The Best Doctors in Dallas 2005
How We Did It: D Magazine’s confidential poll was sent to about 6,000 local doctors in several specialties. About 2,000 of those surveyed were general practitioners, internists, and family practice physicians—those who typically make recommendations and referrals. We asked them to name two doctors they would send their patients or loved ones to in each of the 39 specialties. We also made the ballot available online at www.dmagazine.com so doctors not included in our polling could vote. Only those with a valid Texas medical license were eligible.
An outside marketing firm tallied the results, and a panel of esteemed local physicians reviewed the list prior to publication. This list is designed with the patient in mind; therefore, under the guidance of the panel, we did not include specialties in which the patient has little or no say, such as anesthesiology and pathology. Nor did we include pediatrics, which is vast enough to warrant its own feature story (last published in July 2004). We also admit that these specialties are broad in some instances. This list is extensive but by no means inclusive: if you don’t see your doctor on the list, and he or she is someone you like and trust, you should stick with him or her.
ALLERGY/IMMUNOLOGY
Allan Gilbert, M.D.
Elliot J. Ginchansky, M.D.
Gary Gross, M.D.
Rebecca Gruchalla, M.D.
David Khan, M.D.
Jane Lee, M.D.
William Lumry, M.D.
Michael Ruff, M.D.
Richard Wasserman, M.D.
Leslie Weisberg, M.D.
BARIATRIC SURGERY
John H. Alexander, M.D.
Lawrence Barzune, M.D.
James A. Davidson, M.D.
Nirmal Jayaseelan, M.D.
Joseph Kuhn, M.D.
Todd McCarty, M.D.
David Provost, M.D.
Dirk Rodriguez, M.D.
BREAST SURGERY
Lee Bourland, M.D.
Edward J. Clifford, M.D.
David Euhus, M.D.
Archana Ganaraj, M.D.
Michael Grant, M.D.
David Hampe, M.D.
James Huth, M.D.
Sally Knox, M.D.
Alison Laidley, M.D.
Ann Leitch, M.D.
CARDIOVASCULAR DISEASE
Azam Anwar, M.D.
James Boehrer, M.D.
Melissa Carry, M.D.
Jorge Cheirif, M.D.
Joaquin Cigarroa, M.D.
Tony S. Das, M.D.
James De Lemos, M.D.
Cara East, M.D.
Charles Gottlich, M.D.
Jerrold Grodin, M.D.
Srinivas Gunukula, M.D.
John F. Harper, M.D.
Leslie Hillis, M.D.
Charles B. Levin, M.D.
Steven L. Meyer, M.D.
James S. Rellas, M.D.
J. Edward Rosenthal, M.D.
John Rutherford, M.D.
Richard W. Snyder II, M.D.
Jack W. Spitzberg, M.D.
John L. Tan, M.D.
Ravi Vallabhan, M.D.
John Warner, M.D.
Samuel Woolbert, M.D.
Clyde Yancy, M.D.
CARDIOVASCULAR/THORACIC SURGERY
Richard Bowman, M.D.
Michael Dimaio, M.D.
David Fosdick, M.D.
Robert Hebeler, M.D.
Carl Henry, M.D.
John Jay, M.D.
Michael Jessen, M.D.
William Jones, M.D.
Michael J. Mack, M.D.
Mitchell J. Magee, M.D.
Gregory Matter, M.D.
Dan Meyer, M.D.
Thomas Meyers, M.D.
David O. Moore, M.D.
Melvin R. Platt, M.D.
W. Steves Ring, M.D.
William H. Ryan III, M.D.
Larry W. Schorn, M.D.
Michael Wait, M.D.
Lonnie Whiddon, M.D.
COLON/RECTAL SURGERY
Dale D. Burleson, M.D.
Randy W. Crim, M.D.
Rick Dignan, M.D.
J. Marcus Downs, M.D.
Erik Fetner, M.D.
Sharon Gregorcyk, M.D.
Philip Huber Jr., M.D.
Jefferson Bennett Hurley, M.D.
Robert Jacobson, M.D.
Warren Lichliter, M.D.
Anthony Macaluso Jr., M.D.
Narinder K. Monga, M.D.
Clark Odom, M.D.
Don R. Read, M.D.
Clifford L. Simmang, M.D.
Paitoon Tulanon, M.D.
COSMETIC/RECONSTRUCTIVE SURGERY
Gregg M. Anigian, M.D.
Fritz E. Barton Jr., M.D.
Benjamin A. Bassichis, M.D.
Bernard H. Bloom, M.D.
Byron Brown, M.D.
William Carpenter, M.D.
Jack Gunter, M.D.
Fred L. Hackney, M.D.
Patrick Hodges, M.D.
Jeffrey Kenkel, M.D.
Jeffrey Krueger, M.D.
Melvyn Lerman, M.D.
Hamlet Newsom, M.D.
Paul Pin, M.D.
Bryan H. Pruitt, M.D.
Rod J. Rohrich, M.D.
Steven J. White, M.D.
DERMATOLOGY
Paul R. Bergstresser, M.D.
Cynthia O. Clegg, M.D.
Lucius Cook, M.D.
Melissa I. Costner, M.D.
James Herndon, M.D.
Peter Hino, M.D.
Karen Houpt, M.D.
Mary E. Hurley, M.D.
Alan Menter, M.D.
Jerold Michaelson, M.D.
Dennis E. Newton, M.D.
Amit Pandya, M.D.
Allison Singer, M.D.
Jerald Sklar, M.D.
Lori Stetler, M.D.
R. Stan Taylor, M.D.
EMERGENCY MEDICINE
Compton Broders, M.D.
Kathleen A. Delaney, M.D.
Joseph Meier, M.D.
Terry D. Noah, M.D.
William Norcross, M.D.
Dighton Packard, M.D.
Paul E. Pepe, M.D.
David Pillow, M.D.
Louis Portera, M.D.
Lynn Rea, M.D.
Robert Simonson, M.D.
Mark Till, M.D.
ENDOCRINOLOGY
Stephen Aronoff, M.D.
Howard Baum, M.D.
Steven Dorfman, M.D.
David M. Feinstein, M.D.
Priscilla Hollander, M.D.
Jonathan D. Leffert, M.D.
Mark Leshin, M.D.
Audrey B. Miklius, M.D.
Pablo Mora, M.D.
Emilia Popa, M.D., Ph.D.
Philip Raskin, M.D.
Julio Rosenstock, M.D.
Richard Sachson, M.D.
Mitchell Sorsby, M.D.
FAMILY PRACTICE
J. Mark Anderson, M.D.
Leonard M. Behr, M.D.
Dana Bleakney, M.D.
David Brehm, M.D.
Carl Couch, M.D.
Christopher C. Crow, M.D.
Guy L. Culpepper, M.D.
Walter Gaman, M.D.
Sander J. Gothard, M.D.
Perry Gross, M.D.
Bruce B. Henry, M.D.
Richard A. Honaker, M.D.
Lawrence B. McNally, M.D.
John R. Morgan, M.D.
Lawrence Pivnick, M.D.
Dale Ragle, M.D.
John Richmond, M.D.
Shelley Roaten, M.D.
Gary M. Sackrison, M.D.
Douglas Stafford, M.D.
Sara Tranchina, M.D.
David Turner, M.D.
William J. Walton, M.D.
GASTROENTEROLOGY
Paul Anderson, M.D.
Steven Burdick, M.D.
Daniel Demarco, M.D.
Esmail M. Elwazir, M.D.
Markus Goldschmiedt, M.D.
John Hamilton, M.D.
W. Greg Hodges, M.D.
Rajeev Jain, M.D.
Katherine H. Little, M.D.
Peter Loeb, M.D.
Mark Miller, M.D.
Michael Nunez, M.D.
Kimberly Persley, M.D.
Daniel Polter, M.D.
Charles T. Richardson, M.D.
Thomas Rogoff, M.D.
Allen Rubin, M.D.
John Secor, M.D.
William Stevens, M.D.
Paul Tarnasky, M.D.
GENERAL INTERNAL MEDICINE
Amy Anderson, M.D.
Mark Armstrong, M.D.
Ann Arnold, M.D.
Phillip Aronoff, M.D.
Sue Bornstein, M.D.
John Brooks, M.D.
Don E. Cheatum, M.D. (also Rheumatology)
Robert Reed Click, M.D.
Carol Croft, M.D.
Joan Donley, M.D.
William Downs, M.D.
Susan Fesmire, M.D.
Robert Fine, M.D.
Mark Fleschler, M.D.
Dirk Frater, M.D.
Robert Harris, M.D.
Gary Hoss, M.D.
Mitchell Huebner, M.D.
Ellwood Jones, M.D.
Muhammad A. Khan, M.D.
Steven Leach, M.D.
Ray Lee, M.D.
Paul Madeley, M.D.
Hugh McClung, M.D.
Jack Melton, M.D.
Jeb Miers, M.D.
Paul Neubach, M.D.
Stuart Owen, M.D.
Jeff Phillips, M.D.
Gary Reed, M.D.
Joe Rothstein, M.D.
Wyatt Rousseau, M.D. (also Pulmonary disease)
Neal Sklaver, M.D.
Weldon Smith, M.D.
Peter Stack, M.D.
Carolyn Terry, M.D.
Martin True, M.D.
Paul Wade, M.D.
Rick Waldo, M.D.
John Webb, M.D.
Jonathan Weissler, M.D. (also Pulmonary disease)
GENERAL SURGERY
George Thomas Shires III, M.D.
Richard Anderson, M.D.
Ronald Aronoff, M.D.
Ernest Beecherl, M.D.
John Cottey, M.D.
Howard Derrick, M.D.
Robert Hagood, M.D.
Stan Henry, M.D.
D. Rohan Jeyarajah, M.D.
Andres Katz, M.D.
John Lanius, M.D.
Zelig Lieberman, M.D.
Sina Matin, M.D.
Thomas Newsome, M.D.
John Preskitt, M.D.
Robert Rege, M.D.
Charles Rubey, M.D.
Bruce Smith, M.D.
Stacy Stratmann, M.D.
Walton Taylor, M.D.
Matthew Westmoreland, M.D.
GERIATRICS
Mitch Carroll, M.D.
Mary Hammack, M.D.
Ziad Haydar, M.D.
Mary Norman, M.D.
Vivyenne Roche, M.D.
Craig Rubin, M.D.
Dorothy Sherwood, M.D.
Belinda Vicioso, M.D.
Chia-Ying Wang, M.D.
Wilson Weatherdford, M.D.
GYNECOLOGY/OBSTETRICS
Sharon M. Bakos, M.D.
John Bertrand, M.D.
David M. Bookout, M.D. (also Infertility)
Karen Bradshaw, M.D.
Charles Brodsky, M.D.
Julian G. Carter, M.D.
Donald J. Coney, M.D.
Tara A. Dullye, M.D.
Ted E. Fogwell, M.D.
Deborah A. Fuller, M.D.
Jan Jensen Goss, M.D. (also Infertility)
Robert T. Gunby Jr., M.D.
Julie Hagood, M.D.
Lucy Hairston, M.D.
Eugene Hunt, M.D.
Thomas Hyslop, M.D.
Richard Joseph, M.D.
Cheryl Kinney, M.D. (also Infertility)
Jane E. Nokleberg, M.D.
Frank E. Oliver, M.D.
James K. Richards, M.D.
A. Jay Staub, M.D.
C. Allen Stringer, M.D.
Kim D. Vernon, M.D.
Kathryn K. Waldrep, M.D.
Ellen Wilson, M.D.
HAND SURGERY
Jay Boulas, M.D.
Arnold V. DiBella, M.D.
Paul R. Ellis III, M.D.
Hugh A. “Bo” Frederick, M.D.
Kimberly Mezera, M.D.
Timothy Schacherer, M.D.
Dennis Stripling, M.D.
David J. Zehr, M.D.
HEMATOLOGY/ONCOLOGY
Carlos Becerra, M.D.
Joanne L. Blum, M.D.
Barry Brooks, M.D.
Barry Cooper, M.D.
Claude Denham, M.D.
Eugene Frenkel, M.D.
Susan C. Guba, M.D.
Barbara Haley, M.D.
Sherron Helms, M.D.
Houston Holmes, M.D.
Ron Kerr, M.D.
Robert Kirby, M.D.
Barry Levinson, M.D.
Kristi McIntyre, M.D.
Robert Mennel, M.D.
Steve Perkins, M.D.
Cynthia Rutherford, M.D.
Michael Savin, M.D.
Gabriel A. Shapiro, M.D.
Jivesh Sharma, M.D.
Scott Stone, M.D.
James Strauss, M.D.
Lalan Wilfong, M.D.
HEPATOLOGY
Jennifer Cuthbert, M.D.
Gary Davis, M.D.
William M. Lee, M.D.
Willis C. Maddrey, M.D.
Dwain Thiele, M.D.
Jeffrey Weinstein, M.D.
INFECTIOUS DISEASE
David Allen, M.D.
Edward Goodman, M.D.
Eliane Haron, M.D.
Howard Kussman, M.D.
Allison Liddell, M.D.
James Luby, M.D.
Robert Munford, M.D.
Perry Glenn Pate, M.D.
Bonnie Rawot, M.D.
Cynthia Schneidler, M.D.
Steven Seidenfeld, M.D.
Louis Sloan, M.D.
William Sutker, M.D.
Gebre Tseggay, M.D.
INFERTILITY
Samuel J. Chantilis, M.D.
Brian Cohen, M.D.
James Madden, M.D.
Samuel P. Marynick, M.D.
Anil Pinto, M.D.
J. Michael Putman, M.D., P.A.
NEPHROLOGY/HYPERTENSION
Robert Farkas, M.D.
Andrew Fenves, M.D.
Steven Hays, M.D.
Biff Palmer, M.D. (Nephrology only)
Venkata Ram, M.D.
Steve Rinner, M.D.
Russell Silverstein, M.D.
Jeffery Thompson, M.D.
Robert Toto, M.D.
Ronald Victor, M.D.
Bruce Wall, M.D.
NEUROLOGY
Stuart Black, M.D.
Elliot Frohman, M.D.
Daragh Heitzman, M.D.
Steven Herzog, M.D.
Richard C. Hinton, M.D.
Daniel Hopson, M.D.
Bruce Jenevein, M.D.
Lise Labiche, M.D.
Herbert Leiman, M.D.
Alan Martin, M.D.
Norma Melamed, M.D.
Padraig O’Suilleabhain, M.D.
Malcolm Stewart, M.D.
Duc Tran, M.D.
Anna Tseng, M.D.
Gary Tunell, M.D.
Worthy Warnack, M.D.
Gil Wolfe, M.D.
William Woodfin, M.D.
NEUROSURGERY
David Barnett, M.D.
David Barnett, M.D.
J. Michael Desaloms, M.D.
Robert Hudgins, M.D.
Richard H. Jackson, M.D.
Jon R. Krumerman, M.D.
Martin L. Lazar, M.D.
Walter X. Loyola, M.D.
Jerry V. Marlin, M.D.
Chris Michael, M.D.
Bruce Mickey, M.D.
Brent C. Morgan, M.D.
Howard Morgan, M.D.
Duke Samson, M.D.
Richard L. Weiner, M.D.
Jonathan White, M.D.
OPHTHALMOLOGY/LASIK
R. Wayne Bowman, M.D.
H. Dwight Cavanagh, M.D., Ph.D.
Warren “Chip” Fagadau, M.D.
Ronald L. Fellman, M.D.
Henry Gelender, M.D.
Robert Nickey (Nick) Hogan, M.D., Ph.D. (Ophthalmology only)
James P. McCulley, M.D.
James Merritt, M.D. (Ophthalmology only)
Michael Milner, M.D.
George Moninger, M.D.
Gordon Newman, M.D.
Norman Slusher, M.D.
Craig Smith, M.D. (Ophthalmology only)
Larry Taub, M.D.
Robert Tenery, M.D.
Gary R. Tylock, M.D.
Barry Uhr, M.D.
Jeffrey Whitman, M.D.
Shelby A. Wyll, M.D.
ORGAN TRANSPLANT SURGERY
Stephen S. Cheng, M.D.
Ingemar Davidson, M.D.
Richard M. Dickerman
Robert Goldstein
Goran Klintmalm, M.D.
Marlon Levy, M.D.
W. Steves Ring, M.D.
ORTHOPEDIC SURGERY
Charles Banta, M.D.
Phil H. Berry Jr., M.D.
James W. Brodsky, M.D.
William Bruck, M.D.
Robert Bucholz, M.D.
Wayne Burkhead, M.D.
Michael Champine, M.D.
Daniel Cooper, M.D.
Andrew Dossett, M.D.
Andrew Dossett, M.D.
Daniel Foster, D.O.
Carl L. Highgenboten, M.D.
Shelton G. Hopkins, M.D.
Michael M. Katz, M.D.
Gerhard Maale, M.D.
James Montgomery, M.D.
Paul C. Peters, Jr., M.D.
John Racanelli, M.D.
Kurt W. Rathjen, M.D.
Charles Reinert, M.D.
Charles S. Rutherford, M.D.
Robert Scheinberg, M.D.
Richard Schubert, M.D.
Douglas R. Turgeon, M.D.
Glenn Wheeless, M.D.
OTOLARYNGOLOGY
Evan S. Bates, M.D.
Robert E. Bonham, M.D.
Daniel Dansby, M.D.
Bradford A. Gamble, M.D.
Gary Goldsmith, M.D.
Mark Hardin, M.D.
Wayne R. Kirkham, M.D.
Michael Kronenberger, M.D.
Stephen Landers, M.D.
Brad Marple, M.D.
Presley M. Mock, M.D.
Alan Murray, M.D. *
Gregory N. Rohn, M.D.
Peter Roland, M.D.
Barbara Schultz, M.D.
John Truelson, M.D.
Ewen Tseng, M.D.
Lawrence Weprin, M.D.
PAIN MANAGEMENT
Robert Bulger, M.D.
Robert Haynsworth, M.D.
Carl Noe, M.D.
Tibor Racz, M.D.
Ken Reed, M.D.
Renaud P. Rodrigue, M.D.
Richard L. Vera, M.D.
Kelly Will, M.D.
PHYSICAL MEDICINE
Mary Carlile, M.D.
James Garrison, M.D.
Fatma Gul, M.D.
Karen Kowalske, M.D.
Arvind Peddada, M.D.
Radie F. Perry, M.D.
Leslie Porter, M.D.
Amy Wilson, M.D.
PODIATRY
Timothy Abigail, DPM
Roy W. Ashton, DPM
Scott J. Ashton, DPM
Leon R. Brill, DPM
Carl Solomon, DPM
PSYCHIATRY
Michael Brennan, M.D.
David Crumpacker, M.D.
Celia Jenkins, M.D.
Byron Law-Yone, M.D.
Edgar Nace, M.D.
Michael Rosenthal, M.D.
Leslie Secrest, M.D.
Larry Thornton, M.D.
David L. Tyler, M.D.
Stephen Vobach, M.D.
Myron Weiner, M.D.
PULMONARY DISEASE
Kenneth Ausloos, M.D.
Robert Black, M.D.
Julye Carew, M.D.
Anthony Dal Nogare, M.D.
John Fitzgerald, M.D.
Carlos Girod, M.D.
John Hughes, M.D.
David Luterman, M.D.
Mark Millard, M.D.
Howard Mintz, M.D.
Randall Rosenblatt, M.D.
Allan Shulkin, M.D.
Joseph Viroslav, M.D.
Kenney Weinmeister, M.D.
Gary Weinstein, M.D.
RADIOLOGY
Evan Cohn, M.D.
Norman Diamond, M.D.
William Dittman, M.D.
Bart Dolmatch, M.D.
Paul Ellenbogen, M.D.
Guerdon Greenway, M.D.
Joseph Hise, M.D.
Tom Postma, M.D.
Cynthia Sherry, M.D.
Michael Smerud, M.D.
Herbert Steinbach, M.D.
Lori Watumull, M.D.
RHEUMATOLOGY
Alan L. Brodsky, M.D.
Stanley B. Cohen, M.D.
John Cush, M.D.
Allan Duby, M.D.
David Karp, M.D., Ph.D.
Salahuddin Kazi, M.D.
Alex Limanni, M.D.
Richard Merriman, M.D.
Dianne Petrone, M.D.
Jessica Procter, M.D.
Jack Vine, M.D.
Scott J. Zashin, M.D.
SLEEP MEDICINE
Philip Becker, M.D.
Gregory H. Foster, M.D.
Andrew Jamieson, M.D.
Margaret E. Mike, M.D.
Wolfgang Schmidt Nowara, M.D.
SPINAL SURGERY
Craig C. Callewart, M.D.
Kevin Gill, M.D.
Luis A. Mignucci, M.D.
John Peloza, M.D.
Robert G. Viere, M.D.
UROLOGY
Jeffrey Cadeddu, M.D.
James Cochran, M.D.
Brian A. Feagins, M.D.
Joshua Fine, M.D.
Steve Frost, M.D.
Pat Fulgham, M.D.
Michael Goldstein, M.D.
Michael Gruber, M.D.
Keith Kadesky, M.D.
John McConnell, M.D.
Donald L. McKay, M.D.
Mitchell Moskowitz, M.D.
William Mulchin, M.D.
Mark Norris, M.D.
Margaret Pearle, M.D.
Claus Roehrborn, M.D.
Arthur Sagalowsky, M.D.
Robert Schoenvogel, M.D.
Nabeel Syed, M.D.
Matthew Wilner, M.D.
Philippe Zimmern, M.D.
VASCULAR SURGERY
G. Patrick Clagett, M.D.
Dennis Gable, M.D.
Wilson Garrett, M.D.
Humam B. Kakish, M.D.
Andres Katz, M.D.
Kenneth R. Kollmeyer, M.D.
B. Ward Lane, M.D.
Greg Pearl, M.D.
Steven Reeder, M.D.
Bertram Smith, M.D.
James Valentine, M.D.
* Dr. Murray is a Pediatric Otolaryngologist.
Dallas Medical Hall of Fame
You didn’t want to be sick in the early days of Dallas, but you didn’t have much of a choice. Health care was primitive here, as it was throughout the United States, in the 19th century. The region was subject to frequent epidemics of typhoid fever and other diseases that taxed available medical knowledge and methods of treatment. Sanitary conditions were abysmal, and there’s a reason the city hospital was known as the “Pesthouse.” Doctors were valued professionals, but often they were poorly trained and could seldom make a living solely by practicing medicine. For instance, Dr. Samuel Pryor, who was elected the first mayor of Dallas in 1856, supplemented his income by operating a drug store.
Conditions improved rapidly in the early 20th century, with advances in medical education and the construction of a number of modern hospitals generally sponsored by religious denominations, such as St. Paul’s, Baylor, and Methodist. By the 1930s, Dallas was winning national awards for public health and was considered one of the leading medical centers in the Southwest. This reputation grew more renowned with the breakthrough discoveries by Southwestern Medical School faculty (garnering a handful of Nobel Prizes) and with pioneering achievements at area hospitals, such as the first pediatric transplant surgeries at Children’s Medical Center.
Today, barely 100 years after mothers agitated for pure milk and businessmen organized clean-up campaigns to remove animal manure from downtown streets, the level of health care in Dallas is as high as anyplace in the world.
Leadership from doctors (as educators, scientists, entrepreneurs, and gadflies) has always been critical to medical advances in Dallas. The first five physicians selected for inclusion in D’s Dallas Medical Hall of Fame all exerted extraordinary influence in improving the standards of health care in the city. We applaud them.
Charles M. Rosser, M.D.
The first thing Dr. Rosser had to do when he set up medical practice in Dallas in 1889 was buy a horse that could swim creeks so he could make house calls. Rosser had fled Georgia with his family at the age of 3 during the tail end of the Civil War and had “read medicine” with a doctor in Sulphur Springs, Texas. But then, unlike many of his peers, Rosser actually went back to Louisville to attend medical school. He became health officer for the City of Dallas in 1891 and set about trying to improve conditions at City Hospital, the predecessor to Parkland. At a time when hogs were still wallowing in the streets near the hospital on Lamar Street, the main building of the facility had no window screens, no indoor bathroom, and only a single hanging light to illuminate surgeries.
In 1895, Rosser and two of his associates went to the Catholic Diocese in Dallas and then to the Archdiocese of New Orleans to plead for help. A year later, ground was broken for St. Paul’s Sanitarium at the corner of Bryan and Hall streets, the first private acute care institution in Dallas, later to become St. Paul’s Hospital. Rosser also saw a crying need for medical education here and soon set about lobbying city and state politicians for the creation of a medical school in Dallas. In 1900, a state charter was granted to the University of Dallas Medical Department, a rather pretentious moniker considering no such university existed at the time. For some reason, either lack of confidence in the school’s ability to turn out trained professionals or old-fashioned fear of competition, the doctors at St. Paul’s vehemently opposed the school and refused to agree to a cooperative relationship.
Despite such formidable opposition, the struggling school managed to open for business later that year in a former Jewish synagogue on Commerce Street. Determined to prevail, in 1901 Rosser opened his own care facility in a converted 14-room brick mansion on Junius Street, just a few blocks from St. Paul’s, which he called Good Samaritan Hospital. Striving for bigger and better things, Rosser and others immediately set upon the task of persuading prominent local Baptists to help him handle the demand resulting from the city’s phenomenal growth and ever-burgeoning medical needs. Rosser let the Baptist General Convention have his hospital for what he had in it, and the Texas Baptist Memorial Sanitarium was born in 1903, later to be rebuilt and eventually renamed Baylor University Medical Center.
The Baptist sponsors also assumed control of the University of Dallas Medical Department, soon to be known as Baylor College of Medicine, assuring a close working relationship with the hospital. Rosser continued to figure prominently in the progress and development of both the hospital and the medical school as a staff physician and senior professor. He died in 1945 at the age of 83, well above the average life span—which he helped move up a notch or two during his 56 years in Dallas.
Edward H. Cary, M.D.
The first surgery at the Texas Baptist Memorial Sanitarium was performed by Dr. Cary, a nationally prominent eye, ear, nose, and throat surgeon. Cary had left his mother’s farm and moved to Dallas at the age of 18, first working for his brother as a medical and dental supply salesman. His connection to the local medical community, which he considered frightfully lacking in competence, frustrated him to such an extent that he enrolled at Bellevue Medical College in New York. He returned to Dallas to set up practice here in 1901, and by 1903 he had succeeded Rosser as dean of the medical college. He served in this capacity for 19 years without ever being paid a cent for his services.
In 1921, having grown weary of Baylor University’s refusal to give financial sustenance to the medical school, he resigned and began drawing the plans for one of the first “skyscrapers” in the world to be devoted exclusively to offices for the medical profession. The 18-story Medical Arts Building, a behemoth of reinforced concrete that some were afraid would sink under its own weight, opened the following year at the corner of Pacific Avenue and St. Paul Street on what was then the fringe of downtown Dallas. As a minor jab in the ribs of the skinflints at Baylor, he later added a small hospital facility on the top floors.
By 1932, Cary had gained national prominence by becoming the first Texan to be named president of the American Medical Association. Meanwhile, the relationship between Cary, a loyal Baptist, and the church officials grew worse. In 1939, he spearheaded a drive that garnered a state charter for the Southwestern Medical Foundation, in which he entrenched himself as president. It was unclear at first what he had in mind, and for a while it looked like the foundation and Baylor School of Medicine would work together toward the creation of a quality medical training center. Then Cary announced that any such facility would have to be nonsectarian, and the relationship between the university and the foundation began to crumble rapidly. In 1943, Baylor University packed up the medical school lock, stock, and copper plumbing, and moved it to Houston.
Cary, left in a gaping hole, resorted to desperate measures by resuming operations of a local medical school sponsored by the foundation in a cluster of abandoned Army barracks adjacent to Parkland Hospital. Then fate intervened when Gov. Allan Shivers was struck by an unhinged window frame while on a tour of the facility, emphatically stressing the need for state assistance for a new facility. Cary dreamed of seeing a quality medical institution in Dallas before he died, and he almost made it. When he died in 1953, construction of the foundation-sponsored Southwestern Medical School at Inwood Road and Harry Hines Boulevard, by then affiliated with the University of Texas, was halfway to completion.
William Beall Carrell, M.D.
“Willie Bell,” as he was called by his friends, was Dallas’ first orthopedic surgeon. He was the son of a doctor who moved his family from Lawrenceburg, Tennessee, to Cedar Hill in 1887. The younger Carrell followed his father’s calling by becoming one of the first graduates of the short-lived Southwestern University Medical College here in 1905. He became a surgeon and a professor, and when World War I broke out, he signed on as a member of a special corps of physicians and surgeons that set up a field unit in France.
As a result of his battlefield experience, Dr. Carrell developed a keen interest in orthopedic surgery and learned much from the front-line physicians from England who were far more advanced than anyone the doctor had chanced to encounter on the Texas plains. After the war, he spent time in Liverpool, absorbing all he could on the process of mending physical breaks and deformities. When he returned to Dallas in 1919, Carrell established the specialty of orthopedic surgery, and as the only such practitioner in the Southwest, found himself in great demand, working triple duty at Parkland, Methodist, and Baptist hospitals. He saw a desperate need for the treatment of crippled children, especially those whose families could not afford to pay for such services. In 1921, he persuaded fellow Masons here to build a hospital for crippled children on Welborn Street that was to become known as the Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children. Carrell became the hospital’s chief of surgery—without pay—and built an office building next door. He paid the hospital’s first orthopedic intern out of his own pocket and lobbied the Texas Legislature for statewide assistance for impoverished children with physical disabilities.
In 1943, Dallas experienced the worst polio outbreak in its history, and Carrell, who suffered from emphysema, pushed himself to the limit in the aid of the city’s suffering children. Air-conditioning was just coming into vogue, though not in the city’s hospitals, so Carrell’s aides would take him to a nearby air-conditioned movie theater for brief rests between visits to the hospital wards. He never fully recovered, though, and died the following winter. The Scottish Rite Hospital has since become world renowned for its treatment of pediatric orthopedic conditions, related neurological problems, and learning disabilities, all without charge. The W.B. Carrell Clinic is still open.
Donald W. Seldin, M.D.
When he arrived at UT Southwestern Medical School in 1951, Dr. Seldin was flabbergasted when he laid eyes on Cary’s shantytown campus. Then things got worse—everybody started leaving. Seldin was named chairman of the department of medicine, not only because of his impeccable credentials and considerable skills, but also because he was the only one left in the department. The other department heads had bailed out, too, and the school was on probation. But rather than concentrate on the obvious issue of survival, he adamantly insisted that the school set about becoming a center of true excellence. Somehow he succeeded.
The son of a Romanian immigrant, Seldin was born in Coney Island, New York, in 1920. In school, he was drawn naturally to poetry and philosophy, but during the time of the Great Depression, there wasn’t much of a market for poets or philosophers. So, by the time he was 23, he had graduated from Yale University School of Medicine. At UT Southwestern, his desire to excel was infectious, and he looked upon the void in the staff and the facilities as an opportunity to innovate, install his own inimitable style, and build in the only direction the school could go: up. By the mid-’50s, the school had moved to its present site on Harry Hines, and before long the dynamic doctor had recruited a top-notch faculty. His winning technique was to identify talent—for which he had an uncanny knack—send them off to train with the best in the field, bring them back, and give them the reins to develop into world-class performers. He did this with Joseph Goldstein, whom he talked into specializing in the field of genetics and who later became one of four Nobel Prize winners now on the UT Southwestern staff.
One of the world’s leading kidney researchers himself, Seldin chaired the UT Southwestern Department of Medicine for 36 years. Before his retirement, his students wrote a parody in his honor in which one of the lyrics went, “He knows everything there is to know.” To his students and peers, that didn’t seem like much of a stretch of the truth. Legendary for his ability to converse in any field—art, literature, architecture, football—he once learned to speak German in three months so he could field questions at a presentation he was to give in Germany. While at UT Southwestern, he was the university’s medical statesman and he is still considered its intellectual father.
Charles C. Sprague, M.D.
Dr. Sprague is the only homegrown talent among our inaugural honorees. He was a bone-jarring tackle at W.H. Adamson High School in Oak Cliff and captain of the football team at SMU. His daddy was mayor of Dallas. (Sprague Field was named for the family.) After graduating from the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston in 1943, Sprague served an internship in the U.S. Navy, then joined the faculty of Tulane University School of Medicine, where he became director of the division of hematology and president of the American Society of Hematologists. In 1963, he was named dean of the school, then swapped his Louisiana address for a 752 ZIP code in 1967, coming home to become the dean of UT Southwestern Medical School.
Like Seldin, he faced a challenge. The school needed much more room and a more rounded organization, especially in the area of basic sciences. The personable Sprague was ideally suited for his role as head shepherd. From his medical school days in Galveston, he had contacts all over the state, and his background at SMU stood him in good stead with local civic leaders, who were more than eager to see the school become a class operation. Also like Seldin, he was a fine judge of talent, and he installed nationally recognized chairmen in key areas such as biochemistry, biology, and physiology, and for the first time the school also brought in top talent to head key administrative positions, including business officer and associate dean for student affairs.
Within a year of his arrival at UT Southwestern, Sprague presented local civic leaders with a staggering $40 million construction plan that would add nearly a million square feet to the Harry Hines plant. He convinced them that he could bring it off—after all, this was not some stranger blowing smoke, but a good old boy from Oak Cliff. The local community contributed $8.5 million to the undertaking, which in the 1960s was a fundraising phenomenon. During his 19-year tenure, the physical facility grew from three buildings to 20, the faculty from 200 to 800, and the annual budget from $10 million to $200 million. Sprague resigned as head of UT Southwestern in 1986 and has since served as president and later as chairman of the board at Southwestern Medical Foundation.
Michael Hazel is the editor of Legacies, a local history journal. Tom Peeler is a noted local historian.
