Santa Fe Living Treasures – Elder Stories

"I was lucky I was a pediatrician," she told us, "because I could just come back and go to work. You don't have to stand up when you're talking to kids." She received care and rehab at the University of Chicago, "where there was a very positive attitude and all their patients had jobs." While there she studied bone pathology. She was also active in child protective services, working to assist children in situations of abuse or neglect.

While Carol worked at rural clinics in Rio Arriba and Taos Counties, and as the United Mine Workers' physician at the Madrid mines, Marcus made the "milk run" to Las Vegas, Española and Taos. Often the state police would stop him for coffee and a report on road conditions.

Both doctors participated fully in civic life, especially with opera and concert groups. Marcus came from a musical family and enjoyed singing with the Santa Fe Chorus. In fact, Carol told us, "he would have preferred to have been an opera singer. As a young man he was offered a scholarship to study opera, but he turned it down in favor of medicine. But music was his first love."

Please see Volume 1 for complete text.
Photo ©1997 by Joanne Rijmes