

Our Surgical Heritage

Richard M. Peters, MD (1922–2006)

Hermes C. Grillo, MDa,1, John R. Benfield, MDb,*

a Department of Thoracic Surgery, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts
b Department of Thoracic Surgery, UCLA Center for Health Sciences, and David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, Los Angeles, California

* Address correspondence to Dr Benfield, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, 11611 Terryhill Place, Los Angeles, CA 90049 (Email: j.benfield@verizon.net).

The first 20% of the full text of this article appears below.


   Introduction
 
With the death of Richard Morse Peters (Fig 1) on September 1, 2006, thoracic surgery marks the loss of an incomparable colleague. He was a distinguished surgical scholar who displayed scrupulous exactitude as a scientist, rigorous precision as a surgeon, and directed devotion as a teacher. In addition, he had a principled social conscience as a citizen, and admirable integrity in all that he did.


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  		Fig 1. Richard Morse Peters, MD.

 
Peters was born in New Haven on February 21, 1922, son of a distinguished Professor of Medicine at Yale. He was a varsity swimmer at Yale when that champion team was foremost among colleges. Peters received his doctor of medicine degree cum laude from Yale in 1945. He trained in general and thoracic surgery at Washington University, St. Louis, under the tutelage of the much admired Evarts Graham. In St. Louis he married Ann Wilson DeHuff, a medical student who became a pediatrician and a valued editor of Peters’ publications. Peters completed his residency in 1952 with a two-year hiatus for service in the United States Army at Fort Myers, Washington, D.C. from 1946–1948.

He became the assistant professor of surgery and head of the division of cardiothoracic surgery at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. Peters and his wife became active in the community. Peters’ profound civic conscience led him to long service on the school board at Chapel Hill, where he and other board members labored successfully for 6 years to desegregate the public schools. It was the first system in the south to be desegregated.

At the University of North Carolina he . . . [Full Text of this Article]






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