4: University Years (1961–1965): Living in My Head

I continued the family tradition and went to the University of Missouri in Columbia where my grandparents, parents, uncles, and brother went. I also became a member of the same fraternity that my father and brother had joined—Beta Theta Pi. Through the fraternity, I met people from all over the state and many of them came from families that were not as privileged as those that went to Pem-Day. My grandfather, uncle, and brother had studied medicine so I started in what was called pre-med.

In my freshman year I had my second brush with death. In mid-December, I went to the infirmary with stomach pain. I was there for several days till Hugh Stevenson, who taught in the University medical school and had gone to my fraternity, saw my name on the list of people in the infirmary. He saw that I had an acute appendicitis and he operated on me immediately. I still have a large scar from that operation. If he had not seen my name on that list, my life would have been in danger.