of The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery (1994;
76-A: 1759–1763).
John Golding was a kind, charming, witty man, informed about everything. His prodigious memory kept paperwork to a minimum and pro- vided a constant supply of entertaining stories.
People enjoyed working with him on projects. He had a novelist’s perception of character, which enabled him to find people in the community to help. The projects all grew out of the commu- nity’s needs and it was the community that achieved them—steered by John.
After taking his grandchildren to the zoo, John Golding came home, collapsed and died. A state funeral followed and all Jamaica stopped for the day. This remarkable man had been a hero in Jamaica since 1954 when he coped with a polio epidemic and with its aftermath. His kindness, enthusiasm and ability to carry things through were held up as a national example.
He leaves his wife Patricia, his son Mark and daughter Anna, together with thousands of friends and patients who are better for having known him.
from Manchester University in 1932 and became FRCS (England) in 1935; I was a Hunterian pro- fessor in 1940.
After chance meetings with Robert Jones, I was determined to become an orthopedic surgeon and joined the orthopedic unit of Manchester Royal Infirmary, where I came under the influence of Harry Platt and Henry Osmond-Clarke. From 1942 to 1946, I served in the Royal Army Medical Corps as an orthopedic specialist, and in 1945 I was appointed MBE (Military), an honor which, as a Welsh nationalist, I tried to refuse, only to find that refusal of military “honors” is, appar- ently, impossible.
After demobilization, John Charnley and I were appointed honorary orthopedic surgeons to Manchester Royal Infirmary. I also joined the staff of the Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Ortho- pedic Hospital in Oswestry. In 1952, I was appointed director of the University Department of Orthopedic Surgery in Manchester Royal Infir- mary. I retained this office and my post at Oswestry until 1973, when I retired to the village of Eglwysbach, where I have been able to pur- sue my interests in Welsh culture with great happiness.
My career in Manchester was a partial failure.
I had hoped to re-establish a first-class academic department but did not succeed in so doing, despite serving on or chairing all the appropriate committees. My unhappiness in Manchester, however, was fully compensated for by my great pleasure in working in Oswestry and the North Welsh clinics. There I had splendid colleagues and excellent facilities.
I published widely and a monograph on Pott’s paraplegia (Oxford University Press, 1956), written in collaboration with my old school-fellow Herbert Seddon and my Oswestry colleague Robert Roaf, led to my becoming hon- orary secretary of the Medical Research Council subcommittee on the treatment of spinal tubercu- losis. After Seddon’s retirement I became chair- man in 1974 and my duties involved regular travel in Africa and the Far East until 1981.
I was fortunate to be a visiting professor, guest lecturer or examiner in many countries, particu- larly in the Far East, and was the president’s guest lecturer at the meeting of the American Orthope- dic Association in 1972.
I was fortunate to have no interest in or talent for sport, and was able to devote my time to work, the Welsh language and literature, chamber music and opera. I was delighted to become a member 121
Who’s Who in Orthopedics
David Lloyd GRIFFITHS
1908–1997
I was born in 1908 in Wales, of Welsh parents, and brought up as monoglot English, which I remedied as soon as possible. In 1917 we moved to Manchester, and I was educated at William Hulme’s Grammar School, of which I eventually became Chairman of the Governors. I graduated
Who’s Who in Orthopedics
of the Court of the Royal National Eisteddfod of Wales.
I was considered, by my friends, to be a good surgeon but enjoyed a vastly overrated repu- tation as a teacher. I was also a good after- dinner speaker, another rather valueless accomplishment.
In 1939 I married Nancy Mary Webb, my dearly loved and unfailing supporter. We had three children. I have enjoyed my life and, given the chance, would do the same again.
David Lloyd Griffiths (Lloyd to his colleagues) was a remarkable person with his own firm views on matters orthopedic and general. He expressed these with clarity and honesty, sometimes with ascerbic intensity, but was a stickler for accuracy of expression.
His “auto-obituary” infers that his career in Manchester left him unfulfilled, although one must doubt that assessment. He certainly had a deep attachment to Oswestry as a senior member of the “Welsh firm” in harness with Sir Reginald Watson-Jones, Rowland Hughes, Gruff Roberts, Arwyn Evans and others. His contact with rural Welsh life in peripheral clinics led to a valiant struggle with the intricacies of the Welsh tongue.
The respect of his patients was reinforced by his deep knowledge of Welsh and Celtic culture and music.
He did not aspire to high office in the British Orthopedic Association but he commanded great respect internationally as a teacher, lecturer and writer. His contribution to the management of spinal tuberculosis in developing countries is a notable memorial.
His occasional eccentricity was legendary: I have seen him meandering to the operating theater from the doctor’s mess dressed in a col- orful kimono emblazoned with a red dragon (Welsh presumably).
He retired with Nancy to Eglwysbach in the idyllic Conwy Valley for a very happy period of vigorous community and academic activities.
After he lost his beloved Nancy, he reluctantly left Wales for Cheshire. Despite deteriorating eye- sight and general ill health, his spirit remained indomitable to the end.
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Patrick HAGLUND
1870–1937
In its earliest stages Scandinavian orthopedic practice developed largely along German lines.
Special hospitals for the treatment of cripples were set up, often under the aegis of voluntary organizations. These institutions provided not only beds and outpatient clinics but workshops, which became centers for the supply of orthope- dic appliances and artificial limbs for a consider- able hinterland, and were used also for vocational training. Patrick Haglund of Stockholm was for many years the recognized leader among a small and slowly expanding group of Scandinavian orthopedists. His earlier training had been in German orthopedic clinics and on returning to Stockholm he began almost single handed to create an orthopedic center in premises that con- sisted of a number of houses adapted for the purpose. This was the forerunner of the modern orthopedic hospital to be erected 30 years later on the site of the new medical center of the Caroline Institute—the Medical College of Stockholm. In the rear of opening of the new hospital, Haglund reached the age of 65 and thus was deprived of the joy of working in an institute to the design of which he had given so much thought. To the somewhat primitive and crowded premises of the old Vanforeanstalten, Haglund had attracted patients from all over Sweden and he made good use of this material in his writings and in the train- ing of his assistants. Haglund was a man of high culture, widely read, and a lover of music. His monograph on the Principles of Orthopedics
