'Field of Dreams' Discovery: The Legacy of Archie "Moonlight" Graham

In this bonus episode, we "Go the Distance" on the history and legacy of the real Archie "Moonlight" Graham, who many people know from the "Field of Dreams" movie portrayed by Burt Lancaster and Frank Whaley. Graham was a 1905 alumnus of the University of Maryland School of Medicine and made historic contributions in the field of medicine, specifically, pediatrics. Guest Larry Pitrof, executive director of the Medical Alumni Association of the University of Maryland, talks about his recent discovery of correspondence and artifacts tied to Graham that were previously unknown. This bonus episode is a condensed version of a Twitter Space that aired on Aug. 10, 2022, a day before the second annual MLB Field of Dreams game.

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Transcript

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Jena Frick: 0:04

You're listening to the heartbeat of the University of Maryland, Baltimore, the UMB Pulse.

Charles Schelle: 0:17

Welcome to the UMB Pulse Podcast. I'm Charles Schelle. And this is a special edition of the Pulse, which is a recording of our first-ever Twitter Space. We produced a Twitter Space on Wednesday, August 10th, about 1905 University of Maryland School of Medicine alumnus Moonlight Graham, which you'll hear in a moment. What you're about to listen to is a condensed replay of that Twitter Space minus some technical glitches and you'll hear that about halfway through when the Twitter Space disconnected on its own. Many of you who are listening might be familiar or have watched the Kevin Costner classic Field of Dreams. Or maybe you're in the younger generation. You're just hearing about Field of Dreams thanks to Major League Baseball, who hosted its second Field of Dreams games in the cornfields of Dyersville, Iowa, featuring the Chicago Cubs and Cincinnati Reds this month who could forget when Kevin Costner as Ray confronted James Earl Jones playing Terrence, about what he saw on the Fenway Park scoreboard, flashing Archie Moonlight Graham's name, and stats when Costner's character Ray asks Terrence after the ballgame, "What does go the distance mean?" Terrence exclaims, "We're going to Minnesota to find Moonlight Graham!" It really is the moment that sets the Field of Dreams movie in motion. Moonlight Graham seem to have found our guests, Larry Pitrof, who is the Executive Director of the Medical Alumni Association of the University of Maryland, Larry discovered some previously unknown letters and correspondence at the University of Maryland School of Medicine's Gray Hall that are tied to Moonlight Graham. We're going to get into the discovery and dive into the contributions to medicine by Moonlight Graham, that you might never have realized. If you would like to see a visual representation of these artifacts, and the tweets during the Twitter Space, please visit the UMBaltimore account. Unfortunately, the audio quality of a Twitter Space when you download a recording isn't the greatest. So then we apologize for any technical difficulties from the platform. And with that, here's our program with Dana Rampolla and Larry Pitrof.

Dana Rampolla: 2:31

Hi, Larry, welcome to our space. We're so excited to have you here today for this conversation. I think Charles noted, you're the executive director of the Medical Alumni Association here at UMB. And we have a lot to talk about, as Charles mentioned, we're going to touch on the movie, we're going to talk a little bit about the actual games that are played at the Field of Dreams. But let's start with your discovery. Tell us what in the world. How would you even find these signatures? What are they? Where where are they and truthfully tell us? Did you hear a voice whispering to from a file cabinet or a closet, beckoning you to come?

Larry Pitrof: 3:01

Yes, Dana. That's what happened. No, it actually wasn't. It wasn't a voice. But it certainly was a feeling that had been wearing on me for a number of years. I started at Maryland about five years after the movie came out. And I was made aware that Archie Graham was a graduate of the University of Maryland School of Medicine. And a couple of years later, I had the the benefit of writing a book for our bicentennial celebration and was able to include the passage of Dr. Graham and his attending Maryland and appearing in the movie. But the truth is that I made the assumption that all the files had been exhausted on on Dr. Graham. And in reality up in our storage area of the Gray Hall where we keep all the alumni artifacts and things. There was a file cabinet there that was marked 1812 to 1916. And I can't tell you how many times I walked up there and looked at that filing cabinet and asked myself if I should be checking just to ensure that there's nothing in there on Dr. Graham. So it was after the first Field of Dreams game last August that I promised myself that the next time I was up in that storage area, I would take a look. And it was in middle of October, I think and went into the file cabinet. And Dana, these that file of these documents were laid out so impeccably well, they were just screaming to be found. And I don't mind telling you that it was a tremendous rush of excitement. But at the same time, there was a good dose of embarrassment that I'd waited so long before I had looked.

Dana Rampolla: 4:21

Well, what did you do when you first found them? I mean, you are a history buff. So you had to have been super excited.

Larry Pitrof: 4:27

Yeah, actually. Yeah, actually just sat back on it on a box and continue to fiddle through to find out how many there actually were in looking at these documents throughout a more than 100 year history. You there aren't. There isn't a lot on any one individual. But this file on Dr. Graham was just extensive and which had to do with the fact that he he was traveling and playing baseball during the summers. And so he wasn't able to communicate by walking into the school and asking the dean for his transcripts or to pay a tuition bill or whatever it might be. He had a he had a right And so these correspondences are cover a period of about two years, and go into quite some detail and are actually very revealing about the, the person that that Archie Graham was.

Dana Rampolla: 5:13

And so would you say that in his file cabinet, there were letters for many, many students are these special because they were from

Larry Pitrof: 5:20

Nearly all graduates, they were letters of recommendation from the Dean out to superintendents of hospitals for training programs that our alumni have had applied for at the time validating that they graduated from the University of Maryland. But nowhere could I find, I should back up a step there. There are matriculation cards for virtually everyone during that era. And that was significant because of the financial constraints that the university was in. But when it came down to the personal correspondences data, there were very few that were as in depth as what we found with Archie Graham.

Dana Rampolla: 5:52

Very interesting. And Larry, you just mentioned about the time so let's let's take a step back, let's kind of set the scene for everyone. Before we talk about how Archie actually came to Maryland, what did the University of Maryland School of Medicine look like in the 20th century?

Unknown: 6:05

That's, that's a great place to start. Because you can really understand the narrative a lot better with what these files indicate when you understand where we were as a school. And I think most people know that in 1807, we were founded as a as a private medical college that morphed into a university five years later in 1812. But the truth is that we were founded by a group of doctors who were interested interested in teaching medicine. And so you could get a two year degree when the school first opened up, and that a medical degree, and that actually lasted until the 1890s. But it was after the Civil War, when medical schools started popping up everywhere throughout the country. And this was due to the fact that medicine was not a lucrative business. Now, if you had a practice in Manhattan, or Chicago and a large city, you could actually do okay, as a physician, but for those who were practicing out in the, in the farming communities in the rural areas, you really had to have a second second career. Some were farmers, some are lawyers, some were parishioners. But it was it was a very trying time back then to be a full time faculty member. And so a lot of doctors form what they call medical colleges. And now some of these schools were excellent. They were grounded in basic sciences, and they were associated with universities. But the vast majority of them were not they were glorified apprenticeship programs where doctors could be taking their students with them on house calls. And you know, two years later, they'd have this degree in medicine. So very trying time for organized medicine in 1876, the American Association of Medical Colleges comes along, and it's founded in Washington, DC for the exclusive purpose of organizing medical education and standardizing it. And the first thing they do is they recommend that, that the there be a four year medical education and that these colleges are all aligned with universities. And by that time, now you get into the 1890s, there were about 160 medical schools in North America and 1893 is when Johns Hopkins opened up. And at that time, the data in Baltimore alone when Hopkins opened its door in 1893, there were five medical schools in Baltimore, there was us, it was Johns Hopkins, there was a Women's Medical College of Baltimore, there was the Baltimore Medical College and the Baltimore College of Physicians and Surgeons. So you can imagine how competitive this must have been to attract students. And it resulted in tuition is being lowered and standards being lowered. Now, Hopkins really didn't have that problem, because when they opened up in 1893, they were so richly endowed, that they probably didn't have to have a student and they would have stayed in business. But for all the other four schools that were terrific, tuition driven institutions, tuition mattered. And so it was very competitive. Now, I'm gonna fast forward a little bit on the other side of Archie Graham, and then we'll get into the questions you want to have. But in 1910, the Carnegie Foundation had had charged Abraham Flexner with producing the Flexner Report, which he visited all 60 medical schools in North America and came up with the scathing report on medical education in America. He recommended that, that we reduced from 160 schools in North America to like 33. And all the rest should be closed. It was a sexist and a racist report, he recommended that five of the seven black Medical Colleges close he virtually wanted all of the Women's Medical Colleges closed, and he wanted all the other remaining schools to be aligned with universities that presented a four year medical education with two years being grounded in the basic sciences. And then and then the two years in a in a clinical setting very similar to what Johns Hopkins was was doing at the time. And that resulted in us finally by 1920, surviving, but relinquishing control and turning control of the university over to the state. And that's when we became the great public institution we are today. So that's the transition that is occurring. And Archie comes to school in 1903 when all of this is playing out right before our very eyes.

Dana Rampolla: 9:52

So let's let's hop back over to talking about Archie a little bit. He was born in Fayetteville, North Carolina graduated from UNC Chapel Hill and he had a pretty interesting and large family with deep roots in that North Carolina area. How did he wind up here and one of those?

Unknown: 10:07

Yeah, there were there were 10, some 10 siblings, all of them were, were well educated. And now, again to fit this narrative of medical education at Maryland in 1893, went to a four year curriculum, and it was a real challenge for us. But the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill did not. They maintained a two year A B certificate that they were awarding, and it was a science based certificate and Maryland found out about it and approached UNC with an offer that again, starving for students that we would accept any UNC graduate two year A B certificate into our curriculum, and they could come and complete the final two years of school at the University of Maryland. So you are correct, Archie plays. He grows up in Fayetteville, North Carolina. He plays ball at Chapel Hill. He's a gifted athlete, and seize this opportunity now to complete his education. And he's going to try to do it by nurturing a baseball career as well.

Dana Rampolla: 11:01

Okay, so let's talk a little bit about that. How how did he juggle that? What did that look like for him to try to play baseball, he also was a football player at some point too, right?

Larry Pitrof: 11:10

He was a very gifted athlete, and back then you could you could actually compete in collegiate athletics and be a professional athlete. He signed his first major league contract, not major league, but his first professional contract to play in the minor leagues in 1902. And the first trace we have of him is him showing up through his brother by writing to us, his older brother David writes us and says, you know, my brother was accepted here to be a member of the 1902 class and due to unforeseen circumstances, and we know what those were he signed a major league or minor league contract, he's unable to play ball. He's unable to attend school here. And I wonder since I completed this two year program, if you'll permit me the opportunity to take his space, which is granted by our by our dean, Dr. Cole, and he writes back again and says, Can you sign me up? Can you send me a list of boarding schools in the area, I'd like to take up residency there and just a footnote for David Sloan, the oldest brother, he develops vision problems and is unable to complete his medical education here he attends just one year and then drops out and tries to get enrolled in some other programs winds up joining the military, and he tragically dies in France during World War One in 1918.

Dana Rampolla: 12:22

How lucky for him that all he had to do was hang on his brother's coattails. Yeah, I'm sure he was gifted and bright as well. But interesting that that couldn't be that happened. Certainly that's happening.

Unknown: 12:31

Yeah. But getting back to your getting back to your Archie Graham story about balancing the two professions. I doubt very seriously, you could do that today. As a matter of fact, I think if if a major league or professional league baseball player ever applied to medical school here, they probably be told to come back and apply once you once you you're finished with baseball. Back then you could do it because ballplayers were looking for work in the offseason. And physicians, you know, they had to have a supplemental career. And as long as I think Dr. Graham could find his assistant his opportunities when school completed for training, he probably be pretty, pretty much set. Now he did play on the football team as well as the baseball team. He was recognized overall, as a very gifted athlete. He was voted as the most valuable baseball player during both years. He attended Maryland here. But between school years, Dana between the third and fourth year of medical school, he was in New England, playing in the in Manchester, New England, Manchester, New Hampshire playing in the New England League. And that's where a trail of the of the correspondences pick up. As I said earlier, he couldn't walk over to the medical school. If you had a question between school years he was he was in in Manchester living in a bording house and playing baseball out there. And so he's, he's asking the Dean if you can send him some of his grades. And he's sending Dr. Coale some names of prospective students who he's running into there, which would have been a very wonderful and appreciated gesture on his part. And in these correspondences, we find out that he was a terrific student, the Dean remarks on how well he did and his grades that he was forwarding to him. Dr. Graham was asking him about training opportunities.

Charles Schelle: 14:05

And as you probably could tell, that is when the Twitter space disconnected. And here's the resumption of our program.

Larry Pitrof: 14:16

So where were we Dana? Yeah,

Dana Rampolla: 14:18

So we were, where are we? Thanks for hopping back on where we were, we were talking about the climate what it was like here at the turn of the 20th century. And I was just getting ready, actually to hop in and ask you about the informal rules of that era, allowing college athletes to play professional sports.

Larry Pitrof: 14:35

Yeah, that was they were all ahead of their time. There wasn't much of an issue. These collegiate athletic associations were just beginning to form. And they had a lot of professional athletes who were attending school and were able to play So Archie was able to compete in two sports. He was a member of our football team, and played baseball as well. He was a very, very gifted athlete. The word was that his speed was his primary asset. So you can imagine how valuable that would have been on the base paths. And in right field, which is the position player that he wasn't baseball. So it was not it was not difficult. And, and I think, you know, it was pretty clear. On each of the teams at Maryland, there had to be a faculty advisor, and they were all aware of his athletic abilities. And I think in the long run, you know, they were, they were more than tolerant. They knew he was a gifted athlete that he was planning a dual career in, in medicine and baseball, but they knew baseball was fleeting. And they were, in fact, in all of these correspondences they -- baseball's never mentioned. When they're when the dean is communicating with with Archie Graham. It's all about academics. And they wanted to see to it that this very bright young man who showed all these attributes of being a fabulous physician was going to get all the nurturing.

Dana Rampolla: 15:50

So once baseball was behind Archie, he found himself in Minnesota while he was there, what contributions did he make to that community, the world of medicine, what was life like that?

Larry Pitrof: 16:00

Turns out, Archie Graham had a respiratory issue. And breathing was a was always a problem for him that would flare up every once in a while. So after baseball ended in 1908, and that's a little bit different than than the was told in the movie. He started training in earnest, and he attended a ear nose and throat training program in Chicago, and found out about a forum that was going on at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. So he traveled to Rochester and found the air out. They're so clean and crisp and enjoyed the environment so much that he basically just contacted Chicago and said, I'm not coming back. And so he took a train to Chisholm, Minnesota, which was recommended by a colleague of his showed up in this very small community, and literally fell in love with it overnight, established a private practice. Now, again, when we talk about physicians in rural communities, they weren't making a lot of money back then. So a couple of years after he had established his practice, he was invited to become the school physician for the Chisholm School District, which he gladly accepted. Now he had had training in a number of different disciplines. I don't recall seeing any for pediatrics. But he was a gifted man and started treating these, these young patients in the school system. And I'm going to read between the lines a little bit here, Dana, and suggest that he probably detected some anomalies in some of the workups he was doing on some of his young patients, and saw saw these in the blood pressure because he approached a school system short time later and suggested that a comprehensive study be undertaken on childhood blood pressure with children in the Chisholm School District. Now that was readily accepted by the by the district, but the medical community kind of crossed their eyes at him because it was largely believed back then, that hypertension was an affliction that adults needed to be concerned with, and that it not necessarily be an issue for children. But he pressed ahead anyway. And this study involved about 3500 students, you know, ages five to about 16 years as they as they made their way through the school system. And it established baseline blood pressures demonstrated that there were anomalies in these blood blood pressures, that it needed to be investigated, because it had long reaching ramifications on these, these young, these young people's lives. So this went on for 15 years. And he ran into a couple of colleagues at the Mayo Clinic, who found out about the research he had done. And these were scientists and researchers, and they secured a grant. At the time, I think it was about a$5,000 grant from the Josiah Macy Foundation, which was a lot of money back then, someone helped organize the data, which which was compiled into a paper that appeared in the American Journal of Diseases of Children now that that journal was the forerunner of the JAMA Pediatrics journal. So it was a big deal. And he presented that those findings at the Mayo Clinic in 1945. And it literally changed the understanding and what needed to occur in the treatment of children. And that affected medical education, the way medicine was taught to students, it certainly impacted the way pediatricians taught their treated their young patients, but I would argue that it impacted us all. You know, we were we were all the beneficiaries as children of Dr. Graham's research. And, you know, I can just think back in my early days in the 1960s, and 1970s, when we were competing in sports, or trying out or planning to go to a camp, when there was a physical examination that was required. And one of the things that was that was done was that our blood pressure was was taken. And you can thank Dr. Graham for that.

Dana Rampolla: 19:33

It's really interesting. He also was practicing during a time of typhoid epidemic, the polio epidemic. So Can you imagine? in medicine was busy and he's, you know, creating these new hypotheses and

Larry Pitrof: 19:47

He's nursing this community through a number of endemics, including the Spanish Flu of 1918. So you can imagine the caring and considerate approach she had to take on, on all these different endemics, learning about them making recommendations to the community. But he's recognized as a as a real hero in that community for those for those efforts.

Dana Rampolla: 20:09

Right. Well, Larry, let's let's wrap up a little bit here by talking about the Field of Dreams movie. I know we've many of us have seen it. It's been more than 30 years since it was created. What Why? Why do you think there's this continuing fascination with?

Larry Pitrof: 20:22

Boy? That's a great question. And it's a movie that just won't go away, will it? I mean, it really is, I kind of consider that the, the Wizard of Oz of baseball movies, you know, it's one that came out, got some recognition, and it just, it just doesn't go away. My personal belief is, first of all, the movie was chock full of superstars, you know, Kevin Costner and James Earl Jones and Ray Liotta. And then, of course, the great Burt Lancaster who played Archie Graham, so impeccably Well, I think, I think that character of Graham was one that we all could identify with. He was this wise, senior physician at the beginning of the movie, that gladly gave up baseball to become something much larger in life that could impact so many more people. And you know, a modern day, Archie Graham, I always think of Ted Lasso show, the very popular sports show a series that's on right now. And, and Ted Lasso is a coach of a Premier League team in England who doesn't know anything about soccer. But he knows everything about dealing with people, and his integrity is impeccable. And he somehow makes us all a little bit better at who we are, by by being there. And I think that's the role that Dr. Graham played in that movie portrayed by Burt Lancaster. And when you couple that, with the difference between Archie Graham and Ted Lasso, so we found out that Archie Graham was a real person. So there was this surge, for information on who Dr. Graham really was. And did he live up to the character. And what we have found and what we continue to find. And what we found in these correspondences at the University of Maryland, is that not only did he live up to the character as portrayed by Burt Lancaster, but I would argue that he actually exceeded that character. He was such an impeccably kind, concerned, and compassionate man and he lived his whole life that way. And that's what made him special. It resonates with people who watch the movie.

Dana Rampolla: 22:10

Right? And symbolically, of course, you see that when he saves the little girl from choking on her hotdog, he goes back to you know, he crosses the line and return to being the doctor.

Larry Pitrof: 22:20

Yeah, it's, it's my favorite segment of the movie when he drops that baseball glove, right when he told me the line, and you see that baseball glove drop on the dirt. And he steps up, he started to cross in his his, in his clothes, you know, in his non uniform get-up.

Jena Frick: 22:34

Oh, sorry, I was just gonna say on that topic of, you know, the character of Moonlight Graham, how it was portrayed in the film and the fascination with the real person. You want to hear some fun movie trivia about the Moonlight Graham character in Field of Dreams? So the scene where James Earl Jones was interviewing a bunch of different people who were friends of Moonlight Graham in the bars and telling stories. Those were actual friends of the real life, Archie Graham telling real life stories about him. And not. Yeah, and all of that was true. They flew the Friends of Dr. Graham out for filming so that way they could film them actually speaking about the actual person. And then the other bit of via that I have is when they first come to his doctor's office to find him and his former secretary is reading his obituary. Those were real excerpts from the actual Doctor Graham's obituary that was printed in the newspaper.

Dana Rampolla: 23:30

That's pretty neat. Thanks for sharing that. Because I'm always doing our homework that I love.

Jena Frick: 23:35

I have lots of movie trivia in the back pocket.

Dana Rampolla: 23:38

Awesome. Awesome. Do we have any questions from our listeners?

Jena Frick: 23:43

Oh, well, we do have a question about so. Um, so Moonlight Graham was doing school and playing ball at the same time? Is that something that people could do now is could they attend medical school and playability think that's something that would be possible, Larry?

Unknown: 23:58

I highly doubt that it would be. They'd be able to do that today. Growing up in the 60s and 70s. There were some MD's who played baseball one that I remember quite vividly was manage who went by that name. He was a pitcher for the Detroit Tigers. Today, I think it's gotten far too competitive. I think just getting into medical school, the admissions office would probably tell you Look, give the good baseball your best shot and when it's over, reapply, certainly in the training programs that run a year at a crack you there wouldn't be any opportunity for a break for a baseball season.

Dana Rampolla: 24:31

I do find it interesting. In my job history, I've worked over at Shock Trauma, which of course is our affiliate here at the University of Maryland, Baltimore. And then here in our own schools. We do oftentimes , on several counts, we've had ex-professional athletes come on board to study that we had a dental student who graduated who had been an athlete, so definitely people leaving the field and coming here, but I don't know about doing it simultaneously. Larry, is there anything that we're leaving out there? We shouldn't be talking about do we really talk about how often? Or what? Moonlight Graham's experience was on the professional field? I'm not sure that we mentioned, but that is the case we have a listener who's not aware?

Unknown: 25:11

Yeah, that's a good question. You know, he played what, six, seven years in minor leagues, and by all accounts, was a really talented ballplayer. One of the one of the discrepancies between the movie and real life was his major league debut. In the movie, it's the last game of the season. And he gets his ending in the outfield and doesn't get a chance to hit bat. And then he gives a baseball, and goes on to medicine when in reality, he was up at the majors right after graduation, in May of 1905, he stayed up there for about three weeks. And he was in the outfield for two innings, was on the on deck circle to bat in the top of the ninth inning, but never got his chance. And he was released from his contract right after that game. And so it must have been a very trying time for him to have been up at the at the show, as they call it. And then having the finished the final three months in Scranton, Pennsylvania with a minor league team. He didn't give up hope. And that's that's when one of the letters he authored to Dr. Coale was right after the season, and that he was looking for some training opportunities. But he thought well enough to send the final $30 he owed the medical school for his tuition and fees in September of that of that year, which really lends itself I think, to the character of the man that he was that he felt he had an obligation that He had fulfilled and was grateful for the education that that he received at Maryland.

Dana Rampolla: 26:37

He does sound like a truly wonderful person, especially when we talk about and reflect on all of the great things that he did in the field of medicine and for his community, not only teaching but the medical care. This has been a great conversation. I hope that UMB we can we can do more of these. Um, if anyone has a last minute question, feel free to submit it. We'll stay on for a couple of minutes. And do check out the Twitter Space because our colleague Charles has been adding a lot of really interesting tidbits in the Twitter and the Twitter feed, including images of the actual signatures and letters that Larry, Larry discovered just a few weeks ago.

Charles Schelle: 27:16

Yeah. I'll jump in here for a second. Thanks for mentioning those. You know, there are all sorts of fun little facts that you can glean from these letters and correspondences, depending how much you want to dive down. And, you know, one thing that we mentioned in the tweets is that, you know, Moonlight Graham responds to the Dean and says, Hey, you know, here's my current address 238 West 56th Street in New York City. Well, you know, New York City's big city and things turn over, but sometimes you have some older buildings, well, just pop that address into Google Maps. And, you know, he was really just steps from Central Park, just a couple blocks from Central Park, Carnegie Hall. And if you're wondering what that building is, today, the buildings still there. It's just that the ground floor is a restaurant called Fuji Sushi, and they probably still have apartments above there. So it can very well be that somebody is staying in the same room today as Moonlight Graham. That's just one of the cool, cool things to look through all these correspondences. And, and Larry, as well, I don't know if you want to address this, but you can really put a timeline between graduation and his game by looking at these correspondences and figuring out what he was doing between, you know, that initial ask.

Unknown: 28:29

He was he was busy preparing and juggling to future careers. And, you know, I'll just add to your New York address, Charles, you know, the building that Archie Graham studied, Davidge Hall remains today. You can walk into that building and see the lecture hall where he studied.

Charles Schelle: 28:44

Absolutely. And that's a past podcast episode, we had Larry and as a guest to talk about Davidge Hall on The UMB Pulse podcast. So if you're interested in listening to that, just go on Apple podcasts or any podcasts provider and search for it. And you can learn about the oldest medical education building still being used in the Western Hemisphere. I'll turn it over to you, Dana.

Dana Rampolla: 29:08

That's all I have. Larry, are there any parting words or parting thoughts that you'd like to share that we may have left out?

Larry Pitrof: 29:14

No, you know, we're, we're very proud of Dr. Graham. I'll just say this. He was a great guy, a real humanitarian scholar. And he's probably not a lot different than the other 8,000 Living graduates we have at the University of Maryland. We're proud of them all.

Charles Schelle: 29:32

Thank you again to Larry Pitrof for his time. As I mentioned during the conversation, Larry was a guest this summer for our road trip series highlighting the historic Davidge Hall here on the podcast. To get your history fix, you can also listen to the Pulse's current episode about the Dr. Samuel D. Harris National Museum of Dentistry that's available now to listen on Apple podcasts or wherever you'd like to hear us. In September, the UMB Pulse resumes its change maker series. Our guests will be the University of Maryland School of Medicine Professor Matthew Frieman. Matthew will discuss the current state of COVID-19 research and what scientists know about the behavior of this evolving disease. That episode will be released Friday, September 2. For updates on the UMB Pulse visit us at umaryland.edu/pulse or drop us a line at umbpulse@umaryland.edu And thank you for listening to the UMP Pulse

Jena Frick: 30:38

The UMB pulse with Charles Schelle, Dana Rampolla and Jena Frick is a UMB Office of Communications and Public Affairs production edited by Charles Schelle, sound engineering by Jena Frick, marketing by Dana Rampolla. Music by No Vibe. Recorded in the University of Maryland Baltimore Community Engagement Center