Perhaps because of William Halsted’s powerful personality, health care providers and the general public tend to stereotype surgeons as brusque and abrupt. As with most stereotypes, this comparison is an unfair assessment, especially when considering Leonard’s personality and character traits that are diametrically opposed to those of Halsted’s.
Leonard’s equanimity and wit more closely resemble those of Sir William Osler, Halsted’s friend at Johns Hopkins. Osler, the greatest clinician of his day and the innovator of bed-side teaching rounds, had a magnetic personality that made him the most revered physician in the history of medicine. Leonard, like Osler, has filled his life with the healing triad of learning, love and laughter. Osler’s words remind us of Leonard’s philosophy and personality:
- Things cannot always go your way. Learn to accept in silence the minor aggravations, cultivate the gift of taciturnity and consume your own smoke with an extra draught of hard work, so that those about you may not be annoyed with the dust and soot of your complaints.
- The master word [work]…is the open sesame to every portal, the great equalizer in the world, the true philosopher’s stone that transmutes all the base metal of humanity into gold. The stupid man among you it will make bright, the bright man brilliant, and the brilliant man steady.
- I have three personal ideas. One, to do the day’s work well and not to bother about tomorrow…. The second ideal has been to act the Golden Rule, as far as in me lay, toward my professional brethren and toward the patients committed to my care. And the third has been to cultivate such a measure of equanimity as would enable me to bear success with humility, the affection of my friends without pride, and to be ready when the day of sorrow and grief comes to meet it with the courage befitting a man.
- Look wise, say nothing and grunt. Speech was given to conceal thought.
- The greater the ignorance, the greater the dogmatism.
- The best preparation for tomorrow is to do today’s work superbly well.
Dr. Coleman, like Osler, mentored young men who thought they might be interested in a medical career. During the summer months these college students would assist Dr. Coleman in surgery, make rounds and house calls with him, help change casts and bandages and work in the Navasota Clinic laboratory. Some of those students decided against a medical career. Others, including Mike Mason, C. H. Prihoda, Jr., John Baker, and John Walker, have become much better doctors than they otherwise would have been because of the powerful positive influence of Dr. Coleman.
Dr. Luke Scamardo said he wouldn’t be practicing medicine in Navasota if it wasn’t for Dr. Coleman. Luke was considering many opportunities until he met Leonard. After that meeting Luke knew that he wanted to practice in Navasota. Luke’s wife, Susan, told him, “That’s the kind of man, husband and doctor I want you to be.”
Of all those things that are a pleasure to recall, what Leonard taught me by his daily examples loom largest in my memory. His interactions with his patients demonstrated the compassion of a kind physician, and showed all of us the art of living life well. To relieve suffering and to heal the sick—that was Leonard’s work.