The West African Research Center (WARC, French: Centre de recherche ouest-africain) is the overseas research center for the United States-based West African Research Association (WARA). It is located in Dakar, Senegal. WARC is a center for academic exchange between American and West African scholars that encourages research on the region of West Africa. The idea for the overseas center came about in May 1992 and was implemented in the fall of 1993. Since its inception, WARC has grown both in terms of staff and influence as it continues to connect researchers in the USA with researchers in the region of West Africa interested in common issues.   Currently, WARC is headed by Dr. Ousmane Sene.  It is located in the Fann-Point E-Amitié neighborhood of Dakar.

The center is a member of the Council of American Overseas Research Centers.

Objectives
WARC promotes scholarly research on West Africa and the Diaspora and works to foster cooperation between American and West African researchers, students and artists, and  seeks   active participation   of both West African and American scholars, WARC specifically aims to:

-Encourage collaborative research through a program of research fellowships and the organization of colloquia, seminars, and workshops on topics of both general and scholarly interest.
-Make available to West African and visiting researchers a research library, computer facilities, and a computer network.
-Provides a forum for local and foreign researchers.
-Promote interdisciplinary approaches and considerations of gender in the study of West Africa and the African Diaspora.
-Gathers, catalog, and disseminate the results of research on West Africa.

Facilities
The West African Research Center has a conference, seminar, and round-table room. The Center also makes available for the West African Research Association members and other researchers, computer rooms with printers and access to the Internet, a Restaurant, a Library, and a research room.

The library was named after the late Dr. Mouhamed Moustapha Kane and was opened on February 7, 1998 by the Faculty of Arts's Dean, Mr. Oumar Kane in the presence of the late Moustapha Kane's family. It is composed of two reading areas and a reception/orientation office. In support of WARC's research dimension, one of the reading areas has been specifically reserved for researchers to allow them access to certain publications such as dissertations, periodicals, magazine reviews, etc. The second reading area is open to students and the public. Presently, the library has at its disposal over 3,000 volumes divided specially in the files Africa and Diaspora. It also has many collections of scientific magazines and memoirs.

Its sources of funding include Donations from essentially American or African researchers, students or institutions (American Cultural Center, Michigan State University Library, Late Moustapha Kane's family, African Studies from Columbia University/

See also
 University of Dakar

References

External links
 Official website

International research institutes
Research institutes in Senegal
Council of American Overseas Research Centers
1993 establishments in Senegal
Organisations based in Dakar

West African Research Center


A plate block is a block of postage stamps that includes the part of the sheet margin with the serial number of the printing plate(s) used to print the stamps.

Sometimes the plate numbers appear in the stamps themselves, but the more common practice is to include the number in the margin of each sheet, frequently alongside the name of the printer.

Related pages
 Plating (stamps)
 Postage stamp block

Other websites

Postage stamps

Plate block


A Primary care psychologist (PCP) is a psychologist with specialist training in psychological knowledge and principles of common physical diseases and mental disorders experienced by patients and families throughout the lifespan, and which tend to present in primary care clinics.

Clinical associates in applied psychology are a related "New Ways of Working" initiative in Scotland.

Most recently, the UK Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) initiative, which focuses on primary care psychological therapies provision, has benchmarked professionals at all career levels, from closely supervised psychological wellbeing practitioners (many of which have a psychology undergraduate degree and a post-graduate one year certificate/diploma, although several have master's degrees too) to high-intensity psychological therapists, who, in terms of pay, are benchmarked against doctorate level training (many of these are counselling psychologists and clinical psychologists). Moreover, Clinical lead posts are pivotal in leading related primary care psychological services and these are benchmarked against Consultant Psychologist level (post doctoral expertise).

References

Clinical psychology

Primary care psychologist


Sampsons Island is a  uninhabited, undeveloped barrier island at the mouth of Cotuit Harbor in Barnstable, Massachusetts. It is the location of the Massachusetts Audubon Society's Sampsons Island Wildlife Sanctuary, and it forms part of the Sampsons Island/Dead Neck Island barrier beach system. The island is only accessible by private boat, and is used for recreation and wildlife viewing and preservation.

As a barrier island, Sampsons Island and Dead Neck Island protect Cotuit Harbor and nearby coastal areas. The island is a nesting site for piping plovers, least terns, and common terns and a habitat for many other shore birds. It is designated an Important Bird Area. Access to the island is limited during nesting season.

References

External links
Sampsons Island Wildlife Sanctuary

Barnstable, Massachusetts
Islands of Barnstable County, Massachusetts
Sampson's Island
Open space reserves of Massachusetts
Coastal islands of Massachusetts
Wildlife refuges in Massachusetts
Massachusetts Audubon Society
Important Bird Areas of the United States
Barrier islands of Massachusetts

Sampsons Island


Abraham Flexner (November 13, 1866 – September 21, 1959) was an American educator, best known for his role in the 20th century reform of medical and higher education in the United States and Canada.

After founding and directing a college-preparatory school in his hometown of Louisville, Kentucky, Flexner published a critical assessment of the state of the American educational system in 1908 titled The American College: A Criticism. His work attracted the Carnegie Foundation to commission an in-depth evaluation into 155 medical schools in the US and Canada. It was his resultant self-titled Flexner Report, published in 1910, that sparked the reform of medical education in the United States and Canada. Flexner was also a founder of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, which brought together some of the greatest minds in history to collaborate on intellectual discovery and research.

Biography

Early life and education
Flexner was born in Louisville, Kentucky on November 13, 1866. He was the sixth of nine children born to German Jewish immigrants Ester and Moritz Flexner. He was the first in his family to complete high school and go on to college. In 1886, at age 19, Flexner completed a B.A. in classics at Johns Hopkins University, where he studied for only two years. In 1905, he pursued graduate studies in psychology at Harvard University, and at the University of Berlin. He did not, however, complete work on an advanced degree at either institution.

Personal life
Flexner had three brothers named Jacob, Bernard and Simon Flexner. He also had a sister named Rachel Flexner.

The success of Abraham Flexner's experimental schooling allowed him to help finance Simon Flexner's medical education at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. He proceeded to become a pathologist, bacteriologist and a medical researcher employed by the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research from 1901 to 1935.

Flexner also financed his sister's undergraduate studies at Bryn Mawr College. Jacob ran a drugstore and used the profits from selling the establishment to attend medical school. He then practiced as a physician in Louisville. Bernard pursued a career in law and later practiced in both Chicago and New York.

In 1896, Flexner married a former student of his school, Anne Laziere Crawford. She was a teacher who soon became a successful playwright and children's author. The success of her play Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch (based on the 1901 novel) funded Flexner's studies at Harvard and his year abroad at European universities. The couple supported women's suffrage and had two daughters Jean and Eleanor. Jean went on to become one of the original employees of the United States Division of Labor Standards. Eleanor Flexner became an independent scholar and pioneer of women's studies.

Flexner grew up in an Orthodox Jewish family; however, early on he became a religious agnostic.

In addition to contributions by his brother Simon, their nephew, Louis Barkhouse Flexner, was founding director of the Mahoney Institute of Neurological Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania and a former editor of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Death
Flexner died in Falls Church, Virginia, in 1959 at 92 years of age. He was buried in Cave Hill Cemetery in Louisville, Kentucky.

Career

Experimental schooling
After graduating from Johns Hopkins University in two years with a degree in classics, Flexner returned to Louisville to teach classics at Louisville Male High School. Four years later, Flexner founded a private school in which he would test his growing ideas about education. Flexner opposed the standard model of education that focused on mental discipline and a rigid structure. Moreover, "Mr. Flexner's School" did not give out traditional grades, used no standard curriculum, refused to impose examinations on students, and kept no academic record of students. Instead, it promoted small learning groups, individual development, and a more hands-on approach to education. Graduates of his school were soon accepted at leading colleges, and his teaching style began to attract considerable attention.

The American College
In 1908, Flexner published his first book, The American College. Strongly critical of many aspects of American higher education, it denounced, in particular, the university lecture as a method of instruction. According to Flexner, lectures enabled colleges to "handle cheaply by wholesale a large body of students that would be otherwise unmanageable and thus give the lecturer time for research." In addition, Flexner was concerned about the chaotic condition of the undergraduate curriculum and the influence of the research culture of the university. Neither contributed to the mission of the college to address the whole person. He feared that "research had largely appropriated the resources of the college, substituting the methods and interest of highly specialized investigation for the larger objects of college teaching."

His book attracted the attention of Henry Pritchett, president of the Carnegie Foundation, who was looking for someone to lead a series of studies of professional education. The book consistently cited Pritchett in discussions of views on educational reform, and the two soon arranged to meet through the then-president of Johns Hopkins University, Ira Remsen. Although Flexner had never set foot inside a medical school, he was Pritchett's first choice to lead a study of American medical education, and soon joined the research staff at the Carnegie Foundation in 1908. Although not a physician himself, Flexner was selected by Pritchett for his writing ability and his disdain for traditional education.

Flexner Report

In 1910, Flexner published the Flexner Report, which examined the state of American medical education and led to far-reaching reform in the training of doctors. The Flexner Report led to the closure of most rural medical schools and five out of seven African-American medical colleges in the United States given his adherence to germ theory, in which he argued that if not properly trained and treated, African-Americans and the poor posed a health threat to middle/upper class European-Americans. His position was:

Ironically, one of the schools, Louisville National Medical College, was located in Flexner's hometown. In response to the report, some schools fired senior faculty members in a process of reform and renewal.

Influence on Europe
Flexner soon conducted a related study of medical education in Europe. According to Bonner (2002), Flexner's work came to be "nearly as well known in Europe as in America." With funding from the Rockefeller Foundation, Flexner "...exerted a decisive influence on the course of medical training and left an enduring mark on some of the nation's most renowned schools of medicine." Bonner worried that "the imposition of rigid standards by accrediting groups was making the medical curriculum a monstrosity," with medical students moving through it with "little time to stop, read, work or think." Bonner (2002) calls Flexner "the severest critic and the best friend American medicine ever had."

New Lincoln School
Between 1912 and 1925, Flexner served on the Rockefeller Foundation's General Education Board, and after 1917 was its secretary. With the help of the board, he founded another experimental school, the Lincoln School, which opened in 1917, in cooperation with the faculty at Teachers College of Columbia University.

Institute for Advanced Study

Louis Bamberger and his sister Caroline Bamberger Fuld, founders of Bamberger's department store, which they had sold to Macy's following the death of co-founder and husband Felix Fuld, were set on creating a medical school in Newark, New Jersey. They wanted to give admissions preference to Jewish applicants in an effort to fight the rampant prejudice against Jews in the medical profession at that time. Flexner informed them that a teaching hospital and other faculties required a successful school. A few months later, in June 1930, he had persuaded the Bamberger siblings and their representatives to fund instead the development of an Institute for Advanced Study.

The institute was headed by Flexner from 1930 to 1939 and it possessed a renowned faculty including Kurt Gödel and John von Neumann.

During his time there, Flexner helped bring over many European scientists who would likely have suffered persecution by the rising Nazi government. This included Albert Einstein, who arrived at the Institute in 1933 under Flexner's directorship.

Universities: American, English, German
In his 1930 Universities: American, English, German, Flexner returned to his earlier interest in the direction and purpose of the American university, attacking distractions from serious learning, such as intercollegiate athletics, student government, and other student activities.

Legacy
 The Flexner Report and his work in education has had a lasting impact on medical and higher education. The specific impacts of the Flexner Report on American and Canadian medicine include:
 Average physician quality has increased significantly
 Medicine has become a lucrative and well-respected profession
 A physician must receive at minimum six years, preferably eight years of post-secondary education, typically in a university setting
 Medical education is based on research, specifically in the fields of human physiology and biochemistry
 Medical research follows the same protocols as scientific research
 The state government must approve the founding of any medical school and medical schools are subject to state regulation
 The state branches of the American Medical Association oversee all the conventional medical schools in each state
 The Institute for Advanced Study, which Flexner co-founded, has been conducting valuable research for over 80 years in attempt to understand the complexities of the physical world and humanity

Honors
The Association of American Medical Colleges created the Abraham Flexner Award for Distinguished Service to Medical Education to annually recognize individuals who have made a notable contribution to American medical education. In 2020, "in light of racist and sexist writings" the AAMC renamed the award, removing Flexner's name.
The University of Kentucky College of Medicine has the Academy of Medical Educator Excellence in Medical Education Award, which was formerly named the Abraham Flexner Master Educator Award, to recognize achievement in six categories:
 Educational Leadership and Administration
 Outstanding Teaching Contribution or Mentorship
 Educational Innovation and Curriculum Development
 Educational Evaluation and Research
 Faculty Development in Education
 Abraham Flexner Way in downtown Louisville's hospital district was named by the Louisville Board of Aldermen in November 1978 to honor Flexner.

Bibliography
 1908. The American College: A Criticism
 1910. Medical Education in the United States and Canada.
 1910. Medical Education in the United States and Canada (at Google Books).
 1912. Medical education in Europe; a report to the Carnegie foundation for the advancement of teaching.
 1916. A Modern School.
 1916 (with Frank P. Bachman). Public Education in Maryland: A Report to the Maryland Educational Survey Commission.
 1918 (with F.B. Bachman). The Gary Schools.
 1927 "Do Americans Really Value Education?" The Inglis Lecture 1927(Harvard University Press)
 1928. The Burden of Humanism. The Taylorian Lecture at Oxford University.
 1930. Universities: American, English, German.
 1939. Flexner Abraham (1939 June/November). The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge. Harpers, Issue 179, pp. 544–552. .
 1940. I Remember: The Autobiography of Abraham Flexner. Simon and Schuster. Fulltext
 1943. A biography of H.S. Pritchett.

See also
Charles Flexner (born 1956), American physician, clinical pharmaceutical scientist, academic, author and researcher
James Thomas Flexner (1908–2003), American historian and biographer
Simon Flexner (1863–1946), physician, scientist, administrator, and professor

References

Further reading
Bonner, Thomas Neville, 2002. Iconoclast: Abraham Flexner and a Life in Learning. Johns Hopkins Univ. Press. .

 Nevins, Michael, 2010. Abraham Flexner: A Flawed American Icon. iUniverse. .
 Starr, Paul, 1982. The Social Transformation of American Medicine. Basic Books. .
 Wheatley, S. C., 1989. The Politics of Philanthropy: Abraham Flexner and Medical Education. University of Wisconsin Press. .

External links

 Jacob, The Other Flexner (offers biographical information about Abraham)
 Amy E. Wells: "Flexner, Abraham (1866–1959)." In: Encyclopedia of Education. 2002.
 Biography of Flexner from the Institute of Advanced Studies
 Abraham Flexner and the era of medical education reform. (critically places Flexner and his contributions within the context of social and educational reform of the time)
 Full text of the "Medical education in the United States and Canada; a report to the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching"
 Quotes by Abraham Flexner

1866 births
1959 deaths
20th-century American biographers
American male biographers
20th-century American educators
American education writers
American people of German-Jewish descent
Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni
Directors of the Institute for Advanced Study
Johns Hopkins University alumni
Writers from Louisville, Kentucky
Rockefeller Foundation people
Burials at Cave Hill Cemetery
Medical educators

Abraham Flexner


Victoria is an area of Central London in the City of Westminster. It is named after Victoria Station, which is a major transport hub. The station was named after the nearby Victoria Street.

The name is used to describe streets adjoining or nearly adjoining the station, including Victoria Street, Buckingham Palace Road, Wilton Road, Grosvenor Gardens, and Vauxhall Bridge Road. Victoria consists predominantly of commercial property and private and social housing, with retail uses along the main streets.

The area contains one of the busiest transport interchanges in London and the United Kingdom, including the listed railway station and the underground station, as well as Terminus Place, which is a major hub for bus and taxi services. Victoria Coach Station, 900 yards (800 metres) southwest of the railway station, provides road-coach services to long-distance UK and continental destinations.

Victoria Street runs on an east–west axis from Victoria station to Broad Sanctuary at Westminster Abbey. Cardinal Place, across the street from Westminster Cathedral, opened in 2006 and contains a selection of restaurants, banks and shops, including a Marks and Spencer store. Further along the street, there is a large House of Fraser department store (formerly the Army & Navy) opposite Westminster City Hall. At the Broad Sanctuary end is the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy building, the headquarters of Transport for London at Windsor House, and the former New Scotland Yard building (headquarters of the Metropolitan Police Service from 1967 to 2016).

History

The area formed part of the parish of St George Hanover Square.

Long before Cardinal Place opposite the cathedral came into being there was a huge brewery (Stag Brewery) based at the western end of Victoria Street. From the early 17th century it started off as a small brewhouse with properties that once were part of St James's Palace. This then substantially grew and then was bought and owned by Watney & Co. They built lodgings around the brewery as well as amenities for their staff to use. By the end of the 19th century they were employing a sizeable number of staff. (It closed down in 1959 and was demolished. All that now remains of it is a street named Stag Place and a pub called the Stag.)

Part of a slum, dubbed "Devil's Acre" by Charles Dickens, was demolished to construct Victoria Street, which opened for use in 1851.
 Pleasance Pendred and three other suffragettes smashed the windows of various shops including the antiquities shop at 167 Victoria Street in 1913.

Victoria Station was built in 1860.

The architect Archibald Leitch who was renowned for his work designing football stadiums including Goodison Park, Craven Cottage, Anfield, Stamford Bridge, Old Trafford, Ibrox and White Hart Lane among many others, had offices which were based at 53 Victoria Street and the street as a whole housed many consulting engineering firms until the 1970s.

According to Norman Wisdom's biography, he slept near the statue of Marshal Foch by the bus station at the westerly end of the street when his parents split up at the age of 9. Before going into comedy he worked as an errand boy in the then grand Artillery Mansions on Victoria Street which was then a grand hotel. In the 1980s it went into decay and became a squat – and in the 1990s was gutted, refurbished and now it is an elegant apartment block.

Landmarks

Westminster Cathedral is the largest Catholic church in the UK and the seat of the Archbishop of Westminster. It was built between 1895 and 1903 in the Neo-Byzantine style on a site previously occupied by the Tothill Fields Bridewell prison from 1618–1884.

Victoria Palace Theatre dates from 1911 and replaced the Royal Standard Music Hall, built in 1886. That itself had been a replacement for an earlier Royal Standard Music Hall, which originally opened in 1850 as Moy's Music Hall.

Little Ben, a -tall clock tower in the style of Big Ben, stands at the intersection of Vauxhall Bridge Road and Victoria Street. It was erected in 1892 but removed in 1964 during road widening works, and was kept in storage until eventually being restored in 1981.

The Apollo Victoria Theatre was built in 1929 in Art Deco style, opening in 1930 the New Victoria Cinema. It closed in 1975 before being reopened as a theatre in 1981. In 1984 it became host to the musical Starlight Express, which remained its main production until 2002.

Opposite the Victoria Street entrance to Victoria Station is the site of the former Metropole Kinema, built in 1929 and in operation until 1977. It reopened in 1978 as The Venue, a live music club owned by Virgin Records, which ran until 1984. The building was demolished in 2013.

The House of Fraser department store on Victoria Street, opened in 2005, is built on the site of the former flagship branch of the Army & Navy Stores, opened in 1872. Army & Navy Stores had been acquired by House of Fraser in 1973.

Local schools
Three notable schools are closest to the Victoria neighbourhood, Westminster City School for Boys and Grey Coat Hospital for Girls, as well as the independent Westminster School at Deans Yard near Westminster Abbey.

Future
Victoria is a designated 'Opportunity Area' in the Mayor's London Plan and Westminster City Council's Adopted Core Strategy January 2011 policy planning document, recognising the potential of the area, with its excellent transport links to accommodate commercial and residential growth. There are a number of emerging proposals for major redevelopment in the area, including improvements to the Victoria Underground Station, and regeneration of surrounding sites.

See also
Pimlico

References

Areas of London
Districts of the City of Westminster
Business improvement districts in London
Central business districts in the United Kingdom

Victoria, London


David Charles Marsden (born in Toronto, Ontario) is a Canadian radio broadcaster. Initially operating under the on-air name of Dave Mickie, with much fast-talking patter, he was a notable Toronto DJ of the 1960s who attracted critical attention from Marshall McLuhan.  Reinventing himself, and using his real name of David Marsden, he became a much more laid-back free-form DJ, notably at CHOM in Montreal and CHUM-FM in Toronto in the 1970s.  He then became the driving force behind Brampton, Ontario radio station CFNY in the 1980s, becoming an influential figure in the Canadian music industry by giving many Canadian and international alternative rock artists major Canadian radio exposure. During his stint at CFNY, his nickname (often referred to on-air) was "The Mars Bar".

Marsden currently runs the on-air streaming service nythespirit.com.

Early career

Raised in a foster family in Stratford, Ontario, Marsden took on the name "Dave Mickie" using the last name of his foster parents.  Under the name Dave Mickie, he was the original manager of The Revols, a Stratford, Ontario rock band in the late 1950s whose famous members included, Richard Manuel, who would later become part of The Band; Ken Kalmusky, who played with Ian and Sylvia and Great Speckled Bird; and, John Till who formed, and played guitar in, Janis Joplin's Full Tilt Boogie Band. He later became one of Canada's pioneering rock DJs on radio, joining Chatham's CFCO in 1963. Bored with the station's commercial easy listening music, he reportedly brought in some of his own records one night, breaking format and hosting in an uncharacteristically dynamic style. He was fired the next morning, but was quickly rehired after the station learned that his experiment had increased the station's ratings.

He was later hired at CKEY in Toronto where he was called "the most controversial thing on Toronto radio." He parted ways with CKEY after just five months. He became host of Music Hop on CBC Television in 1965, succeeding Alex Trebek. He also started writing a column for the Toronto Star in the same year. He was the subject of a chapter in Marshall McLuhan's book Understanding Media, which lauded his unique hosting style:

That's Patty Baby and that's the girl with the dancing feet and that's Freddy Cannon there on the David Mickie Show in the night time ooohbah scuba-doo how are you booboo. Next we'll be Swinging on a Star and sssshhhwwoooo and sliding on a moonbeam. Waaaaa how about that . . . one of the goodest guys with you . . . this is lovable kissable D.M. in the p.m. at 22 minutes past nine o'clock there, aahhrightie, we're gonna have a Hitline, all you have to do is call WAlnut 5-1151, WAlnut 5-1151, tell them what number it is on the Hitline.

The Dave Mickie name and persona were phased out in the mid-to-late 1960s, and as David Marsden, he joined Montreal's CKGM in 1967.  Under his own birth name, his hosting style was much less manic and more relaxed, although still informal and unpredictable.

In 1969, he moved to CKGM's sister station, CKGM-FM. Marsden was instrumental in switching the station's format from beautiful music to free form progressive rock. In 1973, Marsden returned to Toronto with his new, completely different on-air persona at CHUM-FM. He left the station in February 1975 to devote more time to his radio commercial production company, but mainly because of the tight playlist CHUM-FM was making their DJs follow. Marsden refused to follow a playlist and left shortly after it was instituted. He eventually returned as an on-air personality at CHIC-FM shortly before it was transformed into CFNY.

Pink Floyd/Dark Side of the Moon
In 1973 Marsden played a major role in introducing the (at that time) largely unknown Pink Floyd to Toronto.  He started a petition to persuade Toronto's Concert Productions International and promoter Michael Cohl to bring the band, who were touring to promote the as yet unreleased Dark Side of the Moon, to Maple Leaf Gardens for the first time. The resulting show sold out in 45 minutes.  He also played an advance copy of Dark Side of the Moon twice, from start to finish, on his show.  He found out later that Capitol Records had other plans for the album's premiere.  "We preceded the world premiere by four days and, of course, CHUM-FM was only available in the Toronto area," Marsden said. "But it was a world premiere as far as I was concerned."

Creates The Spirit of Radio
After CFNY program director Dave Pritchard left the station in 1978 due to conflicts with the station management, Marsden was promoted to program director. The station's mandate had been to present significantly different programming than other radio stations in the Greater Toronto Area. Before Marsden's arrival the station's format had been highly eclectic. Marsden saw the commercial potential of punk and new wave, and widened CFNY's focus even further, creating Canada's first alternative music station. Throughout the 1980s, under the slogan the spirit of radio, CFNY was one of the most influential promoters of new international and Canadian artists most radio stations ignored.

In 1985, Marsden also judged some episodes of CBC Television's battle of the bands competition series Rock Wars.

In July 1987, Marsden and CFNY general manager Bill Hutton hired Don Berns as the new program director. Initially, Marsden continued as director of operations, and as executive producer of the CASBY Awards, but left CFNY a year later. He joined the CBC and moved to Vancouver to produce the TV show Pilot One. That show won several awards, including a silver medal at the Chicago Film and Video Festival. Following that, Marsden launched another freeform modern rock station, Coast 800, later Coast 1040, in Vancouver.

He was later involved in the creation of Iceberg Radio, the first major Canadian Internet radio project, and returned to the terrestrial radio airwaves as host of a freeform rock show on Oshawa, Ontario's The Rock 94.9 in the early 2000s.

The Marsden Theatre
The David Marsden Radio Program, also known as The Marsden Theatre, aired twice a week on Oshawa, Ontario radio station CKGE-FM (a.k.a. The Rock) from June 2003 to December 2014.   Originally, Marsden's show was on Thursday and Friday nights, but it was moved to Saturday and Sunday nights in March 2010. During his time on CKGE, Marsden was the only free form DJ on a commercial radio station in North America.

Though it was announced the show would end on December 14, 2014, Marsden's final broadcast aired on December 7.  There was on-air promotion of a final set of shows the following week (December 13–14), but this never transpired, as Marsden announced on his Facebook page, "I believed it to be best under the circumstances as they played out during the week that I withdraw and disappear quietly from The Rock."

NYTheSpirit.com
Most recently, Marsden and his business partner Igor Loukine created the subscription based radio channel NYTheSpirit.com, which launched in September, 2014.  The station plays a mixture of music, concentrating heavily on the 1980s alternative scene, but with a freeform mentality that mimics Marsden's 1980s heyday at CFNY.

After leaving The Rock, Marsden began doing occasional live hosting gigs on NYTheSpirit; the first one aired on Christmas Eve 2014. Beginning in February 2015, The Marsden Theatre became a regular feature on NYTheSpirit; the live show is currently broadcast Friday and Saturday nights (8PM to midnight, EST).  As well, there is an annual 4-hour Christmas Eve special.

Legacy
Marsden has been profiled in exhibits at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, both for his on-air Dave Mickie persona and for his role as program director of CFNY. He is openly gay, and has also worked as a club DJ at gay club nights dubbed "The Mars Bar". He was featured in a 2015 documentary about radio DJs called I Am What I Play, directed by Roger King. An animated likeness of him at the control board on CFNY appears in a video of The Spirit of Radio by the band, RUSH.

References

External links
 David Marsden at SpiritOfRadio
 David Marsden's Official Site

Canadian radio hosts
Canadian radio executives
Gay entertainers
Living people
1940 births
Canadian LGBT broadcasters
21st-century Canadian LGBT people
Canadian gay men

David Marsden


Count (feminine: countess) is a historical title of nobility in certain European countries, varying in relative status, generally of middling rank in the hierarchy of nobility. Especially in earlier medieval periods the term often implied not only a certain status, but also that the count had specific responsibilities or offices. The etymologically related English term "county" denoted the territories associated with some countships, but not all.

Although the term count was not generally used in England, after the 1066 conquest by the Normans, various European terms for count eventually became the normal translations used for the English title of earl, and the wives of earls are still referred to as countesses.

Definition

The word count came into English from the French comte, itself from Latin comes—in its accusative comitem—meaning "companion", and later "companion of the emperor, delegate of the emperor".

In the late Roman Empire, the Latin title comes denoted the high rank of various courtiers and provincial officials, either military or administrative. Before Anthemius became emperor in the West in 467, he was a military comes charged with strengthening defenses on the Danube frontier.

In the Western Roman Empire, "count" came to indicate generically a military commander but was not a specific rank. In the Eastern Roman Empire, from about the seventh century, "count" was a specific rank indicating the commander of two centuriae (i.e., 200 men).

In the Frankish kingdoms in the early Middle Ages, a count might also be a count palatine, whose authority derived directly from the royal household, the palace in its original sense of the seat of power and administration. This other kind of count had vague antecedents in Late Antiquity too: the father of Cassiodorus held positions of trust with Theodoric, as comes rerum privatarum, in charge of the imperial lands, then as comes sacrarum largitionum ("count of the sacred doles"), concerned with the finances of the realm.

The medieval position of comes was originally not hereditary. The position of count was regarded as an administrative official dependent on the king, until the process of allodialisation during the 9th century in which such titles came to be private possessions of noble families. By virtue of their large estates, many counts could pass the title to their heirs—but not always. For instance, in Piast Poland, the position of komes was not hereditary, resembling the early Merovingian institution. The title had disappeared by the era of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, and the office had been replaced by others. Only after the Partitions of Poland did the title of "count" resurface in the title hrabia, derived from the German Graf.

Land attached to title

Originally, with the emergence of the title came the most powerful symbol of entitlement, that is the ownership of and jurisdiction over land, hence the term county. The term is derived from the Old French conté or cunté denoting a jurisdiction under the control of a count (earl) or a viscount. The modern French is comté, and its equivalents in other languages are contea, contado, comtat, condado, Grafschaft, graafschap, etc. (cf. conte, comte, conde, Graf).

The title of Count was also often conferred by the monarch as an honorific title for special services rendered, without a feudal estate (countship, county) being attached, so it was merely a title, with or without a domain name attached to it. In the United Kingdom, the equivalent "Earl" can also be used as a courtesy title for the eldest son of a duke or marquess. In the Italian states, by contrast, all the sons of certain counts were little counts (contini). In Sweden there is a distinction between counts (Swedish: greve) created before and after 1809. All children in comital families elevated before 1809 were called count/countess. In families elevated after 1809, only the head of the family was called count, the rest have a status similar to barons and were called by the equivalent of "Mr/Ms/Mrs", before the recognition of titles of nobility was abolished.

Comital titles in different European languages
The following lists are originally based on a Glossary on Heraldica.org by Alexander Krischnig. The male form is followed by the female, and when available, by the territorial circumscription.

Etymological derivations from the Latin

Etymological derivations from German  and/or Dutch

Compound and related titles
Apart from all these, a few unusual titles have been of comital rank, not necessarily permanently.
  (English: Dolphin; ; ; ; ) was a multiple (though rare) comital title in southern France, used by the Dauphins of Vienne and Auvergne, before 1349 when it became the title of the heir to the French throne. The Dauphin was the lord of the province still known as the .
  "Count-Duke" is a rare title used in Spain, notably by Gaspar de Guzmán, Count-Duke of Olivares. He had inherited the title of count of Olivares, but when created Duke of Sanlucar la Mayor by King Philip IV of Spain he begged permission to preserve his inherited title in combination with the new honour—according to a practice almost unique in Spanish history; logically the incumbent ranks as Duke (higher than Count) just as he would when simply concatenating both titles.
  'Count-Baron' is a rare title used in Portugal, notably by Dom , 7th Baron of Alvito, who received the title of Count of Oriola in 1653 from King John IV of Portugal. His palace in Lisbon still exists, located in a square named after him ().
 Archcount is a very rare title, etymologically analogous to archduke, apparently never recognized officially, used by or for:
 the count of Flanders (an original  of the French realm in present Belgium, very rich, once expected to be raised to the rank of kingdom); the informal, rather descriptive use on account of the countship's de facto importance is rather analogous to the unofficial epithet  (before Grand duke became a formal title) for the even wealthier Duke of Burgundy
 at least one Count of Burgundy (i.e.  of )
 In German kingdoms, the title  was combined with the word for the jurisdiction or domain the nobleman was holding as a fief or as a conferred or inherited jurisdiction, such as  (see also Marquess), ,  ("free count"), , where  signifies castle; see also Viscount,  (translated both as "Count Palatine" and, historically, as "Palsgrave"),  ("Raugrave", see "Graf", and  (), where  signifies a large forest) (from Latin nemus = grove).
 The German  and Dutch  () stem from the Byzantine-Greek   meaning "he who calls a meeting [i.e. the court] together").
 The Ottoman military title of  was used in Montenegro and Serbia as a lesser noble title with the equivalent rank of a Count.
 These titles are not to be confused with various minor administrative titles containing the word  in various offices which are not linked to feudal nobility, such as the Dutch titles  (a court sinecure, so usually held by noble courtiers, may even be rendered hereditary) and  (to the present, in the Low Countries, a manager in the local or regional administration of watercourses through dykes, ditches, controls etc.; also in German , synonymous with , "dike captain").

Lists of countships

Territory of today's France

Kingdom of the Western Franks
Since Louis VII (1137–80), the highest precedence amongst the vassals (Prince-bishops and secular nobility) of the French crown was enjoyed by those whose benefice or temporal fief was a pairie, i.e. carried the exclusive rank of pair; within the first (i.e. clerical) and second (noble) estates, the first three of the original twelve anciennes pairies were ducal, the next three comital comté-pairies:
 Bishop-counts of Beauvais (in Picardy)
 Bishop-counts of Châlons (in Champagne)
 Bishop-counts of Noyon (in Picardy)
 Count of Toulouse, until united to the crown in 1271 by marriage
 Count of Flanders (Flandres in French), which is in the Low countries and was confiscated in 1299, though returned in 1303
 Count of Champagne, until united to the crown (in 1316 by marriage, conclusively in 1361)
Later other countships (and duchies, even baronies) have been raised to this French peerage, but mostly as apanages (for members of the royal house) or for foreigners; after the 16th century all new peerages were always duchies and the medieval countship-peerages had died out, or were held by royal princes

Other French countships of note included those of:
 Count of Angoulême, later Duke
 Count of Anjou, later Duke
 Count of Auvergne
 Count of Bar, later Duke
 Count of Blois
 Count of Boulogne
 Count of Foix
 Count of Montpensier
 Count of Poitiers

Parts of today's France long within other kingdoms of the Holy Roman Empire
 Freigraf ("free count") of Burgundy (i.e. present Franche-Comté)
 The Dauphiné

The Holy Roman Empire
See also above for parts of present France

In Germany

A Graf ruled over a territory known as a Grafschaft ('county'). See also various comital and related titles; especially those actually reigning over a principality: Gefürsteter Graf, Landgraf, Reichsgraf; compare Markgraf, Burggraf, Pfalzgraf (see Imperial quaternions).

Northern Italian states
The title of Conte is very prolific on the peninsula. In the eleventh century, Conti like the Count of Savoy or the Norman Count of Apulia, were virtually sovereign lords of broad territories. Even apparently "lower"-sounding titles, like Viscount, could describe powerful dynasts, such as the House of Visconti which ruled a major city such as Milan. The essential title of a feudatory, introduced by the Normans, was signore, modeled on the French seigneur, used with the name of the fief. By the fourteenth century, conte and the Imperial title barone were virtually synonymous.

Some titles of a count, according to the particulars of the patent, might be inherited by the eldest son of a Count. Younger brothers might be distinguished as "X dei conti di Y" ("X of the counts of Y"). However, if there is no male to inherit the title and the count has a daughter, in some regions she could inherit the title.

Many Italian counts left their mark on Italian history as individuals, yet only a few contadi (countships; the word contadini for inhabitants of a "county" remains the Italian word for "peasant") were politically significant principalities, notably:
 Norman Count of Apulia
 Count of Savoy, later Duke (also partly in France and in Switzerland)
 Count of Asti
 Count of Montferrat (Monferrato)
 Count of Montefeltro
 Count of Tusculum

In Austria
The principalities tended to start out as margraviate or (promoted to) duchy, and became nominal archduchies within the Habsburg dynasty; noteworthy are:
 Count of Tyrol
 Count of Cilli
 Count of Schaumburg

In the Low Countries
Apart from various small ones, significant were :
 in presentday Belgium :
 Count of Flanders (Vlaanderen in Dutch), but only the small part east of the river Schelde remained within the empire; the far larger west, an original French comté-pairie became part of the French realm
 Count of Hainaut
 Count of Namur, later a margraviate
 Count of Leuven (Louvain), later a dukedom
 Count of Loon
 in the presentday Netherlands:
 Count of Guelders later Dukes of Guelders
 Count of Holland
 Count of Zeeland
 Count of Zutphen

In Switzerland

 Count of Geneva
 Count of Neuchâtel
 Count of Toggenburg
 Count of Kyburg
 Count de Salis-Soglio (also in the UK, Canada and Australia)
 Count de Salis-Seewis
 Count of Panzutti
Count In-Albon

In other continental European countries

Holy See

Count/Countess was one of the noble titles granted by the Pope as a temporal sovereign, and the title's holder was sometimes informally known as a papal count/papal countess or less so as a Roman count/Roman countess, but mostly as count/countess. The comital title, which could be for life or hereditary, was awarded in various forms by popes and Holy Roman Emperors since the Middle Ages, infrequently before the 14th century, and the pope continued to grant the comital and other noble titles even after 1870, it was largely discontinued in the mid 20th-century, on the accession of John XXIII. The Papacy and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies might appoint counts palatine with no particular territorial fief. Until 1812 in some regions, the purchaser of land designated "feudal" was ennobled by the noble seat that he held and became a conte. This practice ceased with the formal abolition of feudalism in the various principalities of early-19th century Italy, last of all in the Papal States.

In Poland

Poland was notable throughout its history for not granting titles of nobility. This was on the premise that one could only be born into nobility, outside rare exceptions. Instead, it conferred non-hereditary courtly or civic roles. The noble titles that were in use on its territory were mostly of foreign provenance and usually subject to the process of indygenat, naturalisation.

In Hungary

Somewhat similar to the native privileged class of nobles found in Poland, Hungary also had a class of Conditional nobles.

On the Iberian peninsula

As opposed to the plethora of hollow "gentry" counts, only a few countships ever were important in medieval Iberia; most territory was firmly within the Reconquista kingdoms before counts could become important. However, during the 19th century, the title, having lost its high rank (equivalent to that of Duke), proliferated.

Portugal
Portugal itself started as a countship in 868, but became a kingdom in 1139 (see:County of Portugal). Throughout the History of Portugal, especially during the Constitutional Monarchy many other countships were created (see: List of Countships in Portugal).

Spain

In Spain, no countships of wider importance exist, except in the former Spanish march.
County of Barcelona, the initial core of the Principality of Catalonia, later one of the states of the Crown of Aragon, which became one of the two main components of the Spanish crown.
Count of Aragon
Count of Castile
Count of Galicia
Count of Lara
Count Cassius, progenitor of the Banu Qasi
County of Urgell, later integrated into the Principality of Catalonia.
The other Catalan counties were much smaller and were absorbed early into the County of Barcelona (between parentheses the annexation year): County of Girona (897), County of Besalú, County of Osona, which included the nominal County of Manresa (1111), County of Berga and County of Conflent (1117) and County of Cerdanya (1118). From 1162 these counties, together with that of Barcelona, were merged into the Principality of Catalonia, a sovereign state that absorbed some other counties: County of Roussillon (1172), County of Pallars Jussà (1192), County of Empúries (1402), County of Urgell (1413) and County of Pallars Sobirà (1487), giving the Principality its definitive shape.

South Eastern Europe

Bulgaria
In the First Bulgarian Empire, a komit was a hereditary provincial ruler under the tsar documented since the reign of Presian (836-852) The Cometopouli dynasty was named after its founder, the komit of Sredets.

Montenegro and Serbia
The title of Serdar was used in the Principality of Montenegro and the Principality of Serbia as a noble title below that of Voivode equivalent to that of Count.

Crusader states
 Count of Edessa
 Count of Tripoli (1102–1288)

Scandinavia

In Denmark and historically in Denmark-Norway the title of count (greve) is the highest rank of nobility used in the modern period. Some Danish/Dano-Norwegian countships were associated with fiefs, and these counts were known as "feudal counts" (lensgreve). They rank above ordinary (titular) counts, and their position in the Danish aristocracy as the highest-ranking noblemen is broadly comparable to that of dukes in other European countries. With the first free Constitution of Denmark of 1849 came a complete abolition of the privileges of the nobility. Since then the title of count has been granted only to members of the Danish royal family, either as a replacement for a princely title when marrying a commoner, or in recent times, instead of that title in connection with divorce. Thus the first wife of Prince Joachim of Denmark, the younger son of Margrethe II of Denmark, became Alexandra, Countess of Frederiksborg on their divorce—initially retaining her title of princess, but losing it on her remarriage.

In the Middle Ages the title of jarl (earl) was the highest title of nobility. The title was eventually replaced by the title of duke, but that title was abolished in Denmark and Norway as early as the Middle Ages. Titles were only reintroduced with the introduction of absolute monarchy in 1660, with count as the highest title.

In Sweden the rank of count is the highest rank conferred upon nobles in the modern era and are, like their Danish and Norwegian counterparts, broadly comparable to that of dukes in other European countries. Unlike the rest of Scandinavia, the title of duke is still used in Sweden, but only by members of the royal family and are not considered part of the nobility.

Equivalents
Like other major Western noble titles, Count is sometimes used to render certain titles in non-western languages with their own traditions, even though they are as a rule historically unrelated and thus hard to compare, but which are considered "equivalent" in rank.

This is the case with:

the Chinese Bó (伯), or "Bojue" (伯爵), hereditary title of nobility ranking below Hóu (侯) and above Zĭ (子)
the Japanese equivalent Hakushaku (), adapted during the Meiji restoration
the Korean equivalent Baekjak (백작) or Poguk
 in Vietnam, it is rendered Bá, one of the lower titles reserved for male members of the Imperial clan, above Tử (Viscount), Nam (Baron) and Vinh phong (lowest noble title), but lower than—in ascending order—Hầu (Marquis), Công (Prince), Quận-Công (Duke/Duke of a commandery) and Quốc-Công (Grand Duke/Duke of the Nation), all under Vương (King) and Hoàng Đế (Emperor).
the Indian Sardar, adopted by the Maratha Empire, additionally, Jagirdar and Deshmukh are close equivalents
the Arabic equivalent Sheikh
In traditional Sulu equivalent to Datu Sadja

In fiction

The title "Count" in fiction is commonly, though not always, given to evil characters, used as another word for prince or vampires:

Count Nefaria
Count Vertigo
Count von Count
Count Duckula
Count Olaf
Count Chocula
Count Paris
Count of Monte Cristo
Count Dooku
Count Dracula
Count Orlok
Count Arthur Strong

See also
 Czech nobility
 Icelandic nobility
 Romanian nobility
 Russian nobility
 Viscount
 Earl

References

Sources
 Labarre de Raillicourt: Les Comtes Romains
 Westermann, Großer Atlas zur Weltgeschichte (in German)

External links

 Heraldica.org - here the French peerage
 Italian Titles of Nobility
 Webster's 1828 Dictionary

Feudalism
Roman Empire in late antiquity
Noble titles
Titles
Men's social titles

de:Graf

Count


A dry bite is a bite by a venomous animal in which no venom is released. Dry snake bites are called "venomous snake bite without envenoming". A dry bite from a snake can still be painful, and be accompanied by bleeding, inflammation, swelling and/or erythema. It may also lead to infection, including tetanus.

Dry bites can occur from all snakes, but their frequency varies from species to species. For example, Australian eastern brown snakes (Pseudonaja textilis) can inflict dry bites 80% of the time while taipans inflict dry bites only 5% of the time. About 50% of snakebite cases can be dry bites. They are characterized by fang and tooth marks and the absence of injected venom.

The first clinically observed dry snake bite occurred in London in 1892, from a South American rattlesnake. The term "dry bite" has been in use since the early 1980s.

Reasons for a dry bite
A dry bite can be deliberate on the part of the animal (delivered as a "warning"), happen by accident or be the result of a property of the animal or the target. Recent scholarship identifies seven main snake-related causes for a dry bite from a snake:

 Gland infection
 Trauma after defence
 Trauma after extraction of venom
 Duct calcification or obstruction
 Venom metering
 Empty gland
 Misjudgement of the distance to victim, leading to only partial penetration or a premature ejection of venom

A variety of factors lead to different dry bite patterns in younger and older snakes. Neonate and juvenile snakes are less likely to "meter" their venom, and therefore usually empty their venom glands when they bite. Older snakes can replenish venom quicker after it has been depleted, but are also more likely to have calcified or obstructed venom ducts.

The victim can also affect whether a bite is dry, if they pulled away when bitten or they were wearing thicker clothes.

Treatment
In practice, it is not necessarily simple to tell a dry bite from a dangerously venomous bite. In the case of a potential dry bite from a snake, the wound should still be cleaned, a tetanus prophylaxis delivered, and the victim monitored for up to 12 hours in case the bite was venomous and antivenom and/or ancillary treatments are required.

Dry bites are often confusing for the attending physician and the victim. The phenomenon can be misinterpreted as evidence for the effectiveness of supposed miracle cures.

In the event of a dry bite, antivenom should not be taken, as it has unneeded side effects.

By animal variety
In 2020, academics consolidated 33 studies into dry bite prevalence among snakes. The studies found a great variety of dry bite prevalence by species, although different criteria for diagnosis were used. The studies found dry bite incidence of anywhere between 4% and 50%. It is difficult to measure dry bite incidence rates because some "wet" (envenomed) bites may go unreported or result in minor or no symptoms, or the species of snake may be misidentified (for example, a bite from a non-venomous snake attributed to a venomous one).

Dry bites from spiders such as tarantulas and large Sparassidae are common and, where correctly identified, can simply be ignored or, if appropriate, treated using mild antiseptics. On the other hand, some reports clearly suggest that some of their bites cause marked neurotoxic effects. For example, in South Africa the common "Rain Spider" Palystes castaneus and similar species, is usually described as negligibly venomous, and certainly it is at the least difficult to find documented cases of serious effects.

See also
Snakebite
Spider bite

References

Venomous animals
Skin conditions resulting from physical factors

Dry bite


The Least mean squares filter solution converges to the Wiener filter solution, assuming that the unknown system is LTI and the noise is stationary. Both filters can be used to identify the impulse response of an unknown system, knowing only the original input signal and the output of the unknown system. By relaxing the error criterion to reduce current sample error instead of minimizing the total error over all of n, the LMS algorithm can be derived from the Wiener filter.

Derivation of the Wiener filter for system identification

Given a known input signal , the output of an unknown LTI system  can be expressed as:

where  is an unknown filter tap coefficients and  is noise.

The model system , using a Wiener filter solution with an order N, can be expressed as:

where  are the filter tap coefficients to be determined.

The error between the model and the unknown system can be expressed as:

The total squared error  can be expressed as:

Use the Minimum mean-square error criterion over all of  by setting its gradient to zero:

which is

for all

Substitute the definition of :

Distribute the partial derivative:

Using the definition of discrete cross-correlation:

Rearrange the terms:

for all

This system of N equations with N unknowns can be determined.

The resulting coefficients of the Wiener filter can be determined by: , where  is the cross-correlation vector between  and .

Derivation of the LMS algorithm

By relaxing the infinite sum of the Wiener filter to just the error at time , the LMS algorithm can be derived.

The squared error can be expressed as:

Using the Minimum mean-square error criterion, take the gradient:

Apply chain rule and substitute definition of y[n]

Using gradient descent and a step size :

which becomes, for i = 0, 1, ..., N-1,

This is the LMS update equation.

See also

 Wiener filter
 Least mean squares filter

References
 J.G. Proakis and D.G. Manolakis, Digital Signal Processing: Principles, Algorithms, and Applications, Prentice-Hall, 4th ed., 2007.

Digital signal processing
Filter theory

Similarities between Wiener and LMS


Charles Louis Schepens (March 13, 1912 – March 28, 2006) was an influential Belgian (later American) ophthalmologist, regarded by many in the profession as "the father of modern retinal surgery", and member of the French Resistance.

Early life: medical training and member of the French Resistance

Schepens was born in Mouscron, Belgium, in 1912; his father was a physician. He initially studied mathematics before graduating from medical school in 1935 at State University of Ghent in Belgium. Schepens then trained in ophthalmology at Moorfields Eye Hospital in London, England prior to World War II. After the Germans invaded Belgium in 1940, he became a medical officer in the Belgian Air Force.

After the fall of Belgium, Schepens escaped to France where he became active in the French Resistance smuggling documents and people over the Pyrenees to Spain during 1942 and 1943. Schepens was twice captured by the Gestapo. He worked under the alias of Jacques Perot, a lumber mill operator in the French Basque village of Mendive. Aware that the Germans had learned of the operation, he escaped to England.

Ophthalmologist, retinal specialist, and inventor

After the war, Schepens resumed his medical career at Moorfields. In 1947, he immigrated to the United States and became a fellow at the Harvard Medical School. Schepens is credited for creating the vitreo-retinal subspecialty in ophthalmology. In 1949, he established the world's first retina service and first retinal disease fellowship at the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary. He founded a research laboratory for the investigation of retinal disease, the Retina Foundation, in 1950. Now known as the Schepens Eye Research Institute, it is affiliated with Harvard and the Massachusetts General Hospital. It has grown from 6 staff initially to 200 as of 2006, and at that time was the largest independent eye research organization in the United States. In 2011, the institute combined with the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary.

In 1967, Schepens founded The Retina Society and was its first president from 1968 to 1969.

Schepens invented the binocular indirect ophthalmoscope (BIO), which is routinely used to look at the retina. His original BIO is now in the collection of the Smithsonian Institution. It has been reported that Schepens assembled the prototype for his BIO from metal scraps collected from the streets of London during the German blitz. He was also a pioneer of surgical techniques such as scleral buckling for the repair of retinal detachments. The use of these techniques has raised the success of retinal reattachment surgery from 40% to 90%. During his career, Schepens wrote four books and over 340 research papers.

Awards and recognition
In 1999, Schepens was chosen by the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery as one of the ten most influential ophthalmologists of the century. The American Academy of Ophthalmology named him as one of their inaugural laureates in 2003 as recognition for his contribution to the field. In 2006, his earlier heroics were also rewarded when the consul general of France presented him the French Legion of Honour award for smuggling over 100 people from France into Spain.

His life's story has been told in Meg Ostrum's 2004 book, "The Surgeon and the Shepherd: Two Resistance Heroes in Vichy France". In 2006, Schepens died of a stroke at the age of 94.

In 2013, a biographical profile of Dr. Schepens was included in a bestselling book called Saving Sight: An eye surgeon's look at life behind the mask and the heroes who changed the way we see, by Andrew Lam (author), M.D.

References

External links
Joseph P. Kahn.  Boston Globe. April 15, 2004.
Schepens Eye Research Institute
Schepens Retina Associates Foundation
Schepens International Society

1912 births
2006 deaths
People from Mouscron
Belgian emigrants to the United States
American ophthalmologists
French Resistance members
Knights of the Legion of Honour

Charles Schepens