OBITUARIES

Class of 1924

Marcy H. Cowan, retired educator and lawyer, on May 25, 1999. A lifelong resident of Brooklyn, Cowan received an LL.B. from Fordham and a master's from the New School for Social Research. He began teaching in the New York City public schools shortly after graduation and served for many years as principal of P.S. 270. He also taught at the New York City Community College, served as assistant examiner for the NYC Board of Education, and was general counsel for the Union of School Superintendents. He was a member of the Association of Teachers of Social Sciences and the Economics Teachers Association. After retiring from full-time teaching, Cowan continued his legal practice in Manhattan. An active alumnus, Cowan participated in several fund drives for the College. On the day before his 75th reunion in 1999, Cowan visited the Morningside Heights campus. Survivors include sons Edward '54 and Neil '60 G.S., and granddaughters Rachel Jennifer '90, Jennifer R. Cowan '91 Barnard '97L, and May Deborah '95 Barnard. The family has established a book endowment at Columbia in Cowan's honor.

Class of 1925

Francis K. Nelson, Jr., Atlanta, in 1998.

Class of 1928

Philip Feldblum, retired labor attorney, Philadelphia, on February 14, 1999. A 1930 graduate of the Law School, Feldblum's interest in labor law stemmed from his father, Adolph Feldblum, who in 1930 was appointed "impartial chairman" of the dress industry by New York Governor Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Feldblum joined the New York State Labor Relations board in 1942 as a senior attorney. He became associate general counsel in 1944 and general counsel in 1951. As general counsel, a position he kept until 1967, Feldblum was a highly successful litigator, winning over 95 percent of his cases. A decade before Guss v Utah Labor Board (1957), which held that state regulation of labor relations was barred even when the National Labor Relations Board declines jurisdiction, Feldblum became concerned that federal preemption of labor relations legislation could lead to unregulated labor relations in some circumstances, and he wrote and spoke frequently on the issue. In 1959 Congress enacted legislation that embodied proposals Feldman had recommended in testimony before the Senate Labor Committee in 1953 and filled the legislative gap. In 1967 Feldblum became deputy director and general counsel of the newly created New York City Office of Collective Bargaining, a body composed of city and union officials that processed labor disputes between the city and its employees. He was instrumental in drafting the office's policies, rules and regulations, and in 1970 he conducted the preliminary negotiations that led to binding arbitration to settle collective bargaining impasses. Resigning in 1971, he became an arbitrator, settling numerous cases involving state, city and federal agencies. A life member of the National Academy of Arbitrators, he retired in 1986, when he moved to Philadelphia.

Sydney M. Simon, retired physician, Long Branch, N.J., on June 22, 1998. Simon, a 1932 graduate of P&S, had a private family practice in the Bronx, N.Y., for 50 years. He served as an Army medical captain during World War II.

Class of 1929

Jule Eisenbud, psychiatrist and parapsychology researcher, Denver, on March 10, 1999. Eisenbud, who received his medical degree from P&S in 1934, was an associate in psychiatry at P&S from 1938 to 1950, while also maintaining a private practice in the city. In 1950, he became an associate clinical professor of psychiatry at the University of Colorado Medical School and the first psychoanalyst with a private practice in Denver. Eisenbud researched numerous areas of psychiatry during his long career, and his opinions were sought on issues ranging from the Kinsey Report to racial prejudice. But it was his forays into the paranormal that earned Eisenbud notoriety. In the controversial The World of Ted Serios (1967), Eisenbud recounted his experiments with a Chicago bellhop who appeared to be able to project mental images onto photographic film. Serios's projections, which Eisenbud dubbed "thoughtographs," were inexplicable, dreamlike images. The book was widely criticized when it appeared: In a New York Times review, H. J. Eysenck of the University of London blasted Eisenbud's experimental methods, insisted that the images were the result of trickery, and suggested that Eisenbud was either Serios's dupe or his accomplice. If the images were the result of trickery, however, no one has been able to demonstrate how the trick was accomplished, and Eisenbud's reputation shielded him from most criticism. Among parapsychology researchers, Eisenbud is credited with illuminating new areas for psychical research, especially how unconscious processes affect psychical functioning. Eisenbud was a fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, a member of the American Psychoanalytic Association, and a charter member of the Parapsychological Association. He was instrumental in establishing the medical section of the American Society for Psychical Research.

David A. Krosnick, Columbus, Texas, in 1998.

John Franklin Murphy, retired businessman, Wellfleet, Mass., on July 2, 1999. While at the College, Murphy rowed No. 2 on the undefeated Columbia varsity eight crew that won the Poughkeepsie Regatta and the national championship; in his senior year, he was team captain. He and his teammates were later inducted into the U.S. Rowing Hall of Fame. Murphy worked for the Nassau Suffolk Lumber and Supply Company on Long Island from 1930 until his retirement in 1970. He moved to Wellfleet upon retirement.

Class of 1931

Francis C. Keil, retired physician, Ithaca, N.Y., on April 2, 1999.

Edgar O. Martinson, physician, North Branford, Conn., on April 2, 1999. Martinson, who received his medical degree from P & S in 1935, had a general surgical practice in Brooklyn, N.Y. for many years.

Charles L. Mayer, attorney, Shreveport, La., on December 24, 1998.

Class of 1932

Bernard E. Simon, plastic surgeon, on August 1, 1999. A Brooklyn, N.Y. native, Simon enrolled in P&S but received his medical degree from Johns Hopkins in 1937. Upon completing his residency at Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan, he continued to work there for 40 years until his retirement in 1979 as chief of the division of plastic surgery. Simon is best known for his work on the team of doctors who operated on the "Hiroshima Maidens," a group of 25 female survivors disfigured by the World War II atomic bombing. Along with donating their time and services, the team members were among the first doctors to instruct and exchange ideas with Japanese doctors in the field of plastic surgery, then a little-known area of medicine in Japan. At a 1996 reunion, his former patients credited Simon with not only reconstructing their scarred bodies but also helping to reconstruct their lives. In The New York Times, Shigeko Sasamori, whose burns covered one third of her body and required over a dozen operations, praised Simon and his colleagues for enabling her to move forward in life.

Class of 1933

J. Harry Carr, retired accountant, Hampton Bays, N.Y., in 1998. Carr was comptroller for Vitro Engineering Co. in New York for many years.

Class of 1934

Robert W. Gitzen, retired executive, Menlo Park, Calif., on July 31, 1999. Gitzen, who received a law degree from Columbia in 1936 and a master's from the Business School in 1937, was an executive at Western Electric for many years.

Bernard C. Glueck, retired psychiatrist, Goshen, Conn., July 24, 1999. A 1938 graduate of Harvard Medical School, Glueck became certified in psychoanalysis by the Columbia University Psychoanalytic Clinic. In the 1940s he assumed the leadership of Stoney Lodge, a psychiatric facility in Westchester County, N.Y., which his parents (both psychiatrists) had founded. He was supervising psychiatrist at New York's Ossining state prison from 1949 to 1952 and became the first president of the Westchester County Psychiatric Association. In 1960, he became director of research at the Institute of Living in Hartford, Conn. In addition, Glueck was a professor of psychiatry at the University of Connecticut Health Center. He was a past chairman of the Research and Development Committee of the American Psychiatric Association, of which he was a life fellow. He also served as president of the American Psychopathological Association, chairman of the Narcotic Addiction and Drug Abuse Review Committee of the National Institute of Mental Health, and chairman of the Connecticut Council of Corrections Officers. Glueck died less than three hours after his wife, Mary Louise, who suffered from diabetes and Alzheimer's disease, had passed away at a local hospital. A few months earlier, he had promised her that he would not die before she did.

Robert Lieberman, retired writer, New York, in 1998. Lieberman, who earned a master's in psychology from Columbia, was a freelance writer and editor. Previously he had worked for the Chicago Tribune and the New York News Syndicate.

Class of 1935

Leonard Wallace Robinson, author, Missoula, Mont., on April 30, 1999. A native of Malden, Mass. Robinson was editor of The Columbia Review while at the College. Robinson enjoyed a long career as an editor as well as a writer. Hired initially as a staff writer for The New Yorker, he later became managing editor in charge of fiction at Esquire, fiction editor at Collier's Magazine, and executive editor at Rinehart Publishing. His fiction appeared in many publications, including The New Yorker and Harper's, and he was the recipient of several writing awards. His short story "The Ruin of Soul" appeared in the 1950 O. Henry Prize Stories and another, "The Practice of an Art," was selected The Best American Short Stories of 1965. His novels include The Secret Service (1960), The Assassin (1967), and The Man Who Loved Beauty (1976). In The Whale, a collection of his poetry, was published in 1984. Fascinated by psychology, Robinson apprenticed himself for a time in the 1950s to a prominent psychologist as a lay practitioner. During the 1960s, he was an adjunct professor at the Journalism School, where he founded and taught in the magazine article workshop. Robinson spent much of the 1970s in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, but moved to Missoula, Mont. the 1980s, where he taught creative writing at the University of Montana.

Class of 1936

Robert Ernst, retired professor, Westbury, N.Y., on July 15, 1999. Ernst, who received a master's from Brown in 1937 and a doctorate from Columbia in 1947, was professor emeritus of history at Adelphi University in Garden City, N.Y. Previously he had taught at the University of North Carolina and at Briar Cliff College in Sioux City, Iowa. He was the author of Immigrant Life in New York City, 1825-1863 (1949, republished in 1994), Rufus King, American Federalist (1968), and numerous scholarly articles.

Class of 1937

Robert G. Barnes, retired publisher, Lakeville, Conn., January 24, 1999. Barnes, who attended the Engineering School after graduation, began his career at Proctor & Gamble. After serving in the U.S. Naval Reserve as a lieutenant commander during World War II, he joined Doubleday & Co., for whom he was production manager of Doubleday's Hanover, Pa., manufacturing plant; manager of Country Life Press on Long Island; and manager of the company's Berryville, Va., manufacturing plant. In 1960, he was made assistant to the president in Doubleday's New York office, where he managed the paperback division, including the Anchor, Image, and Dolphin Books imprints. He later became first vice president for personnel. He joined Columbia University Press as director and president in 1969 and retired in 1980. His 11 years were marked by the publication of the fourth edition of The New Columbia Encyclopedia and by consistent growth in sales. After retirement, he became a publishing consultant to Moseley & Co. until 1984.

J. Franklyn Bourne, Fairmount Heights, Md., in 1998. Robert Fondiller, inventor, consultant and entrepreneur, New York, on February 9, 1999. Fondiller, who received a master's from the Stevens Institute of Technology, an MBA from NYU, and a doctorate in psychology from California's Fremont College, was a prolific engineer and consultant. After working for a time with Western Electric, Fondiller became president of Fondiller Corp., later known as Futura Corp. The holder of 20 patents, "Robin" Fondiller was credited with inventing a battery used to power life-support systems in spacesuits used on the first moonwalk, the erase key for typewriters, the wristwatch calculator, and fitted bedsheets. He designed clip-on sunglasses, the first kitchen configured for use by the wheelchair-bound, a "healthmobile" with medical diagnostic equipment for use in rural areas, and the "princess" telephone. He also created a spray process to help construct low-cost housing in less than a day. A member of Mensa, the Explorers' Club and the New York Academy of Sciences, as well as a Knight of Malta, Fondiller was something of an eccentric - he once entertained the King of Spain with grilled cheese sandwiches. On a trip to Cuba in 1960 to meet Magda Lupescu, the mistress of the deposed king of Romania, Fondiller was arrested for taking unauthorized photographs, only to be released when it was discovered that he had forgotten to load film in his camera. He learned to fly airplanes after being forced to land a plane in Mexico when the pilot suffered a sudden heart attack. Fondiller became a widely respected consultant on economic development, technology and business management, advising 21 governments (including the People's Republic of China, Russia and South Korea) and the United Nations. He addressed the general assembly of UNESCO in Paris on a literacy system for underdeveloped countries that he had developed. Fondiller also taught widely, including courses at City College, the New York Institute of Technology, NYU and Columbia; in later years, he became a popular speaker for the American Management Association.

Class of 1939

George Feldmann, Wood Creek, Del., on July 3, 1999. Feldmann studied chemical engineering, receiving a master's degree in 1941 from the Engineering School. He worked on the Manhattan Project, then joined the DuPont Company where he worked for nearly 40 years, eventually becoming Principal Marine Engineer.

Robert Gericke, retired professor, Springfield, Mass., on January 3, 1999. Gericke had been a professor of history at Bay Path College in Longmeadow, Mass., for many years, and willed his large collection of history books to the College. Memorial contributions can be made to the College to maintain the Gericke Collection.

William F. Le Mien, retired banker, Laurelton, N.Y., in 1998. Le Mien worked for many years at Citicorp.

M. Lee Saunders, freelance editor, Orlando, Fla., in 1999. Saunders worked for the Orlando Opera Company.

Class of 1941

Edward A. Bernholz, Jr., retired executive, Houston, on February 27, 1999.

W. Philip Van Kirk, attorney, Rye, N.Y., on August 15, 1999. After World War II service as a captain in Army Intelligence for the 412th Fighter Squadron, Van Kirk received his law degree from Columbia in 1946. He served as managing partner for the firm of Burns, Van Kirk, Greene, and Kafer in New York and as a partner in several other Manhattan firms. Most recently, Van Kirk was of counsel to the firm of Meighan & Necarsulmer in Mamaroneck, N.Y. An enthusiastic outdoorsman, Van Kirk was affiliated with several sports clubs and spent considerable time at a farm in Williamsville, Vt., that he purchased in the early 1960s. A longtime resident of Scarsdale, he moved to Rye in 1988. Van Kirk's service to his alma mater included support of the Alpha Delta Phi chapter at Columbia and his class's presidency.

Class of 1946

Herman M. Bates, Jr., real estate broker, Briarcliff Manor, N.Y., on September 9, 1999. A licensed real estate broker, Bates was national sales manager and president of H. Bates Co. of New York. He had served as a member of the Ossining Assessment Review Board, president of the Young Men's Republican Club of Westchester County, member of the Westchester County Republican Committee, chairman of the Ossining Republican Town Committee, and member of the Westchester County Disposal Advisory Board from its inception until his death. He was also a life member of Sigma Chi fraternity and a member of the Veterans of the Seventh Regiment, New York National Guard.

Class of 1949

Albert E. Elsen, art historian, Palo Alto, Calif., on February 2, 1999. Elsen, the Walter A. Haas Professor of Humanities at Stanford, was a professor of art at Stanford for 27 years and an international authority on the history of modern sculpture, particularly the work of Auguste Rodin. He earned his doctorate at Columbia under the noted art historian Meyer Schapiro '24 and taught at Carleton College (1952-58) and Indiana University (1958-68). He was a visiting professor at Stanford in 1963-64 and joined the faculty in 1968. Elsen was widely credited with renewing scholarly interest in Rodin's work. Through his efforts, the Stanford University Museum acquired the world's second largest collection of Rodin's works. Considered "the father of outdoor sculpture" at Stanford, his leadership was responsible for the university's creation of a Rodin sculpture garden adjacent to the museum, with Rodin's massive Gates of Hell as the centerpiece. He also produced two major exhibitions on the artist, including "Rodin's Drawings, True and False" exhibited at the National Gallery in Washington and the Guggenheim Museum in 1972-73. An innovative teacher, Elsen helped develop the first university course on art law; he became an international authority on art forgeries and contributed to legislation designed to protect artists from hazardous materials. In 1978, he won the Dean's Award for Distinguished Teaching at Stanford. He was the recipient of fellowships from the Fulbright-Hays Program, the Guggenheim Foundation, the American Society of Learned Societies, and the Senior National Endowment for the Humanities. Elsen was a consultant to many museums and organized exhibitions for the Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim Museum, the National Gallery of Art, the Baltimore Museum of Art and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, among others. A past president of the College Art Association, he supervised the body's creation of a code of ethics for art historians. Elsen was a contributing editor to ARTNews and the author of several books - including Rodin's Gates of Hell, In Rodin's Studio, Purposes of Art, The Sculpture of Henri Matisse, The Origins of Modern Sculpture and Modern European Sculpture, 1918-1945 - and countless articles. He co-authored Law, Ethics and the Visual Arts with John Merryman.

Class of 1955

Marvin W. Simonson, retired editor, Utica, Mich., on November 14, 1998. In the late 1950s Simonson held a series of newspaper jobs in his native Michigan, including staff writer at the Muskegon Chronicle and the Daily Monitor-Leader in Mt. Clemens, state capitol correspondent for the now defunct Detroit Times, and picture editor and assistant city editor for the Macomb Daily. In the 1970s, he became advertising and publications supervisor for Macomb County Community College in Warren, Mich., from which he retired.

Class of 1957

A. Arthur Gottlieb, physician and medical researcher, New Orleans, on June 7, 1998. Born in Haifa, in what was then Palestine, to a British diplomat father and American mother, Gottlieb attended the Bronx High School of Science and entered the College before his 16th birthday as part of the Ford Foundation's early admission scholarship program. At Columbia, he served as coxswain of the junior lightweight crew, became a member of Alpha Epsilon Pi, and graduated summa cum laude with distinction in chemistry. Elected a member of Phi Beta Kappa, Gottlieb received his medical degree from NYU in 1961 with the prize for highest academic standing. After a medical residency at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in Boston, Gottlieb became a clinical associate at the National Institutes of Health. In 1965 he joined Harvard University, where he became a research fellow and later a tutor in chemistry, an associate in medicine and assistant professor of medicine. In 1969, Gottlieb joined Rutgers University's Institute of Microbiology as an associate professor, becoming a full professor of microbiology in 1972. From 1975 until his death, Gottlieb was a professor of medicine and chair of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Tulane Medical School in New Orleans. From 1981 to 1996, he was also president, CEO and scientific director of IMREG, Inc., a New Orleans-based publicly held biotechnology firm specializing in immunoregulation. Early in his career, Gottlieb's research demonstrated the role of macrophage in processing antigens to initiate the immune process. During the last 20 years, his research focused on discovering substances that support the human immune system. The discovery of these substances also demonstrated the link between the neuroendocrine system and the immune system, which had been elusive. His research led to the discovery and testing of novel investigational therapies for diseases that affected, or were affected by, the human immune system. Gottlieb, who published his first medical article while still a medical student, wrote more than 100 medical and scientific papers; he also served on editorial boards of the International Journal of In Vivo Research, the Regiculoendothelial Society, Immunological Communications, and the IRCS Journal of Medical Sciences. Gottlieb held 15 U.S. patents and 29 foreign patents pertaining to the regulation of human immunity. A respected lecturer and teacher in America and overseas, Gottlieb had been a visiting professor in Melbourne, Australia; Wakayama and Maebashi, Japan; and Shanghai. At his death, he was president of the International Transfer Factor Society. He was a consultant to various government agencies, including the FDA and the National Institutes of Health. He was a member of many medical school committees and scientific societies as well as a fellow of the American College of Physicians and the American Academy of Microbiology and a traveling fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine. Survivors include his wife, Dr. Marise S. Gottlieb (née Suss) Barnard '58.

Class of 1959

Robert E. Leeds, West Lynn, Mass., in 1998.

Gene Ulansky, writer, Berkeley, Calif., April 23, 1998. Ulansky, who received a master's degree from the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and a doctorate from the University of California at Berkeley, was a partner at Writing Repair, a Berkeley-based firm.

Class of 1963

Robert D. Ennis, physician, Sebastopol, Calif., on June 3, 1998.

Class of 1964

Howard M. Fraser, educator, Williamsburg, Va., on April 18, 1999. Fraser, who did some postgraduate work at Columbia, earned a master's and doctorate at the University of New Mexico and held a second master's from Harvard. He was a professor of Spanish and Portuguese at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va.

Class of 1968

Maurice H. Dumas, reporter, Penn Yan, N.Y., on April 1, 1999. After graduation, Dumas first pursued a career in education, teaching school in Stratford, N.H. In 1974, he and his wife, Frances, moved to Barrington, N.Y., where they worked pruning grapes at local vineyards. A chance encounter in 1979 with the editor of a local weekly paper, The Chronicle Express, launched Dumas's journalism career. After six months at The Chronicle Express, he was hired by The Finger Lakes Times, where he stayed until illness forced him to retire in 1998. Dumas was well respected for his coverage of Yates County, for which he won four New York Associated Press Awards.

Compiled by Tim Cross and Lisa Kitayama