Chapter 03: Post Retirement from MD Anderson

Chapter 03: Post Retirement from MD Anderson

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Description

Ms. Davis concludes the interview by discussing her departure from MD Anderson to the Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio. She worked as a library consultant, overseeing operations for various military libraries across the country. She ends the interview with anecdotes about her interactions with colleagues from the institution.

Identifier

DavisLF_01_20050618_C03

Publication Date

6-18-2005

City

Houston, Texas

Topics Covered

The Interview Subject's Story - Post-Retirement Activities; Post Retirement Activities; Career and Accomplishments

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

Disciplines

History of Science, Technology, and Medicine | Oncology | Oral History

Transcript

Kathryn Hoffman:

What made you decide to leave here?

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Yeah, that was my next question.

Lora Frances Davis:

OK, I had worked – see in World War II I was at the Naval Hospital at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, and I was at Lejeune when they built it, and we just had a hospital with tents. And anyway, then as soon as the Naval Hospital was built I went to it. I helped set up libraries on the base before then. And I had -- so I had seven years towards retirement when I was here in civil service and I had come here from Tokyo Army Hospital. And my commanding general there went to Brooke Army Medical Center and [inaudible] and anyway, like I said, everybody here was kind of worried about, are you really going to have a job or not. And the other thing was that I had seven years towards retirement and I thought that counted for something, and it did, too. So I went back to Brooke Army Medical Center which was really a big change because here you had unlimited funds. There you had to fight to get any. Well, the money and everything, you know, but ultimately I was glad. I went and I got -- when they started the Health Services Committee and I was their library -- what do they call them? Consultant, analysis. And I was the consultant on libraries and had charge over technically the personnel for the libraries in the continental United States and (inaudible) libraries in the continental United States and Hawaii and Alaska. So anyway, and then they were doing a study of Army libraries because some -- what we call special service lib-- popular type book -- had gotten a bad review so they were doing a study of all the Army's libraries and I would go and represent the medical ones in Washington. So I got a lot of time in Washington as well as in San Antonio. And I'd see over people I had worked with before, you know, and things like that. It was nice and I enjoyed it.

Kathryn Hoffman:

So you've been in San Antonio ever since you left here?

Lora Frances Davis:

Mhm.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Long time. How did Dr. Clark take your departure, or --

Lora Frances Davis:

I talked to him once, I think, and he said he always thought that I would be more interested if they had a broader field than just cancer. And I said, no, that was not my problem, but anyway, that's the only thing he ever said to me one way or the other, and I got a nice letter from Dr. Taylor, Dr. Grant Taylor somewhere.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Yeah, I did want to ask you a little more about Dr. Taylor. Did you know him in Japan?

Lora Frances Davis:

No, I didn't, but I knew of his work. And I had been on a tour one time when I went to Nagasaki and Hiroshima where -- and stayed at the [Tomom Kaj Commission's 16:05] place is. But I didn't know him. I never saw -- I don't remember ever seeing him over there. I might have. I could never remember whether I did or not.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Did you see him a lot once you were here?

Lora Frances Davis:

Yes, but I knew him for several months. Like I said, I didn't know he was supposed to be in charge of the library.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Did he take an active role in the library after you found out he was --

Lora Frances Davis:

Well, he was very positive about some of the things he did and didn't want done or something.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

What do you mean?

Lora Frances Davis:

I can't remember exactly now. And other times, you know, sometimes you'd think nobody could please him and then you'd get a letter thanking you for what you've done, so...

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Did any of the other --

Lora Frances Davis:

There was a lot of friction in those days from the various department heads and things and I don't -- like I said, everybody thought they were going to find the cause of cancer and nobody else was. Dr. Taylor said the biggest scourge of this country was going to be alcohol and if we -- and when they would discover the cure for cancer, then they'd work on alcohol.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Why did he think that?

Lora Frances Davis:

I don't know. He might turn out to be right.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Well, he may be, but I just -- I hadn't picked up on that in some other things so I just was curious. I wonder where that came from. Any other faculty or staff stand out? Do you remember Dr. Shu? (sp?)

Lora Frances Davis:

Just his name. I don't remember much about him or anything.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

I'm just trying to think of other -- any women faculty stand out from those years?

Lora Frances Davis:

There weren't very many women faculty people to have. One I told you about, the --

Kathryn Hoffman:

Psychiatrist?

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Yeah, she was just --

Lora Frances Davis:

Psychologist.

Kathryn Hoffman:

A psychologist?

Lesley Williams Brunet:

She was a psychologist, not --

Lora Frances Davis:

Yeah, she was a psychologist. She wasn’t a psychiatrist.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Let's see --

Lora Frances Davis:

And I told you about the nurse that I knew that was head of the nursing.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Renilda Hilkemeyer wasn't here then.

Lora Frances Davis:

She was.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Oh, she had started then?

Lora Frances Davis:

Mhm. It's funny, you can remember names if you look at them.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Marilyn Stovall was here then.

Lora Frances Davis:

Yes.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

She's still around and is very helpful.

Kathryn Hoffman:

p19:00] Here's the picture of Marilyn Stovall.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

They're doing quite a bit of work on the history of radiation physics here. Peter Almond, I don't know if you remember him. Other people that were around then...

Lora Frances Davis:

I see Dr. Russell here. And one of them's names I saw... I ought to look at the second names, too, shouldn't I? Dr. Shernell (sp?) was at one time a really important person here and I think he's the one that was the head of the Mormon church here in this part of Texas.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

He was head of the Mormon church?

Lora Frances Davis:

Mhm.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Oh, I didn't know that.

Lora Frances Davis:

And I think he's the one that -- when he was chairman of the committee they brought me here and then he left.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

The person you mentioned -- you were talking about someone you had talked to about what the library needed, and it was something about loyalty. Was that the administrator, like Joe Boyd or John Musgrove?

Lora Frances Davis:

No, he was like the number two man here and he was a retired Army General. I think his name began with an "L," let me see if I can find him.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

I'm not sure who that would be.

Lora Frances Davis:

The only name written in a book. I don't know if he was here later --

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Oh, Russell Connelly?

Lora Frances Davis:

No.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

I'm not sure who that would be. So it wouldn't have been the administrator of the hospital, the person who -- you know, the business office person?

Lora Frances Davis:

No, no, he was an MD.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

I thought Howe was.

Lora Frances Davis:

He probably wasn't here too long.

Kathryn Hoffman:

What about Copeland, when was he here?

Lesley Williams Brunet:

I don't think he got here till the '60s.

Lora Frances Davis:

I don't see a guy's name that sounds like him.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Is there anything I've maybe failed to ask you that stands out in your memory?

Lora Frances Davis:

I think they had a lot of good residents and I think they worked very hard. Then they had a lot of foreign residence that (inaudible) because they didn't go back home, they went from this hospital to one of the cancer hospitals like the one in New York and they always went round and round and some of them could speak good English and some of them didn't even know what they were doing because they didn't know enough English. And it bothered us that some of them would go back home and if like you were in an accident and you were in that country or something they'd say (inaudible) because he'd been trained in the United States and he wouldn't have known what he was trained in. Some of them just plain didn't know enough English and of course there were other ones who did. One of them from South America gave me a book of poems he wrote.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

A resident?

Lora Frances Davis:

Mhm.

Kathryn Hoffman:

Well, it sounds like you took very good care of the physicians and the residents here.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

And yeah, the library.

Lora Frances Davis:

I did the best I could.

Kathryn Hoffman:

Well, it sounds like you did a great job.

Lora Frances Davis:

Yeah, but it also makes -- all these things I've told you [inaudible] make it sound like I was hostile to the community.

Kathryn Hoffman:

No.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

No, it's -- there's --

Lora Frances Davis:

Dr. Shu was here.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Yeah, Dr. Shu.

Lora Frances Davis:

Oh, one time one of the doctors -- one of the people I had known at the library, see in Tokyo, when I was at Tokyo Army Hospital, at Keio University they had a medical -- an army school and so they would send me practice work students sometimes and then I was speaking one time at the national meeting that they had for the Japan Medical Library Association and who really belonged to it were not the librarian that was working in the library as much as some -- you know, somebody from the staff or professional person who was in charge of the library. That's who really came. And anyhow, what was I going to tell you? I forgot how it related to here and now I've lost my train of thought. Anyway, I went to one of those meetings and they did have one of the doctors, when they -- my little person who was translating seemed to get upset and everything because her professor was there and everything and so when one of them said, "Ms. Davis, I was trained at the University of Chicago." And so he told about the University of Chicago. I can't think now how I was going to relate this to Anderson. That's the trouble with being old, you forget. What were we talking about before --

Lesley Williams Brunet:

We're right there with you. It starts early.

Lora Frances Davis:

What were we talking about before that?

Lesley Williams Brunet:

We were talking about residents and --

Kathryn Hoffman:

That you took good care of --

Lesley Williams Brunet:

You took good care of the library and your activities. You were very active in the Medical Library Association, weren’t you, for years?

Lora Frances Davis:

Yes.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

You have a lot of Google hits. Do you know what those are? You’re online in a lot of places, your name is.

Lora Frances Davis:

What was I going to tell you? I don’t know now but it did have some connection. Well -- oh, I think it was Keio University which it was. Then -- oh, I know what I was going to tell you. Anyway, one of those libraries -- so I had price work at the library and said they would come to my -- you know -- and one of those men came to the United States, and he went to -- he called me, and anyway, he was going to Eastman Kodak somewhere in Canada and he had several other places going and just being polite I said, “Then where are you going from there?” Oh, he was coming to see me. Because, you know, Japanese people feel they’re obligated to anybody who taught them anything.

Kathryn Hoffman:

Yes, that’s right.

Lora Frances Davis:

So anyway, that was near Christmas time. I went home and picked up some kind of a bug and I came back, but anyway, somebody here helped me to get in touch with the Japanese community where we -- took him, you know, where they took him around for the New Years and that kind of thing. And then some way or another they got in here and let him hold some piece of equipment so he could watch some surgery. And all he ever got out of that was he had to hold something, which I think he considered kind of menial, and then we went over to Rice and I told him, I found out about the time he had his airline reservations all mixed up and I thought we’d go and get them straightened out. And I told him, I said that I’d go see about that and for him that there were these older ladies in the library and they would tell him, there’s a place -- they’d ask him, did he want to go up in the tower and look off? And I told him to say he didn’t want to because they really wanted -- he would walk up there. So anyhow, he went back and told the people in Tokyo that I was sick so they -- (laughter) couldn't see everything.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

(inaudible)

Lora Frances Davis:

(inaudible) this Japanese man visiting us.

Kathryn Hoffman:

Did you know when you were here, and he was a librarian, his name was Mr. Suka and I'm thinking he was at Keio.

Lora Frances Davis:

Tsuda.

Kathryn Hoffman:

Suga? S-U-G-A?

Lora Frances Davis:

T-S-U-D-A. Tsuda.

Kathryn Hoffman:

And so you were --

Lora Frances Davis:

He's been -- he came here to the University of Chicago for part of his training and then he kept going back and forth from time to time. He was always showing up somewhere.

Kathryn Hoffman:

Well, I'm wondering if it's the same man I know. I was in Japan in 1985 and I was there for the European Congress and Mr. Tsuda was on the committee that planned the meeting and I was there to teach and --

Lora Frances Davis:

Was he at Tokyo University?

Kathryn Hoffman:

He was either at Tokyo University or Keio, I can't remember which. And anyway, he came to see me. He came to visit me in the United States and he just has been a very dear friend ever since and he's probably in his 80s now.

Lora Frances Davis:

Well you don't pronounce it the same way we did anyway so you're probably saying the same man.

Kathryn Hoffman:

I'm thinking it's the same man.

Lora Frances Davis:

I'm pretty sure it is. He knows English real well.

Kathryn Hoffman:

Yes. Yes.

Lora Frances Davis:

Yeah, that's the same man.

Lesley Williams Brunet:

Small world.

Kathryn Hoffman:

Wow, we have that in common.

Lora Frances Davis:

Mhm. He was -- that time I was telling you about speaking at the conference and things. He had translated for me and I ended up saying that good medical library services, the name of the place or something, and he --

Kathryn Hoffman:

He gave me these when I was there.

Lora Frances Davis:

That’s nice. Well, let me tell you one of the funniest things I had happen. One time I was going out to the different medical libraries and there were two men that kind of helped us and one of them was connected with -- he was one of our troops, he was a Nisei and the other man was truly Japanese and worked with their military forces. And anyway, the one that was American spoke kind of broken or something and the other man spoke extremely well. Anyway, he was in there once and I've been somewhere or other and I said, you know, I take a dim view of giving all these things to these Japanese libraries because they don't run their libraries like we do and they don't -- END OF FILE

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Chapter 03: Post Retirement from MD Anderson

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