Fame and Death
After three years in the military, Ransohoff completed his residency at Montefiore Hospital. He went on to teach at Columbia University and practice surgery at the New York Neurologic Institute at Presbyterian Hospital. In 1962, Ransohoff was invited to become chairman of the New York University School of Medicine, a prestigious position he held for over thirty years. While in this capacity, he was famed for hosting a weekly spinal and neurosurgical gathering for doctors of the tri-state area of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut to come and seek his advice on challenging cases. Ransohoff was part of the team at George Washington University Hospital that successfully operated on White House Press Secretary James Brady after the Secretary was shot in the 1981 Reagan assassination attempt. During his chairmanship at NYU, he was also known as an early and strong advocate of wider stem cell treatments.
In 1992, Dr. Ransohoff left New York University Hospital for Tampa, Florida, at the behest of the James A. Haley VA Hospital, which wanted to reform its neurosurgical department. Professionally he greatly improved the neurosurgical and spinal centers at the VA Hospital and Tampa General Hospital, and significantly added to the brain cancer research programs at Moffitt Cancer Center. In terms of his personal life, however, Dr. Ransohoff endured a spate of unwelcome publicity in 1999 after a 27-year-old lingerie model, Laura Holt, was sentenced to a year in jail for grand theft. She told police the doctor had given her more than $100,000 over time after her friends threatened to expose their affair.
Dr. Ransohoff died at his home on the morning of January 3, 2001 of natural causes.
Read more about this topic: Joseph Ransohoff
Famous quotes containing the words fame and, fame and/or death:
“The genuine remains of Ossian, or those ancient poems which bear his name, though of less fame and extent, are, in many respects, of the same stamp with the Iliad itself. He asserts the dignity of the bard no less than Homer, and in his era, we hear of no other priest than he.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Celebrity-worship and hero-worship should not be confused. Yet we confuse them every day, and by doing so we come dangerously close to depriving ourselves of all real models. We lose sight of the men and women who do not simply seem great because they are famous but are famous because they are great. We come closer and closer to degrading all fame into notoriety.”
—Daniel J. Boorstin (b. 1914)
“I knew the poor,
I knew the hideous death they die,
when famine lays its bleak hand on the door;
I knew the rich,
sated with merriment,
who yet are sad.”
—Hilda Doolittle (1886–1961)