Philadelphia Reflections

Appendix E, Newpaper Accounts of Remarks by Dr. Adolph Lorenz.

Dr. Lorenz entertained the Medical Club at a recent banquet given in his honor by telling them something of the story of his life, and a most interesting story it is. He has risen to eminence by no easy means. From the first the obstacles in his way were numerous, and for a long time they increased as he went along, so that there were moments when he was in almost complete despair.

In narrating the events of his early life, he said: "Forty-four years ago I was a little and very poor boy. One day, wandering along the street, I found a single glove. I put it on. It was much too large and contrasted harshly with my feet, which were bare. Proud and happy I walked to my home and showed my treasure to my mother. "My dear boy, "she said,'you will have to work very hard to find the other glove.'"

Very often in his youth and young manhood the doctor had occasion to remember those words. The search for the other glove was in his case about a difficult a task as was ever imposed upon genius and industry. At thirty years of age, the aspiring student had overcome all obstacles in his way and risen to be the first assistant of one of the most famous surgeons in Europe. Just as his prospects were brightening before him a dark cloud overcast them. Dr. Lorenz says: " I taught general surgery, and the dream of my life was to become a famous surgeon. But the dream never came true. I contracted a peculiar form of eczema, and could not allow my chosen work. I thought that the other glove was gone forever, and I could scarcely resist the temptation to blow out my brains. In complaining of my lot to Professor Albert, he said to me, 'if you cannot get along with wet surgery, try dry surgery.' So it was not by love, but by necessity, that I became a dry surgeon. But necessity is the mother of invention, and after twenty years of hard work I found, at last, the other glove."

Originally published: Thursday, March 26, 2009; most-recently modified: Monday, May 13, 2019