George Will has remarked that because of his profession as a social critic he tends to be regarded as a scold. Deservedly, I might say. As a faculty member charged with teaching biochemistry to freshman medical students I have acquired the reputation of a grouch. As such, I can expand at great length on the derelictions in attitude, policies and practices of Loma Linda University. Properly stimulated, I might even write such an article for Adventist Today. However, I find myself impelled to finish such diatribes with “having said all that, I must add that Loma Linda has been good to me”. To that topic I now proceed.

When I moved from Boston to Loma Linda in 1965 I had the feeling that I was stepping back in time. Many of the faces were familiar from growing-up around Seventh-day Adventist academies and spending four years at Pacific Union College. The familiar Seventh-day Adventist jargon assaulted my ears. The administrative structure seemed like Newbury Park Academy, only bigger.

My feeling was wrong. Loma Linda inevitably shares much with my Seventh-day Adventist cultural background, but it is its own place. Loma Linda seldom looks to the future far more than it looks backward.

Any place derives its character from its surroundings and from the people in it. Surrounding Loma Linda is the “Inland Empire” half way between Los Angeles and Palm Springs, with the advantages and disadvantages of both. In 1965 I described it as congested but not civilized. The atmosphere was smoggy enough to make my chest hurt while doing yard work. There were—and still are—no bookstores in the true sense of the word. Being a reading addict I was ready to start walking just to get to the Harvard Square. But in many ways it is better now. It is just that the drive can be longer. Instead of six or seven miles to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts it is 50 miles to the Palm Springs Desert Museum.

Redlands, which always had summer concerts in the bowl, is slowly pulling itself up by its own bootstraps. When you are in town be sure to try the new Italian Restaurant “Rosemarino’s”. And of course, the music at the University Church is consistently good and sometimes reaches the sublime. I get my books from Amazon.com. The smog is much abated.

For me the people have been more important than the surroundings. The university was smaller in 1965, and even as an assistant professor I had access to the School of Medicine deans, David Hinshaw, John Peterson, and Gordon Hadley. They were unfailingly supportive and ready to share their wisdom. The best piece of advice on teaching medical students I ever got was from David Hinshaw: “if the students see you as being on their side, you can do almost anything you want in the classroom”. I have demonstrated that principle, sometimes to my sorrow and occasionally to my satisfaction.

John Peterson was chief of the Endocrine Section of the Department of Internal Medicine, and he immediately incorporated me into the weekly endocrine conferences, where I was welcomed by Milton Crane, Jack Harris, Bob Rosenquist, and Jerald Nelson. Jerry Nelson and I joined in a research collaboration that continues to this day.

Several faculty from my PUC days had moved south, including Graham Maxwell, Paul Stauffer and Ivan Neilsen. PUC’s loss was a distinct gain for Loma Linda, and for me.

My first department chairman was Raymond Mortensen. Of towering reputation, tall and erect of stature, stentorian of voice, dignity personified, he was the authority on the history of Loma Linda, the nuances of its culture, and most of all on teaching medical students. I followed him in that office, and of course had to endure the inevitable question from alumni: “are you the guy who has the unmitigated gall to try to replace Dr. Mortensen?” And of course I had my answer ready, adapted from Thomas Jefferson: “No one could replace Dr. Mortensen. I merely replace him.”

In the late 1960s both internal and external forces were pushing LLU to add a liberal arts college to the existing health profession schools. The trustees responded by merging Loma Linda with La Sierra College—a simple solution, but as it turned out not so easy to implement. In 1970 the academic vice-president, Robert Cleveland, asked me to serve on a standing committee charged with curriculum innovation. I had the fun of working with people like Willard Meier, Fritz Guy, Walter Hamerslough, Gene Rathbun and Betty Stirling and Iris Landa. We started with grandiose ideas about a new approach to general studies for the whole university and ended up with a smallish program called Interdisciplinary Studies, or “Interdip” for short. It was a short and happy venture into the academic life.

Interdip lasted a few years, and the merger a bit longer. In 1990 La Sierra and Loma Linda split. Norman Woods, soon to leave his post as president of the university, asked me to help restructure faculty governance. With my characteristic lack of good sense I accepted the chair of what became the Interschool Faculty Advisory Council. That placed me as an observer at some of the historic meetings of the constituency and the trustees as Loma Linda made the transition to a health science university. After our successful re-accreditation by WASC I gratefully shuffled off the coil of campus politics.

As Lyn Behrens, another good friend, was moving from her position as dean to president she asked me to assume the chair of the School of Medicine curriculum committee. My ten-year stint in that position was not withoug interest. Making a friend of Leonard Werner is a major dividend. A side-benefit has been going to medical education meetings at places like Snowbird and Park City, Utah, Scottsdale, Arizona, and Asilomar on the Monterey Peninsula. Somebody had to do it.

As I write it strikes me that my friends are too numerous to mention, but I won’t stop. There are George Lessard and Ray Gonzalez, who share my view that the really important things are somehow connected to an internal combustion engine. Ray also shares a taste for P. G. Wodehouse and Patrick McManus. Dick and Ardis Koobs were neighbors in the early years and are still friends.

Central to everything are the students. With my shocking memory for names (I am no Gordon Hadley or Bill Hooker) the number of faces that I recognize but can’t quite place is very large. Dean and Roger Hadley, Phil Roos, Berneva Adams, Carl Sandberg and Elmar Sakala were in the group that broke me in during the ’70s. I am far beyond the point where the freshmen look younger every year, but they always look very good.

There have been changes, the most striking being the much larger proportion of women in the medical and dental classes. In the laboratory, slide rules were replaced by pocket calculators and laptops. Chalk and blackboards were replaced by overhead projectors followed by PowerPoint presentations.

Alongside the onrush of medical and dental students has been the leisurely trickle of graduate students. From Bill Kersey from Southern California through Lloyd Juriansz from Canada, Rene Weiss and Milton Drachenberg from Argentina to Rong Wang from Beijing, they have kept me from sinking too far into mediocrity as well as becoming colleagues and friends.

Loma Linda is my children’s home, but not my home. I just don’t feel at home here. That bothered me for years. It bothers me no longer. Loma Linda is part of the Christian tradition, which as G. K. Chesterton pointed explains how I can feel homesick at home.

When I welcome newcomers to our university, I tell them “Loma Linda is a strange place - but it is a good place”.

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