In Memoriam

Abstract

It is with great sadness that I wish to inform readers of The Journal of Emergency Medicine that longtime member of the editorial staff, Marty Martell, recently passed away. Marty was well known to editors and reviewers of JEM. She was an integral part of the JEM family for longer than I can remember. She started with the Journal when Peter Rosen, our founding editor, came to San Diego, back in 1989. Back in those days, all journal operations were by hand and snail mail. Marty would actually receive paper manuscripts, photocopy them, assign them to reviewers and associate editors, mail them out, and track their reviews. Reviewers could accept or decline reviews by mail or telephone, would handwrite and later type/print out their reviews and send them back to Marty, who would compile them and send them to the associate editor for initial decision. Once an initial decision was made, it was sent back to the authors for revision by mail, and then when, finally, it was returned to the associate editor and a decision was made, it was then sent back to JEM and Peter would confirm the final decision of acceptance or rejection. As you might imagine, this process could take months, and Marty would track it all for each manuscript submitted.