Page
THE CHINA, MAIL,
TUESDAY, JULY 28, 1959.
Doctor faces 92nd
IN
operation
for CANCER
• RADIATION BURNS
FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT
New York.
a Chicago hospital recently, one of the martyrs of medical science-the first man to use X-rays in treating disease-- waited patiently for the surgeon's knife.
Time passed quickly for the 83-year-old white-haired man. Though
in pain, he knew how to wait without fear.
Dr Emil Grubbe was facing his 92nd operation on the cancerous burns eating his body. He has suffered the dreadful effects of excessive X-ray radiation for 64 years.
"I can tell you about radiation from the beginning," he says in a surprisingly clear and strong voice,
"I was the first one burnt and I am the only one living from that period."
That Dr Grubbe (pronounced Groo- bay) is alive at all is amazing.
Only six months after his first ex- posure to X-rays in 1895, Dr Grubbe had his first operation for skin cancer burns on his left hand.
Since then his left arm has been amputated below the elbow and parts of his nose, lips, jaw and cheeks have been removed.
Now, the index and little fingers of his right hand have been so in- tensely attacked by the skin cancer that they, too, must be removed.
Dr John Orndorff, of Chicago, son of the surgeon who amputated Dr Grubbe's left arm in 1924, will perform the 92nd operation.
The pioneer whose work, even before he became a doctor, contributed to saving or prolonging millions of lives, had his last operation only last November.
Dr Grubbe had Kraduated from a university with a degree in chemistry and physies, and was working for a bank as an nssayer and refiner of rare metals when he discovered platinum in Idaho in 1895.
use
"In those days," he says, "the only
I had for platinum was in vacuum tubes, so to ga into the vacuum tube, business."
Dr Emil Grubbe smiles an the eve of his 92nd operation,
test the product was to nee The ink had paid him his hand between the tube and effects on off with 25 thousand dol- the crystal screen, lars worth of platinum.
If they produced such strong! healthy issue, he reasoned, they should certainty be useful in burning away con- rerous growths,
A doctor told them of ♫ who had had woman patient two operations for cancer of the breast and suggested that she be exposed to radiation treat-
IS there
sufficient wits Vain in the tube, the benes Late in 1895 Dr Grubbe of his hand would appear black rewl that
German and sharply elched. #1 physicist, Wilhelm Roent-
He used his left hand nahe a few
months son noticed that it swelled up gen, had
on paintinlly and became flushed. before seen a shadow
ne of the bones in his
At that time he was also a
"On January 20, 1090," says band.
physics instructor and medical Dr Grubbe, "I began the first
Chiengo medlest
of 10 treatments of 10 minutes college.
rich
Roentgen had found student ut
that by putting his hand between o vacuum tube "Too late" charged with electricity
consulted the and
barium. platinum-cyanide crystals, faculty about his swalien hand,
some
He
medical
his hund's hone structure The physicians could not re
commend
trealment, but became visible.
one of them, Dr J, E. Gilman,
Dr Grubbe soon found that though: that X-rays should in the manufacture of his own prove valuable in the treatment vacuum tubes the best way to of unhealthy body tissues,
Headache
Do not wait patiently for your suffering to end Take
tablets of CAFASPIN dissolved in half a glass of water, and headache will soon vanish
GFASPIN
HAYEH
Advertising Calendars
for 1960
We have ...
A large selection of different
Calendar Mountings
A variety of 4-colour pictures
covering a goodly number of topics.
Please call and inspect our range of 1960 calendars
SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST, LIMITED
PRINTING DEPARTMENT
PHONE 20002 Urders of 50 or more placed before August 31, 1959 will be delivered early in December.
1-3 WYNDHAM STRRÉT, HONG KONG.
ment.
"The pain was gone."
Beccuse he was not a doctor
at the time, Dr Grubbe's early work was not reported.
But decices at referred o many as 75 patients a day him.
to
He gradusted from medlent) college in 1893, became the
first
DI professor world's roentgenalogy and opened the first hospital X-ray depart- ment.
"It wasn't until 1937 that the medicat society accepted radiology
il Berputie
agent," says Dr Grubbe
"All who practised it before
enfied fakers." then were
But
by then the cancer damage to Grubbe already was far advanced,
"I realised almost immediate- ly after the first tests that 1 had been burnt by X-rays," he said.
"From that day on I protect- ed myself from the rays.
"But it was too late." Today, Dr_Grubbe lives plane in a small lakeside apartment in a Chicago suburb,
Friends bring him a hot meal every day.
X-ray
"Daddy says what's wrong with sending another 20,000 U.S. planes over here
row than you make already." from France-you couldn't make more blasted
London Express Servic
On the stand today a beautiful, green-eyed, socialite film star
Spotlight on Linda
WHERE
born?
were you
In Tampleo, an oil town
of Mexico.
WERE
child?
you #1 EL only
No. I have three brothers and one sister, My brothers are l
estate real
In and business Mexico anti my sister, Ariadna Weller four family name), an actress
JOHN IZBICKI - asked the questions
-IN PARIS
ARE you a religious woman?
I have always hungered for
I
a reason for our being in this
why 'That is
have world. studied just about every religion that exists,
Kuman
DID you have a happy child- Catholle. hood"
bul
I
m A
Pet Hates
+ AS
WILL the book be sensational' each to make people "sit up! und lake notice?"
No. It will be more human 19an sensational. I will tell of the problems a giri experiences when the goes to Hollywood for A career, how it feels to be in the Umellett and meet all soris of people in one's travels.
Do you play any sportc?
I used to. Before I had the children, I-used to play a lot of tennis and go horse riding. Now
I can only swity. I don't like fishing or hunting because I de-
I ever had to be in a kitchen
test kline beautiful animals. If
Very happy. When you are a child everything is given to you,
Catholic you would When you grow up, you have to take care of, yourself.
sli consider yourself married. You would WHEN did you Arst net to Tyrone Power.
yourself his consider
true Tyrone Power!
The very first time we het widow? was in 1048
only very Yes, that ly correct. You see. briefly, ile netted a writer the other girls Tyrone married i friend of his along is his home he trarried outside the Church, and 1 came too. He was then no one of those, marglaces was
chicken, I'd turn still married to Annabella, the recognised by the Church. We and ki a
were married in the Church. vegetarian immediately. French te zetress, so nothing
The There was a little scandal in WHAT are your plans? of that meeting,
Callfornia because we did not I'm off to the Berlin Film second time was again briefly a
he had Festival, long after
then in Rome to get year later. Our real meeting wall very was in 1947, in Neyerber, You obtained his divorce before gel myself a new wardrobe. I pre- But I feel that fer Italian clothes to the French. could say it was love at third ting married.
they can give you the rules of the Church are There more important than the waiting whole new wardrobe in a work while in Parts one has to wait Bawn of California.
three weeks Just for a fitting. Then I'm going back to Holly. wood to discuss Bins and con- inue writing my book.
cams
Bight,
HOW long did the marriage Jas17
We married st 1949 and parted in 1955.
HOW many children
you?
WHAT are your pet hates? Noise. Not the sort of noises have you cel at a parly because that Is Just one big noise, I mean
mixture a
progressing
Do you make lots of money out of your films?
very
Two daughters, Romina who individual noises like the bang. wili be eight In October and g of a door when you are try
I make far more money from Film Taryn who will be six toward in to rest in your room or a
my real estate business. the end et September. Both car hanking in the street.
mech are HOW
stars rarely make you of cirla possess
They are artikis, not Tyrone's eyes, my mouth and with your autoblography "The money.
Way Live"?
business people. It Very nicely, thank you. our features.
should be finished by the end of They this year.
WHERE are they now?
At school In Mexico. slay with my mother there.
Do you ll love Tyrone? You cannot live with a man and have chlidren by him with- out always cherishing scure love I never for him in your heart. wanted to part. Ty felt that te wan not up to matrimony and family life. He wanted his freedom. Yel even when wo Parled he said. "I'll always love 1 you Linda, you know that." warned him that he would not be free for long and that au- would soon get other woman
him. But he just lauched this off and right up to two months before he married again, for the last er, he told me that he would never get married.
WHAT is the happlest memory-of-your-mnursinga?_
Giving birth to a child. You see, I had three children before "my-two-litile-girls-were-born. All were miscarriages and were born dead.
YOU were in a similar post- tlon to Marilyn Monroe in that How did you overcome cue. this terrible problem?
Apart from that help, he could use the slu of his left arm and the two Angers and thumb of his right hand is care for hanself-washing clothes, dressing, opening doors, A leading Sydney
A gynaecologist advised me to have a series of hormoze in- said specialist
that Bkin
the Jections. I had these after cancer had formed on xirls of Dr Grubbe's body Tyrone's and my third altempt which had been, dicensed by to have a child." But I was not clven enough injections and excessive exposures to radiation,
"The
cancer, which Is tumorous growth, grew up on the diseased tissues," he said.
"Skin cancer cau form on any kind of burn, but it is most radiation
a
the child died again. But whito I was carrylog tomina, I ́was made to stay in bed for a good three-quarters of the time of pregnancy and given overdovas of hormone infections. The result was happy, healiby
I am sure that Marily "Dr Grubbe was unfortunate | child. because he simply didn't know Monroe should have the me treatment and everything would
likely to form
burns.
on
what he was doing.
"Nowadays, the effects of be all right.
radiation are known, and great cure de taken to provat
cessive exposure,
сх
WOULD JOU like to get married again?
Any human being would like: "Dr Grubba would not have | to have a partner,
Is there any felt or seen anything happening
Но, кеце,
to his body while it was að-; marriage? sorbing the rays,"
HOW old are you, Linda? Every girl munt have
Bille accret. That's mine,
опе
a
KEVİSLEY
prospect of
NEW ROAR IN FLEET STREET.
$2.
World Copertont by arrangement with the Manchester Quargiai.