York, testing the acidity of pickles and the color of egg yolk going into mayonnaise. She moved to a position at Johnson & Johnson that she hoped would be more promising, but ultimately involved testing the strength of sutures. In 1944, she left to work as an assistant to George H. Hitchings at the Burroughs-Wellcome pharmaceutical company (now GlaxoSmithKline) in Tuckahoe, New York. Hitchings was using a new way of developing drugs, by intentionally imitating natural compounds instead of through trial and error. Specifically, he was interested in synthesizing antagonists to nucleic acid derivatives, with the goal that these antagonists would integrate into biological pathways. He believed that if he could trick cancer cells into accepting artificial compounds for their growth, they could be destroyed without also destroying normal cells.Elion synthesized anti-metabolites of purines, and in 1950, she developed the anti-cancer drugs tioguanine and mercaptopurine. She pursued graduate studies at night school at New York University Tandon School of Engineering (then Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute), but after several years of long-range commuting, she was informed that she would no longer be able to continue her doctorate on a part-time basis, but would need to give up her job and go to school full-time. Elion made a critical decision in her life, and stayed with her job and give up the pursuit of her doctorate. She never obtained a formal Ph.D., but was later awarded an honorary Ph.D. from New York University Tandon School of Engineering (then Polytechnic University of New York) in 1989 and an honorary S.D. degree from Harvard University in 1998. Personal life Soon after graduating from Hunter College, Elion met Leonard Canter, an outstanding statistics student at City College of New York (CCNY). They planned to marry, but Leonard became ill. On June 25, 1941, he died from bacterial endocarditis, an infection of his heart valves. In her Nobel interview, she stated that this furthered her drive to become a research scientist and pharmacologist. Elion never married or had children. However, her brother, whom she was close with, married and had two sons and a daughter that she took pride in being able to watch grow. She listed her hobbies as photography, travel, opera and ballet, and listening to music. After Burroughs Wellcome moved to Research Triangle Park in North Carolina, Elion moved to nearby Chapel Hill. She retired in 1983 from Burroughs Wellcome to spend more time