Interviews with Professor Hugh Wynter

Abstract

Interview I Joan Meade (JM) and Pansy Hamilton (PH) are the interviewers JM This is January 17, 2007, the date of our first interview. PH The thing is that we think that there is a human interest story in the role that you played in the development of the Fertility Unit. We know that a lot has been said about it and that you have received a number of awards which acclaim the work that is done here in this Unit. Were there any important events that really put you on the path? I think what we want to get is really, as an individual, what were the things that influenced you. Before you got into your profession, were there any events or things that happened that sort of made a light bulb go off to say that is the thing that I probably could do something about, and then with your own professional development, maybe concretized it? So we are not restricting you, but those things that you think influenced you or were important in terms of moving you along a certain path, made you concerned, and pushed you towards doing something that could address that concern. Because, somehow, I think that in all the things that I have read and that I have seen I have not seen that aspect of it and I think we would want to capture it in terms of a human interest story. Youthful Stimuli HW My mind is jumping around. Well, but you will have to take out and put back and patch up as I jump around the place. First of all, let me thank you for the suggestion that I put into action your own thoughts about what I might have to say looking back on my life in relation to my profession, my occupation. I can go as far back as when the University started when, as a youngster in a scout troop, we were participating in the installation of the Princess Alice as the first Chancellor of the University College, as it then was. I was one of the ushers on that occasion. I recall a beautiful afternoon and the playing fields with the sunlight against the mountains, the chairs out on the lawn and the robing room in which the Princess and the University hierarchy were gathered. I can see the red carpet going from the changing room which is now replaced by the swimming pool. I can hear the fanfare as the procession came out. I can see the gowns, the reds and scarlet of the first undergraduates, the first batch of medical students. This was followed by the academic staff. Then more fanfare as the founders of the University, Sir Raymond Priestly in his black gown with silver brocade, next the chancellor of our University of London, this was the Princess' husband the Earl of Athlone in his black brocaded gown with gold motifs all over, then the big moment when the fanfare ushered in the Princess Alice. It was a very emotional moment for me. My parents were in the audience. I can see Bustamante coming in the opposite direction to which the audience was entering, his hair flying in the wind, quite a stature. I can see the Princess with the train held by Denise Mitchell, who became Mrs. David Thwaites later on. The train has now been cut for some reason;. I suppose they know why. I, with a big emotional feeling, recall the first words of the Princess when she said I, Alice, Princess of Great Britain, Countess of Athlone, promise. . . ., and so the oath went on and it was at that moment that I thought that I had to be a part of this venture, at age 1 3 or 14, somewhere there. I felt this was something new and I had to be a part of it. Perhaps it was the whole ritual, the whole ceremonial that gripped me, but apart from that I felt that this was perhaps an avenue down which I could go to make my contribution. JM Just elaborate the thought you just had a moment ago about the contribution you could make. HW I don't think the influence was at that particular time; it was just something I had heard along the way that, at around age 3 I think I was, I was very ill. Now you must remember it was the pre-antibiotic days and my father, who was a general practitioner, along with his colleagues, some four or five of them including the head of the Pathology Department at KPH, were over my bed, I am told, and a diagnosis was difficult in coming. …