Frederick Griffiths St. ClairSTRANGE

Who’s Who in Orthopedics tially successful in this and remained a life-long critic of the fragmentation of the care of trauma.

Derick Strange was an articulate and enthusi- astic teacher, an original thinker rather than a regurgitator of the views of others. His initiative resulted in the beginning of postgraduate teach- ing at the Kent and Canterbury Hospital and the eventual opening of the Kent Postgraduate Medical Centre.

His most important contribution to the devel- opment of orthopedic surgery was probably the publication, in 1965, of his monograph entitled The Hip. It ran to only 284 pages, but Norman Capener, in his review of it in The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery, said that “in a special way, this book . . . can be described as a work of art.” A special feature was the line diagrams with which it was illustrated, which are an example of Strange’s ability to convey complex ideas simply by his own drawings. He was a member of the original group of ABC Traveling Fellows, and, at 86 years of age, published The History of the ABC Club of Traveling Fellows. Each year’s group, and each meeting of the club, is described. This book will surely be a valued possession of every member, and is a very good “read” for any ortho- pedic surgeon in the English-speaking world, if only for the insight it gives into the earlier exploits of some of the present-day leaders of the profession.

Strange won the Robert Jones Gold Medal and Association Prize for his essay on amputations in 1943, and was a Hunterian Professor in 1948.

He was a member of the editorial board of The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery from 1964 to 1968. He has been president of the orthopedic section of the Royal Society of Medicine, and vice president of the British Orthopedic Associa- tion. At the time of his death, he was one of only four surgeons who were honorary fellows of the British Orthopedic Association and who were British by birth.

For nearly 30 years, he was honorary surgeon to the Kent County Cricket Club, and served as honorary civilian consultant to the army from 1967 to 1976. His East Kent colleagues inaugu- rated an annual FG St. Clair Strange Lecture in 1988. He died during the night preceding the 2002 lecture.

Strange was a competent pianist, a painter in oils and watercolours, a poet, an observer of people, a raconteur and a deeply valued friend.

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Frederick Griffiths St. Clair STRANGE

1911–2002

Frederick Griffiths St. Clair Strange was born on July 22, 1911, in Moh Kan San, near Shanghai, to Dr. Charles Frederick Strange, of the Church Missionary Society, and Olive Cecilia Strange (née Harrison). He was educated at Rugby School and the London Hospital Medical College. He qualified in 1934, and gained the FRCS in 1939.

After a number of junior hospital posts, he spent the years of World War II as senior surgeon at Dunston Hill Hospital, near Newcastle, where he had sole charge of 200 beds for wounded service personnel.

He was appointed to the Kent and Canterbury

and Ramsgate Hospitals as an honorary consult-

ant in 1947, a year before the beginning of the

National Health Service. At this time, fractures

were managed by general surgeons and orthope-

dic clinics were organized by county councils or

large orthopedic hospitals. Strange realized the

need for a long-stay hospital for orthopedic

patients in East Kent and established an orthope-

dic unit at the Royal Sea Bathing Hospital in

Margate, which was then being used for the man-

agement of patients with tuberculosis. With the

success of the treatment of this disease by drugs,

the number of beds available for orthopedic

surgery increased, and the unit thrived until its

eventual closure in the 1980s. Strange also real-

ized the need for a centralized accident unit and

advised it be sited at Canterbury. He was only par-