Northwestern Magazine
Summer 2010HomeAlumni NewsCampus LifeMailboxPurple ProseBack Issues
Tools
Submit a Class Note
Class Codes
Submit a Purple Prose
E-mail the Editor
Back Issues
Update Your Address
Advertise with Us
Contact Us

In Memoriam


E. Richard Blonsky (FSM59, GFSM63), 74, former clinical professor of neurology at the Feinberg School of Medicine and associate professor of rehabilitation medicine at the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago, of Glencoe, Ill., died Aug. 26.

A pioneering neurosurgeon and pain medicine specialist, Blonsky directed RIC's Center for Pain Studies from 1985 to 1993, and in 1992-93 he served as president of the American Academy of Pain Medicine, an organization that he helped found.

Francesco del Greco, 86, professor emeritus of medicine at the Feinberg School of Medicine, died Jan. 17 in Sarasota, Fla. A noted nephrologist, del Greco pioneered the use of hemodialysis in the treatment of chronic renal failure and hypertension.

In 1958 he established the metabolic and dialysis unit at Passavant Memorial Hospital, which later became Northwestern Memorial Hospital. The unit was the first of its kind in Illinois, and Passavant was one of the first hospitals in the country to offer dialysis for patients with chronic kidney disease.

Donald N. Frey, 86, professor of industrial engineering and management sciences, died March 5 in Evanston, where he lived. In the 1960s Frey helped develop the Ford Mustang and convinced Henry Ford II to approve the prototype that became an American icon. He later spent 17 years as president of the engineering and manufacturing firm Bell & Howell.

Frey, who came to Northwestern in 1988, taught graduate courses in innovation and entrepreneurship and information systems as well as Engineering Design and Communication to first-year engineers. To reward McCormick undergraduates for interdisciplinary innovation and creativity, he established the annual Margaret and Muir Frey Prize, in memory of his parents, in fall 2001. (See "Man Behind the Mustang," fall 2004.)

Ian R. Macneil, 80, John Henry Wigmore Professor Emeritus of Law, died Feb. 16 in Edinburgh, Scotland. An influential contract law scholar, Macneil joined Northwestern's faculty in 1980.

As a visiting professor at Harvard Law School in 1988, Macneil taught Barack Obama (H06). Macneil predicted to his wife that Obama would become the first African American president.

American by birth, Macneil inherited the chieftainship of Clan MacNeil, one of Scotland's oldest, in 1970. Through his position, he managed a 9,000-acre crofting estate on the Scottish Isle of Barra for nearly 35 years and eventually gifted the estate to the government.

Richard Rovner, 78, former professor of neurology at the Feinberg School of Medicine and renowned epilepsy care advocate, died Nov. 27 in Chicago. In addition to teaching at Northwestern for 35 years, he also served as chief of staff of the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago in the 1970s.

He co-founded the Epilepsy Foundation of Greater Chicago and helped establish American Disabilities Act guidelines for people with epilepsy.

Printer-Friendly Format