Walter Dandy - Personal Life

Personal Life

In 1923, five years after finishing his arduous surgical training, Dandy started to focus on his personal life. Throughout his training he had remained close to his parents, with whom he corresponded at times daily. Dandy made arrangements for his parents to move to Baltimore in early 1911, one year after he finished medical school. Dandy met his future wife, Sadie E. Martin, in 1923, got married on October 1, 1924, and had four children: Walter Edward Jr. (born 1925), Mary Ellen (1927), Kathleen Louise (1928), and Margaret Martin (1935). He described his family relations as "the finest thing in life." Fox 1984, p. 118) He vacationed with his family regularly, when his children's school schedule allowed. He rarely traveled, however, for professional meetings, and preferred to stay in Baltimore close to his family and work. Upon being invited to join the Society of Neurological Surgeons as a charter member, he wrote to Cushing on June 30, 1921, that he was "very averse to joining societies of all kinds because I feel they are more social than beneficial and I cannot spare the time for them." (Fox 1984, p. 73)

Irving J. Sherman, who trained in neurosurgery under Dandy from 1941 to 1943, addressed this in his recollections:

"Historians are uniformly effusive in praise of Dandy's research and surgery, but they are less kind with regard to his personality, no doubt because they did not know him personally ... Dandy never charged schoolteachers, clergy, other medical workers, or patients who had no money to pay. At times, he also gave money to patients to help them with the expense of coming to Baltimore. ... There were stories of Dandy being dictatorial and demanding perfect service for his patients, and these were true. There were other stories, also true, of Dandy having outbursts of temper when "things did not go right in the operating room," firing assistant residents, scolding personnel, and occasionally throwing an instrument. However, during my time on the general surgery and neurosurgery housestaff (1940-1943), I never observed such incidents. ... although Dandy was at times dictatorial and demanding, his actions made it obvious that he care deeply for our welfare, although not about how hard we worked." (Sherman et al. 2006)

Outside the hospital, Dandy's warmth and playfulness were evident in his interactions with his family, friends, and colleagues. (Tamargo 2002, p. 101). His personality is best summarized in his obituary in the Baltimore Sun of April 20, 1946:

"... Gruff of manner, hot of temper, and endowed with a tongue as sharp as his instruments, he exacted awe, respect, and the hardest kind of work from his students. ... And when they got to know him well, they found beneath the hard exterior - as is not uncommon in men of such temperament - a deep vein of tenderness."

Dandy enjoyed excellent health most of his life, except for November and December 1919, the year after completing his residency, when he became bedridden with sciatic neuralgia. (Fox 1984, p. 54) On April 1, 1946, five days before his 60th birthday, Dandy was hospitalized with a heart attack. He asked his secretary to help him prepare his will, which he signed on April 9 while in the hospital. He was discharged home, but suffered a second heart attack on April 18. He was taken again to the Johns Hopkins Hospital where he died on April 19. (Fox 1984, p. 221) He was buried in Druid Ridge Cemetery in Pikesville, Maryland.