My father George Rosen, MD, Ph.D., died 33 years ago in Oxford , England. It is in memory of my beloved parent that I wish to memorialize him, once again. Remarkable by any measure, the man, the author, the practitioner, the teacher, he exerted a deep and lasting influence on his generation and on the generation that was to follow his. As a parent he was loving and exacting, and gave both my brother, Paul Peter Rosen, M.D.,and myself a lasting love for the world, be it cultural experience, anthropological understanding, scientific curiosity and practice or innumerable other facets of knowledge: nothing seemed too small or too large to consider. How fortunate I was to be nurtured in this context. Books surrounded us and music from Dowland to Brecht with the MJQ and the Blues were staple fare. Lucky me. I vividly recall Balanchine's troupe at the City Center and Jose Limon at Barnard. My father's great love, his wife, my mother, Beate Caspari-Rosen shaped the welcoming atmosphere of the household. But it was a household that focused on work. In the evenings, after my parents returned from their busy day of teaching or practicing medecin:, my father wrote and my mother assisted him in his labors. We did not have a television set until the 1960s! But among my very earliest memories are visits to museums, and hikes in New York City and later in New York State and Maine.
Thirty-three years ," three decades and then some," and yet my father's presence is as vivid as ever. It is only his voice that I have difficulty recreating. But somewhere an archive must hold a recording of his voice .
My father was born in Brooklyn, New York and his parents may have been born in the Ukraine in Lvov. But I am uncertain. Since I inherited my father's curiosity and I am an historian, I hope to be able to piece together fragements and regain the past that vanishes into obscurity.
The photographs I have chosen do not follow an argument or a chronology, but they do show facets of his life: he gardened, he served in the military, voluntarily enlisting. Knowing at first hand the Nazi agenda, since he received his medical degree in Berlin during the rise of Hitler in the 1930s, he did not hesitate, despite the fact that he had two babies and a wife and family who depended upon him. Among his other duties was intelligence, medical intelligence to discover what was taking place in the concentration camps. Fluent in German and a physician, he interviewed German military charged with carrying out extermination and more.
Two pictures relate to that phase of his life. His teaching career began at Columbia University, The School of Public Health, now titled The Mailman School of Public Health (And to keep this post up to date, the institution where Chelsea Clinton received her doctoral degree.). In the 1960s , he went to Yale University, where he had a joint appointment , teaching the history of medicine and also courses Public Health.
People with his commitment to public health and who fought for it despite grave consequences are difficult to locate today. And his vast knowledge was brought to bare on the history of medicine. His work opened up mnumerous avenue for research and to this day his work still lives, I am thankful to report.
And now for the pictures:
Military Intelligence
Service form
Canterbury Ct, North Society Road, my parents. Schatzi our dachshund, myself and a friend
George Rosen tending the lilacs in Canterbury
Geroge Rosen seated at his desk, in his office at Columbia School of Public. Note objects on desk
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