Letters 12 Part 1
Life at Johns Hopkins Medical School in 1945
January 16, 1945
Your last letters have been written from Kashmere. Isn't that a place that delights every age of man? The serenity of the chinar trees, the placid waters, the stately mountains. I'm so glad you could go there for a well deserved holiday. How much I wish I could have been with you! That meadow you mentioned above Fahalgam where you sat down to eat lunch, I think I visited the same spot. There was a little house at one corner of a cornfield, the whole surrounded by towering firs and over all loomed a snow peak.
I think often of all those scenes of India’s forests, hills and plains. My childhood was spent in a beautiful country. America is beautiful too but I haven't seen much of it yet. I haven't tramped its vales und forests. I don't want to lose my enjoyment of the good earth God made for us. I hate to be such a slave I cannot see the beauty outside the window where I sit every day. I have a book that helps me appreciate God's good gifts, Boyland's Prayers Written for Use in an Indian College. I found it among the things Bill left behind at Waco when he went into service. I love this prayer which I committed to memory and use often:
Father
The path ahead is dark
And we know not where thou wouldst have us go.
Give us, O give us Thy gracious guidance
And a tranquil trust in Thy love
That we may step forward through the gloom
Unfaltering, fearless, confident …
Having within us that divine light
Which maketh clear as day the darkest midnight,
Guiding the traveller who shall trust in Thee
Safe through impenetrable forests
And over trackless mountains.
Perhaps it’s too bad I haven't had greater obstacles to overcome for the sake of proving what stuff this Howard is made of. Of course there was the long uncertainty about military service to worry about, and assorted discouragements of kith and kin relating to my lack of finances for a medical education. That lack could have blocked things, I suppose, but I never doubted that if it were God's will that I finish here, I would finish.
I have had generous scholarship grants, but needing more money for books and clothes I recently took a job. It opened up just as I needed it and turns out to greatest advantage.
I inquired about work at Sinai Hospital, one of the city's largest, right across the street from Hopkins and half a block from where I live. Without delay they appointed me "medical librarian" to come on duty at 6 p.m. and work till 9. Since there is very little going on then I'm able to study and am allowed to stay as long as I like. I would have been fortunate to get the job even without remuneration but as it is I have this good place to study and I earn all my meals.
The library is on the same floor as the operating rooms. I walk into them sometimes, fondly turning on and off the huge lamps. It's a dream place and some day. I will build a hospital with operating rooms like these! Two days after taking this job Miss Allis wrote to say her Society had decided to grant me double the amount they had been sending, $1200 for the next eight months. The amount was so staggering I could hardly believe it so had to sit down and be quiet awhile till I could take it in.
Now I lack nothing; the best books and instruments are possible. I have done nothing to deserve such goodness and cannot see very far ahead as to its purpose, but there must be a reason. It seems like the very hand of God granting me every opportunity for the finest preparation.
I spent a grand weekend at Rahway with Uncle Lee and Aunt May making myself as much of a nuisance as possible to distract their minds from the German counterattack. Their Paul was in Belgium then so the house was tense for a few days.
I also spent three days at Cumberland where Tissie is now working. I know you are praying that we make no mistake about our marriage. We both truly seek to know God's will in the matter.
Gene is at Farragut, Idaho [part of a state park now north of Coeur d’Alene] plugging away in an office and grumbling that the Navy takes the cream of his youth, John at Norfolk on ship repair, keeps busy and happy. Only I of your progeny see no humor in the present critical situation. Tertius, your third son, the once healthy Himalayan athlete, still lives, but feels his schooling will never end; that he will never cease to be a beginner, each day being introduced to yet another new thing.
January 21, 1945
I frequently attend the Franklin Street Presbyterian church. Dr. Kirk, the minister, who must be about 70 years old, looks and speaks like Winston Churchill, which is to say with great conviction, about his beliefs and ideas. He never wavers and seems to put some of his overflowing strength into me who needs it so much.
When I'm in his church he takes me right back to the good old days and it is then I know I am right and no wrong to believe all you taught me. One hears so many platitudes nowadays about the Christian life being a matter of peace, or even that it can be "fun". I'm dead sure of this: Christ comes into no life except as a disturbing Force. It is not easy to live a Christian life. Even to live up to the least one believes about Him is to have one's complacency shattered to bits. Christ's peace comes from an inner rightness and an unquestioned obedience.
My bookshelves are filling up with choice treasures all the way from science to religion. The other day I stepped into a little rat hole of a shop in Monument Street for a new bacteriology text book, and came away with it and C.S. Lewis' Problem of Pain, Gibran's Jesus and Nehru's autobiography, Towards Freedom. With the generous new grant I shall want nothing in the way of good books or scientific equipment. I may even get a microscope of my own.
February 24, 1945
Tissie had to come up for slight surgery. I got her an appointment with Dr. Firor, associate professor of Surgery here who has the reputation of being the finest abdominal surgeon in the United States. He was formerly a medical missionary in India and for that reason is one of my idols. The Bible class be holds for doctors and nurses on Thursday evenings is the highlight of our week.
These are great days in a student's life. The past week ushered in the first lectures in physical and surgical diagnosis, and ophthalmology. With what pride we stroll off with brand new stethoscopes in our pockets for the first time! Ah me! I have such a beautiful instrument. It is sheer magic. I am sure I can cure all the ills of the world with it! I allow myself this feeling of exhilaration, for all too soon comes the realization that all we learn here is a more introduction of what is yet to come. Is it any wonder doctors put up such a brave front? They must, to hide their ignorance!
Somebody at the American Baptist Publication Society's office asked for the story of my life/for one of their weekly papers, Young People. I won't have time to write it but will send some pictures and notes they can embroider to suit themselves.
[Editor Erma Kelly wrote it up under the heading "Destination India", and published it in November and December, 1945.]
In the last Candidate News from our Board I read Ruth Daniels' report of milk distribution among the famine-stricken people of West Bengal, [Miss Daniels was one of the Midnapore missionaries.] It seems she was hampered, instead of helped, by petty opposition from local political factions. Jealousy and non-cooperation operate in the very teeth of the famine that wiped out one and a half million people. Can it be that Ruth cares for the sufferers than their own people?
When I hear of the courage and persistence of that woman I want to stand up and cheer! Brave Ruth Daniels, I'm all for you! To do what she has done year in and year out all these many years in Midnapore District shows that she has certainly "got what it takes". Her faith is not a passive thing. I just want to touch the hem of the garment of that marvelous woman.
April 8, 1945
Here it is spring again with the trees on Broadway leafing out. The Easter holidays have come and gone. I spent them at Cumberland with Tissie batting things back and forth about marriage. Everything points in that direction now, but when? Not before I finish here, probably. There will always be problems, and as for finances—will I ever be able to offer my wife financial security! We shall wait for your arrival and your blessing, of course, but please come soon!
The other night Madame Pandit spoke in Baltimore at some bankers' function. I went to hear her and got a few private words with her at the close. She remembered me very well and grew quite excited at finding me here. She took my arm and introduced me all around as "the boy who went to school with my daughters". Chand, she says, will soon graduate from Wellesley and plans to do graduate work at some school in New York.
I am getting a jump on medical school. Through my library job at Sinai I get to see a great many operations over there. Everything after 6 p.m. when I go on duty, are emergencies, and some are extremely interesting. The surgeons, knowing my status, explain everything in detail for my sole benefit. I have witnessed 12 major operations, and some deliveries which are preparing me for my OB work coming up soon.