So that history might not vanish
A hint as to why novelist Robert Kotlowitz '47 decided to write Before Their Time (Alfred A. Knopf, 1997), a memoir of his combat service in the Second World War, can be found on p. 192 of the book. Kotlowitz is visiting Bern Keaton, possibly his only surviving buddy from the war. It is the 50th anniversary of V-E Day, in 1995, and they have not seen each other since the war.

Kotlowitz writes, "At one point, moving on to other matters for the moment, I mentioned to him that I had just read somewhere that more than half the personnel who served in the U.S. Armed Forces during World War II were already dead, a half-century after the war. This seemed an astonishing statistic to me, hardly possible to accept, in fact, one that somehow carried an important warning, or omen, as though history itself--Bern's history, my history--might begin to vanish with this lethal roll call."

Kotlowitz concedes in his book that he was no hero. In 1943, he was a pre-med student at Hopkins, mostly to avoid the draft. But his grades were so lousy, the Army drafted him anyway, figuring he wasn't going to become a doctor anytime soon. He recalls, "I had gone through the Baltimore public schools and I wasn't prepared for the European style university like Johns Hopkins."

He writes about his many fears as he goes through basic training, and his embarrassment at being afraid, there and in Europe. "Once I knew I was going to be in the infantry, that I was going overseas, and that I was going to be in combat, I knew that my future was really going to be problematic," he says. "Then I really got scared. I had grown up thinking like everybody else: God, that can't happen to me.... And then suddenly, at 18, I was beginning to understand that the worst really could happen to me, and probably would. I was scared all the time. I got a letter from somebody who served in another division but went through an experience something like mine. He said, 'I was not only afraid, I was sick with fear all the time.' That was the truth."

In France, Kotlowitz takes part in just one battle, an engagement so small it only shows up in the most detailed of regimental histories. But in that single battle, that one day of combat, nearly everybody Kotlowitz knows is killed in a futile, and probably ill-conceived, assault on a German position called the Horseshoe. He is, so far as he knows, the only member of this unit who was not wounded. He survived snipers by playing dead for an entire day, until the German troops pulled back and American medics appeared to save whomever they could save.

By the time you reach this section of the book, Kotlowitz has crafted vivid portrayals of the ordinary soldiers who fight this obscure little battle: feisty Lt. Francis J. Gallagher, who doesn't bother to hide his scorn for the slow-witted Capt. Michael Antonovich; hapless, overweight, erudite Ira Fedderman; Rocky Hubbell, the squad leader who is prone to mysterious disappearances; Paul Willis, the scout with the peculiar habit of stealing underwear from the other troops. These are not guys who get movies made about their exploits. These are plain and simple G.I.s: young, scared, brave, homesick, competent one moment and stumblejohns the next, unsung until now. For a writer, they are a fine cast of characters. "Every squad has good characters," Kotlowitz says. "They weren't all people I admired or liked, but God knows they were as real as real could be."

Much of Before Their Time is about memory. "That's true, but it was not a conscious effort that way," Kotlowitz says. "I tend to do things behind my own back. I have an intense memory, and I remember a lot of my life. But you have to remember that more is forgotten than is in this book. There's a lot that's not there. It's just gone.

"I had a friend call me and say, 'The thing I liked best about your book was the fact that it was seen through the eyes of an 18- or 19-year-old, until the last chapter, when the voice became yours of today.' I knew as soon as he said this that it was absolutely true."

He adds, "I get phone calls from veterans, and they follow a pattern. They are very hesitant and shy, and suddenly they start talking about their war experiences. And I realize, they haven't talked about it in 50 years, either! They go on for 45 minutes and it's amazing, it's wonderful." --DK

An "exciting time" for public television
Some people believe public television is in a downward spiral from which there is no return. Congress is slashing its funding to practically nothing, and cable stations are so profuse--and their programming so diverse--that it seems even Barney might not be able to compete. So you'd think that an offer to head Maryland Public Television (MPT) during these tough times wouldn't be terribly appealing. But David Nevins (MS '77) leaped at the chance.

Discarded needles not a problem
On seven different occasions between August 1994 and August 1996, trios of researchers fanned out across a 32-block area in East Baltimore, their eyes trained on the ground. They were searching for--and counting--drug vials, bottles, and needles in an effort to answer an important question that has surrounded needle exchange programs in high drug use areas: namely, do they lead to more discarded needles?

"One major objection to these programs is the fear that they will increase the number of potentially infectious needles discarded in the streets or gutters," says Meg Doherty (MPH '92), a School of Public Health doctoral candidate who helped design the study and served on one of the three survey teams. "Another objection is that they might draw a greater number of injection drug users to a specific area of the city, thus potentially shifting the location of discarded needles."

The research teams performed their search-and-count missions once before a mobile van began regularly dispensing needles to drug users, one month after the program began, and then again at regular intervals over the two-year period. The teams were careful to return to the same blocks on the same days of the week in order to avoid bias in their observations, explains Doherty, who is now a first-year medical student at Harvard Medical School.

They found no significant increase in the number of discarded needles, and no significant shift in where discarded needles were found, Doherty reported at a recent meeting of the American Public Health Association and in the April 15 American Journal of Epidemiology.

Drug users can't get new needles from the mobile vans without returning their used ones, Doherty notes. Of the 25,713 needles distributed during the first two months of the program, 97.2 percent were returned.

Says Doherty,"Public health planners should feel confident in implementing needle exchange programs without fear of putting other members of the community at risk of infectious disease." --SD

Written by Heather Byer (MA'96), Sue De Pasquale, and Dale Keiger.

RETURN TO JUNE 1997 TABLE OF CONTENTS.