Letter from Mary Anne Whelan, MD

Bidding Lewie Farewell

Lewis Hamilton was, quite literally, the first person I met in Cooperstown when, in 1982, I came to Bassett Hospital for a job interview. It took only the briefest acquaintance to know that he would be a fine person to join. And indeed, he was a wonderful colleague and friend. There could not have been a more intelligent, supportive and generally wonderful person to work with.

I used to tease him about his intended communications—he didn’t talk until he was four, and it could be hard to understand him, because of what had become a habitual, and sometimes, I think, a rather deliberately idiosyncratic mode of communication—I spent a lot of time saying to the residents, “Or, as Dr. Hamilton just said…”! But fortunately, as I was left-handed, my right brain usually understood what he meant and sent it over to the left, for translation. And I would tease him about it, afterward. We worked well together.