Memorial Minute - Sydney J. Freedberg

Sydney Joseph Freedberg died on May 6, 1997, after an illness that he had long overcome with valiant determination and good humor. He was born in Boston in 1914 and graduated with distinction from the Boston Latin School. What seemed to him an incongruity between his origins and the cosmopolitan world of art scholars, connoisseurs and collectors into which he quickly became absorbed no doubt prompted him to create in dress and in speech an image of fastidious refinement; his celebrated accent, perhaps initially intended to be British, effectively erased the Boston connection, and never failed to promote discussion. He was always willing to joke about it himself, invariably describing it as "pure affectation." His prose -- and lecture -- style, perfectly suited to his nuanced penetration into paintings and drawings, was also a consciously nurtured construction of a Henry-Jamesian complexity.

Apart from a period of teaching at Wellesley College, his career before retirement was tied to Harvard; He received his B.A. summa cum laude in 1936, his Ph.D. in 1940, and he published the majority of his books with the Harvard Press. After receiving his doctorate he served for four years in the Army, while attached to a British naval intelligence unit accountable directly to the British War Cabinet, he risked disciplinary action by refusing as a matter of conscience to work on intelligence about Rome, fearing that any information gained would be used in a military operation against the city which might damage works of art there. Despite this, he was awarded the Order of the British Empire. His many other honors include two of the most prestigious decorations of the Italian Republic as well as the International Galileo Galilei Prize.

Sydney served Harvard for twenty-seven years, from 1954 to 1983, in the last three years as the first Arthur Kingsley Porter Professor of Fine Arts. His legendary lectures and seminars, like his other contributions to art history, were predicated on the unshakable belief that our own humanity has been generated from the dim, distant past in an uninterrupted chain. In the study of the links that constitute the chain, he maintained, there is not only the explanation of what and how we have come to be, but the opportunity to relive portions of past time. The links that concerned him above all were those formed by the galaxy of painters active in Italy during the sixteenth century and the first decades of the seventeenth. He profoundly experienced the artistic individuality of artists active from the time of Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo and Titian to Caravaggio and the Carracci, and had a genius for communicating his reactions, controlled by his expert knowledge, in his always scrupulously nuanced language. Another strength was his passion for teaching advanced students the principles of connoisseurship: how to identify objects, determine their quality, and assess their character. His students now constitute a large percentage of those teaching Italian Renaissance art in research universities. These accomplishments served him as a collector in his own right, and he was the defacto curator of the Fogg Museum's Italian Renaissance and Baroque art. Sydney's intimate knowledge of the Fogg Museum collections and of the place of the Museum in the structure of the University led to his appointment, in 1978-79, as acting Director of the Museum, at the time of a major capital fund drive.

His two best-known books Painting of the High Renaissance in Rome and Florence of 1961, and Painting In Italy, 1500-1600, (in the Pelican Series in the History of Art), 1971 (both followed by several revised editions), were written at least partly in the spirit of public service - an extension, as it were, of teaching; they were major reference works on their subject in the ensuing years. The last book, Circa 1600: A Revolution of Style in Italian Painting, of 1983 reached beyond the close reading of pictures to discuss the impact of religious and political ideas of the period.

For almost four decades, Sydney was involved with the Harvard Center for Italian Renaissance Studies at Villa I Tatti. From its inception he was influential in defining its mission, shaping its policies, advising its Directors, and choosing its fellows. Sydney loved I Tatti from the days when it was the home of his mentor, Bernard Berenson; in its intellectual and sensuous surroundings he chose his specialty and forged his professional identity. It was his Italian home, where he seemed happier and more fulfilled than almost anywhere, and his affection was reciprocated by its fellows and its staff. In 1966, after the catastrophic floods in Italy, he served as national vice-chairman of the Committee to Rescue Italian Art, and later joined the Board of Directors of Save Venice.

On retiring from Harvard in 1983, Sydney accepted an invitation to join the staff of the National Gallery of Art in Washington as Chief Curator. Over the next five years he effectively carried out a mandate to raise the standards of curatorial appointments, scholarship and publishing, acquisitions and exhibitions. The highlight of his tenure was the organization, with John Pope-Hennessey of the Metropolitan Museum in New York, of a comprehensive exhibition of Italian art in the period of his main interest: "The Age of Correggio and the Carracci: Emilian Painting of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries." For his career achievements he was awarded, in 1988, the National Medal of the Arts, the only scholar to have received this decoration.

He is survived by his wife, the former Catherine Blanton (Harvard Ph.D., 1981), their son, Sydney Jr. (Harvard B.A., summa cum laude, 1995) and by William (Harvard B.A., 1964), Kate and Nathaniel, children from earlier marriages.

Sydney's capacity for friendship was, among those lucky enough to be his friends, legendary; in this he was as discriminating as in all his other enthusiasms; but once one was chosen, one was given without reservation his life-enhancing companionship. The friends whom he gathered around him on evenings in Channing Place, or at the I Tatti villino were drawn not merely from his professional circle but also from a more extended, comprehensive congregation.

Respectfully submitted,

Walter Kaiser

Seymour Slive

Arthur Solomon

John Wilmerding

James S. Ackerman, Chair

Memorial Minute - Benjamin Gene Covino

MEMORIAL MINUTE

Benjamin Gene Covino, Ph.D., M.D.

September 12, 1930 - April 6, 1991

Both the practice and science of regional anesthesia have expanded in acceptance and popularity over the past several decades, and in no small part owing to the efforts of the late Benjamin Covino, Ph.D., M.D. In his influential scientific and drug development work at the Astra Pharmaceutical Company, as one of the founders of the American Society of Regional Anesthesia (ASRA), and, at the time of his untimely death, as Chairman of the Department of Anesthesia at the Brigham and Women's Hospital, he had promoted the safe, multifaceted use of local anesthetics. During his tenure as Chairman at Brigham and Women's that department became a world center for teaching, practice and research on local anesthetics, a reputation that survives to this day.

In commemorating Ben Covino's career there are several aspects wherein he made everlasting impressions. Firstly, he was a devoted family man, a deeply religious man, and a lay member of the Catholic church. Secondly, he was chronologically first a scientist and then a physician, moving from basic research in cardiovascular physiology to a role in the development of new novel local anesthetics ultimately to a place as practicing anesthesiologist. He served in a third major part as an organizer and administrator, guiding the merger of three separate and disparate anesthesia departments into the eventual single entity at the Brigham and Women's Hospital. Fourth, he was an inspiring teacher, in the lofty position as Editor-in-Chief of the journal Regional Anesthesia, as an international lecturer in demand on all aspects of anesthesia and as an intimate teacher of residents in his specialty.

Religious belief was forever an essential fabric of Ben Covino's existence. He was taught by the Jesuits, both at Holy Cross and Boston College, who reinforced these values, and his one time classmate, then devoted spouse, Lorraine, was convinced that early on he contemplated seriously a purely religious life. Instead, Ben became a lector and later a Eucharistic Minister, thus permitted to distribute Communion to the congregation.

First and foremost, Ben's main concern was his family. He was a wonderful father; calm, patient, interested, loving and indulgent, a characteristic he might have modestly denied. The family was blessed in that they could travel about so often with him, and he occasionally took sons, Paul and Brian, individually, allowing each the opportunity to see what he did when he was away from them. It is noteworthy that Paul is a liturgical consultant and Brian a physician, such was the influential model of their father.

His personal concern extended well beyond his immediate family. Throughout his adult life, his peers, friends and family members gravitated to him when they were in need of help - professional, personal, or healthwise - and he was never too busy to take the time to listen.

Ben Covino took multiple pathways en route to his eventual professional position. Having earned an A.B. degree at Holy Cross College and completed work for the M.S. degree at Boston College, he entered a doctoral program in the Department of Physiology at Boston University. Fortunately for his later inclinations, the required studies included many of those assigned to first and second year medical students.

While a predoctoral candidate, Ben held several fellowships and assistantships, one of the latter provided by the U. S. Air Force under contract to support studies on the pathophysiology of deep hypothermia. Ben focused on the perplexing phenomenon of terminal ventricular fibrillation during hypothermia, attempting to elucidate the underlying mechanisms and to discover preventive measures. In his three predoctoral years, Ben impressed his colleagues with his theoretical and practical talents and his mature ambition and self-confidence. During this period, he published the results of his work in no less than seven peer-reviewed articles, an extraordinary feat for those times.

After the doctorate in Physiology he was commissioned second lieutenant in the
U. S. Air Force assigned to the Arctic Aeromedical Laboratory in Fairbanks, Alaska, where a prime area of research was hypothermia. Dr. Covino was provided with substantial support for experimentation and assigned the responsibility of monitoring all research contracts awarded by that laboratory to academic physiologists/biochemists/ pharmacologists in the U. S. Still in Alaska, Ben published a final paper resulting from his predoctoral work and authored 12 additional articles on hypothermia.

In the summer of 1957, Captain Covino was decommissioned and he and Lorraine returned to the Boston area where Ben enrolled as a first year student at Boston University School of Medicine. Simultaneously he was appointed Assistant Professor of Pharmacology at Tufts University School of Medicine, the first of a series of dual positions wherein he was both teacher and student.

In 1959, Ben transferred to the University of Buffalo, as a third year medical student as well as Assistant Professor of Physiology. As a student, the third and fourth academic years were programmed over three years with the awarded M.D. degree in June 1962. As Assistant Professor, he participated fully in teaching and he continued his program of experimentation on the cardiovascular effects of hypothermia.

In October 1962, Ben Covino joined a small pharmaceutical firm, Astra Pharmaceutical Products, Inc., in Worcester, Massachusetts, the firm a subsidiary of AB Astra, with headquarters in Sweden. In 1962, the Worcester firm had essentially one-product, lidocaine (Xylocaine"), a versatile local anesthetic which, at the time, was the most widely used local anesthetic in both medicine and dentistry. Ben Covino's first title at Astra was Director of Clinical Research, his first charge was to establish a Clinical Research Department. By 1977, his title had become Research Director and Executive Vice President, responsible for 105 positions in disciplines in the basic and clinical sciences.

In the year 1962, facing now Congressional amendments to the Food and Drug Act, Astra was fortunate since Dr. Covino had extensive experience with controlled experimentation and was current in his understanding of the rapidly changing clinical environment. From 1962 to 1979, during Ben Covino's stay, most of Astra's new drug applications were approved by the FDA, including the use of intravenous lidocaine as an antiarrhythmic agent, use of terbutaline as a bronchodilator and etidocaine as a long acting local anesthetic.

In the mid-sixties, Ben established a small clinical laboratory at Worcester's St. Vincent Hospital where he was able to carry out clinical studies on new compounds developed at Astra, such as the local anesthetic, etidocaine. In light of these new directions, Ben's interest moved away from cardiovascular physiology towards local anesthesia and pain. His professional focus also changed, from the role of research scientist to that of physician. Towards that end he took leave of his position at Astra and began an anesthesia residency at the Massachusetts General Hospital.

He completed the residency in the fall of 1977, following which he was appointed Professor of Anesthesia and Vice Chairman of the Department of Anesthesia at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center in Worcester, Massachusetts. On no other occasion in its long and illustrious history has the Department of Anaesthesia at the MGH had a resident graduate whose first academic appointment was that of Professor and Vice Chairman! In July of 1979, less than two years after completion of his residency, he returned to Harvard as Professor of Anaesthesia and Anesthetist-in-Chief at the soon to be Brigham and Women's Medical Center.

The task at the Brigham was a splendid opportunity and simultaneously a challenge. Not only must he succeed one of the true giants of anesthesia, Dr. Leroy D. Vandam, but he must preside over the unification of three separate and independent anesthesia services (Peter Bent Brigham, Robert Breck Brigham, and the Boston Hospital for Women) into a single, harmonious clinical and fiscal entity. Within the academic anesthesia community at Harvard, Ben Covino had the special capability of characterizing the contentious issues in a way that most often lead to harmonious solutions. Despite his strong leadership there was minimal discord and much satisfaction in the conduct and growth of his department.

Ben Covino's role in developing and popularizing the widespread use of local anesthetics, activities for which he was recognized internationally, must be appreciated in historical context. In the early 1960s when Covino joined Astra, local anaesthesia in clinical practice was at a low ebb, anesthesiologists having gone down the path of polypharmacy made possible by the introduction of muscle relaxants. This trend had deleterious effects on the practice of regional anaesthesia since it required little in the way of practical skills of dexterity apart from those required to set up an IV line and intubate the trachea. The same technique could be used for virtually all operations, major and minor. In many departments the use of regional techniques, particularly spinal anaesthesia, was considered too dangerous. Those responsible for teaching trainee anesthesiologists often did not have the experience or motivation to include regional blocks. Indeed, in many countries the attitude to teaching regional anaesthesia was positively hostile. It is true to say that it had survived at all only because of the enthusiasm and dedication of a small number of individual practitioners who were able to teach by example and clearly show the advantages.

With the inauguration of the American Society of Regional Anesthesia, of which he was a founding member, Dr. Covino quickly appreciated the contribution the Society could make to the teaching and development of regional anaesthesia. His enthusiastic promotion of this subspecialty was effectively focused through this Society, of which he was an outstanding president in 1988-89 and a leader throughout his life. By the time he assumed the Chair at Brigham and Women's Hospital, anesthesiology in the USA was changing quite dramatically and the specialty started to enjoy a very considerable increase in the number of young doctors seeking training in it. Many seasoned attendings as well as neophytes made pilgrimages to Covino's department to be immersed in the practice and research of regional anesthesia.

At the outset of the Brigham and Women's years, Dr. Covino presided over a merger attended by enormous changes with a new building, many operating rooms, intensive care wards and a busy department of obstetrics and gynecology. A pain service, both acute and chronic soon grew in use.

Covino foresaw the importance of pain management as an emerging subspecialty in anesthesia. He encouraged the growth and academic development of the Pain Treatment Center and initiated the use of Patient Controlled Analgesia for postoperative pain relief. Considering the huge workload he carried, he never became the unapproachable "big man". Much to the contrary, his door always remained open to all his staff and his wise council was much sought after. He never talked down to anyone and, only if it was unavoidable, would he ever give a direct order without full discussion of the problems. He retained his appetite for science and new and interesting findings always brought him forward to the edge of his seat, eyes sharp for details of the data and brain engaged in mechanistic analysis. Despite the years as research administrator and clinical chairman, his passion as an investigator remained at the core.

If a person's importance in the world can be gauged by the consequences of his departure, then Ben Covino's import was profound and long lasting. His death left an emotional void in the lives of people throughout the world. Those of us who continue the work we had done with him, however, are counseled by the wisdom that he provided and are nurtured by the spirit of his life.

G. R. Strichartz

with contributions from:

Lorraine G. Covino

Henry D'Amato

Richard Kitz

D. Bruce Scott