[CANCER RESEARCH 34, 3159—3164, December 1974J An Autobiographical Essay Alexander Haddow The Lodge, Pollards Wood, Chalfont St. Giles, Buckinghamshire, England “At'slongavita brevis, “—Hippocrates,Seneca was forced to confess it. Although it was late, my mother immediately sent for Dr. Scott who promptly diagnosed a Happy is the man whose occupation and career are decided perforated appendix and arranged for me to be taken to and determined in early life, and I have every reason for Edinburgh for surgery. I was taken to be operated on by the thankfulness in this regard. surgeon to a well-known nursing home (1 7 Ainslie Place) I was brought up in Broxburn, West Lothian, Scotland, and which, as I well knew, was far beyond my father's means. it may be of interest to record the beginnings of my attraction Thereafter, this being long before the advent of penicillin, I lay to biology and medicine, and especially to cancer research, in bed for a matter of some 6 weeks, and one of my main which began at a tender age in my career. recollections (before the use of the drip) was in the first few Broxburn is a small town lying about 10 miles west of days the torture of an almost intolerable thirst. Edinburgh, and in the course of a very happy childhood I was With this over, I had the marvelous opportunity to witness greatly influenced by the works of the great surgeon, Sir the daily visits of many great Edinburgh surgeons of the time, Frederick Treves, and by reading the life of the famous Sir several of whom I came to know in my student days. These James Young Simpson who was the first to apply the use of included the great Sir John Fraser and Mr. Quarrie Wood upon chloroform in surgery and obstetrics. Another telling factor whom, with others, the fame of the Edinburgh Medical School lay in the circumstance that our family doctor was the rested. On attaining full recovery I was discharged, although well-known Dr. Alexander Scott who, because of his striking from the remarks of friends and neighbors in Broxburn I must appearance and skill, became in my mind the absolute hero have remained rather pale and thin. Thereafter, I remember (7). Broxburn lies in the center of the Scottish shale field, and my mother took me for a short holiday to the lovely county in the course of his practice Dr. Scott carried out an excellent of Peeblesshire and to individual places such as West Linton, survey of the natural history of cancer of the skin and Romanno Bridge, and Lamancha, where I explored the especially cancer of the scrotum, which in those early days surrounding moors and made a list of no fewer than 72 bird was a formidable occupational disease among the workers species including the curlew, partridge, fieldiark, corncrake, engaged on the retorts and presses of the industry (8, 9) but kestrel, hawk, and plover. which has now been largely abolished following the institution On resuming school, while I must have been distinctly of pithead baths. Hence, early in life my motives were directed priggish and introverted, I can recall the actual day when it not merely to medicine and biology but also to cancer seemed to me I must be doing rather well in my class. Our research. At that time (1915 to 1918), public health and headmaster was Mr. William Brown, whom we nicknamed hygiene were far from being fully developed. For example, the “Squeak―becauseof the high pitch of his voice . Although town contained several open middens which every spring and Broxburn High School was merely a village seminary, we summer led to a great plague of the common housefly and to enjoyed a wonderful education and I can never pay tribute the appearance in every home of adhesive flypapers to counter enough to the band of teachers for their devotion and skill, the menace. One of the results was the annual occurrence of even though they worked in obscurity and on what must have a particularly virulent form of scarlatina. Like many others, I been, in those times, a very low salary. Mr. Brown and I contracted this disease (at about the age of 10) and have never, became great friends, and at the weekends he would often take before or since, felt so ill. I was removed for some weeks to an me on long country walks to find, examine, and identify the infectious diseases hospital where I learned, even in those flora of the district, on which he was a great authority. I have preantibiotic days, what a wonderful life and prospect lay in never known a man to handle a book with such loving care, the study and application of medicine. These feelings and and on our return from such rambles he would go through his ambitions were enhanced soon afterwards. library, which contained many volumes, to read of some One day, other schoolfellows and I were invited by the local species ofwhich we had not been sure. squire, Lord Cardross, to spend our time in dragging timber at At that time most of the boys leaving school at 12 (I myself his wonderful house, Almondell House, lying some miles away. stayed later) used to enter the mines as a matter of course. Early that day I was stricken with intense abdominal pain and However, I asked my father if I might enter medicine in general illness. How I got through the day I shall never know, Edinburgh and to my great relief he assented. I also remember but I eventually returned home with the others. The pain was asking him if I might enter for an award from the Carnegie so intense and the discomfort so great that I knew something Trust for the Universities of Scotland in Dunfermline. The must be seriously wrong. I had developed the art of concealing Trust expected such awards to be paid back in later life and ailments from my dear father and mother, but this particular this I would gladly have done, but I recall my admiration for illness proved too much, and on being put to bed that night I my father when he indicated that we could probably just DECEMBER 1974 3159 Downloaded from cancerres.aacrjournals.org on September 25, 2021. © 1974 American Association for Cancer Research. A. Haddow manage and that he did not feel he should make use of this demoralizing appearance with his black skull cap. Every 3 proposal. At the present time, most universities and medical months, each one of us had to present ourselves before him for schools have infmitely more applicants than they can examination in what was then called the Quarterly. I accommodate, but in 1924 things were much easier, and as I remember my first part was head and neck. I am afraid I did held the required Higher Grade Certificates I simply notified not know it at all well, and when I went up I performed the Dean's Office in Medicine (by postcard) that I would be miserably. At the end of this ordeal, Jamieson said, “Haddow, starting in October of that year. Then there began what were profoundly unsatisfactory—46%.― In part this awful experi possibly the happiest years of my life in “mineownromantic ence depressed me but it also galvanized me into real effort in town.―Even then, Edinburgh stifi revered the names of Lister, the following term. My part was then abdomen, and when I Liston, and Syme and their contributions to its surgical fame. went for the viva I felt full of knowledge and confidence. I was One of the great disadvantages of old Edinburgh was that we not surprised to fmd myself doing exceptionally well. At the lived not in community life but in digs mainly in Marchmont end, the same old Jamie reported to me, “Haddow, across the Meadows. This I did, going home each weekend. profoundly more satisfactory—92%.― I stifi retain most vivid memories of my first day in the New Although he did not know it, part of this satisfaction was Quadrangle of the Medical School, with its Florentine-based due to my attendance at an extramural course which was run architecture, and of signing the Sponsio Academica. Our first at the Surgeons' Hall by Professor (or as we called him, lecture was in anatomy from Professor Arthur Robinson “Daddy―)Whitaker.This was really a cramming course mainly (1862—1948), a great anatomist and embryologist whose run for poor fellows from Cambridge who had come down in knowledge was matched by his amazing modesty. On this first their examinations and who wished to get through next time. morning of our medical life he appeared at the appointed It consisted of mnemonics and rhymes and Daddy Whitaker hour—I think 9 a.m.—blushed rather shyly and simply said, beat out his instructions, with the aid of an old femur bone, to “Thisisyour first day in medicine. If in later life you don't the strains of the parietals in blue, the frontals in red, leading succeed, please don't blame anyone except yourself.―Then he in a great crescendo to “thesphenoids in faded heliotrope―; plunged into his subject and kept our noses to the grindstone but it certainly did the trick. A failure of mine, no doubt due for 2 further years. Of course the change was great, and to temperament, was my wish to do the things that appealed anatomy did not at that time appeal to me since it appeared to to me and to defer until the last moment those things that did be too mechanical a subject.