Interviewer: Hello! It is 4 p.m. on Thursday, August the 4th. This is Dr. Raul Necochea from the Department of Social Medicine at the UNC School of Medicine, and I am interviewing Dr. Michael Robinson, UNC School of Medicine class of 1973. Hello, Dr. Robinson!<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Hi! How are you?<\/p>\n
Interviewer: I\u2019m well. Thank you very much. And thank you very much for joining us for this interview that is part of the Black alumni experience project.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: My pleasure!<\/p>\n
Interviewer: I\u2019m glad you could join us today. As I mentioned before, this project came up as an initiative of medical students from SNMA who were keen to find out more about the experiences of the earliest graduates of our School of Medicine, particularly \u2013<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: \u2013 folks who graduated in the 1960s and the 1970s. We are aiming to build a collection of as many of you as we can reach, and to highlight how your experience as medical students back then was similar to, or different from the experiences of our students in the present so as to give our students the best possible chance to reflect on how some things have changed, and how some things have not.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Sure, sure. And I think that\u2019s valuable information for students that are now there to see where the school came from, so to speak, and where the school is now in terms of how they handle diversity, and how it impacts them and their chances for success. And so, I\u2019m all in favor of them doing this.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Excellent. Dr. Robinson, to begin with, let\u2019s talk a little bit about your origin story. Can you please tell us your place of birth and your date of birth?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Right. So, I was born in Winston Salem in North Carolina in November 1947. And that was the home of my grandparents, my mother\u2019s parents. But I grew up in Greensboro.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, all of my schooling was done in Greensboro, and that\u2019s where I graduated from high school, and so forth.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Did you grow up primarily within the family of your mom?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: No. I mean, I had a dad. My dad was a Professor of Sociology at North Carolina A&T. My mom was a high school history teacher initially. So, I grew up in a regular family home. I was fortunate in that way. And I had one older brother. I should say the first part of my growing up was in Fayetteville, North Carolina till I was about 3 or 4, because my dad, one of his first jobs was at Fayetteville State University as a young professor until he got his PhD in 1950, I believe, from Ohio State. And so, we eventually then moved to Greensboro.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Growing up, who was most influential in your youth among your relatives and friends? School teachers?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, my dad was one of the biggest influences for me. I really admired him. I was very close to my dad. He was a very bred man. And he was a likeable kind of guy. He was liked by everybody, he was jovial. And he was very philosophical, which kind of met my needs growing up, \u2018cause I was similarly set up in that way. So, I loved to discuss philosophical issues with my dad, and him being a sociologist and so forth. And that had importance later during the beginnings of the civil rights movement, which I could talk about more. But I was very involved in that in my high school years.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm. I would love to hear more about those experiences, and how your dad got involved, and how that shaped that for you at such a young age.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah. Well, my dad, as I said, was a Professor of Sociology. So, he got his Master\u2019s degree at Atlanta University, and was a graduate assistant of W. E. B. Du Bois. Du Bois was the founder in NAACP. And he was a great influencer to my dad. And so, when my dad was a professor at North Carolina A&T, one of his pride students, so to speak was Jesse Jackson. So, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Wow!<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 Jesse was my dad\u2019s prot\u00e9g\u00e9, so to speak, and he was in our house all of the time. He considered my dad like his dad. And so, we were very close. And it just happened that that was the time when the civil rights movement was beginning to become a focal point in Greensboro, starting with the sit down strikes in the \u201860s, which really prompted the mass movement that spread in all the cities of the country.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And Jesse was president of the student body. And my dad encouraged him to do that, to run for the office position. And then, of course, that was the platform for which he eventually became a national figure.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Wow. Wow, that\u2019s impressive. What was your dad\u2019s name?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Leonard. Leonard Robinson. Yeah. My dad was from a small town in Arkansas called Fort Smith. And so, in the eastern board of Oklahoma, and the western board of Arkansas. So, adjacent to what\u2019s called the Indian Territories, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 at that time is where my grandmother came out of. And my dad came out of a very poor family background, grew up without a father, and made it. Somehow, he got a scholarship to an Historically Black College in Ohio called Wilberforce, which is now called Central State, and graduated from there, and then went to Atlanta U as I said, and then did his PhD ultimately at Ohio State, which was the beginning of my connection with that school.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Because you got your Bachelor\u2019s at Ohio State as well.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: That\u2019s correct. And so did my brother. So, my brother went to Ohio State and finished there as well. And so, I had gone there as a kid growing up when my brother was there. So, it was always in my back pocket so to speak to go to Ohio State. I looked at other schools to go to, but it ended up being Ohio State.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Going a little bit back to the time when you were still a little younger, and in high school, and all of this ferment about civil rights was around you, \u2013<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: \u2013 what were you most hoping would happen as a result of all that you saw around you?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, it\u2019s just an interesting word you use, hope. \u2018Cause it was about hope. I couldn\u2019t imagine that there could be desegregation. I\u2019d grown up in a segregated society and school system. And even going to a bowling alley or to a movie in a nonsegregated way was impossible. So, to see all of that change was a major change in my life, and a realization of my life. And so, all that happened during my high school years. I was a vice chairman of CORE, Congress of Racial Equality at that time, which was led by James Forman. So, I was the only high school student leader at that time.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, I was involved in organizing and leading the marches, and so forth. And some of the early integration programs that the city of Greensboro eventually did participate in, they started out with certain restaurants, and then they moved it to things like bowling alleys and then movie theatres. I mean, it didn\u2019t happen overnight. So, it was a process. A gradual process that evolved.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: But I remember \u2013 and you bring that up, hope \u2013 I remember after we had organized a march from a local Baptist church there that we started the marches. It was on the edge of A&T\u2019s campus. And Jesse and I was standing there on the balcony. And I remember looking at Jesse, and I said to him almost childishly, I said, \u201cJesse, you think we\u2019ll ever have integration?\u201d And he looked at me, he said, \u201cMike,\u201d he said, \u201cI\u2019m thinking way beyond that.\u201d He said, \u201cThat\u2019s a given.\u201d So, it\u2019s interesting that his vision at that time was much greater than my hope that we could have something as simple a thing as local integration.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: I want to circle back to that. Getting to beyond hope, later on.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: And thinking a little bit more about that contemporary moment of you as a young man, did you know many physicians back then?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, many is questionable.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: A relative term.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: But I knew a couple at least, okay? My dad was a professional, and my parents were professionals. So, there was one physician in particular. His name was Dr. Alvin Blount. And he was our family doctor. He was a surgeon, but he did family practice. And he had one son who was a couple years older than me. And he went through a divorce. And so, he was kind of kicked out of the house. And during that time, he stayed \u2013 because they didn\u2019t live too far from us \u2013 he stayed in the house from time to time. But over time, I became like a second son to him. And so, sometimes, he would take me around when he\u2019d make house calls, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 I\u2019d be with him when he\u2019d stop into the emergency room and sew up a laceration or something. I could walk into his office anytime if I felt like I had some problem. I never had to go into the waiting room. I\u2019d just walk right into his office. So, I had that license with him, so to speak. And he was the biggest influence, in terms of a role model. He never tried to say, \u201cMike, you should be a doctor.\u201d He just was a role model for me.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: The second one was a friend of my father\u2019s, who happened to be from the same hometown of Forth Smith, Arkansas. Came up a little bit more privileged than my dad, but they were good friends. And he was like an uncle to me. I called him \u201cUncle Turner.\u201d And he was a family practice doctor in Lexington, North Carolina.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And he decided to go back to school when I was in \u2013 I must\u2019ve been in junior high school at that time. And he had a son, one son, Charles. And his son had Type 1 Diabetes. And so, when he went back to school to become a pediatrician, his son lived with us for two years as a Type 1 Diabetic. And I think when I look back at that, I think that was one of the things destiny would hold for me that I would become of all things, a Diabetes specialist. After living with a Type 1 Diabetic, I certainly could identify with what they go through.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Right.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And especially in those days, when you didn\u2019t have much of anything to monitor Diabetes, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Right.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 and you had to sterilize your needles and your syringes on a pot of hot water in the morning. I mean, I watched all of that. I watched him go through hypoglycemic episodes, and binge eating, and all of that stuff that an adolescent would go through with Type 1. So, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Oh, okay.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 life is a major teacher.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah. And all of the care that this person had to take, right?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Correct.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: On a daily basis.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: On a daily basis, yeah. So, it was quite a thing actually for my mother. It was probably more strain for her and my dad, who I mean, this was his best friend from childhood. So, I think he was more obligated to make that happen.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: But anyway, then Turner became the pediatrician for the family after that. And he was a major influence. Actually, \u2018cause he was connected with the University of North Carolina as a clinical faculty at Moses Cone. So, during my third year, when I was doing pediatrics, I decided to do it in Greensboro at Moses Cone. And so, I stayed with him, and did my pediatric rotation there.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Oh, okay. So, you encountered him again, but now, \u2013<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: \u2013 you were a student? A med student?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: A med student. That\u2019s correct. Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah. And before we get to that of course, you went to Ohio State for your Undergraduate degree.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Right. I did.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: How was the transition out of North Carolina to Ohio?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, it\u2019s challenging. I come in from a segregated educational system to a big university school with 60,000 students. It wasn\u2019t easy. Some classes, I had over 1,000 students in the class. And it was a situation where it was set up to eliminate, and not educate, right? And so, I remember the orientation that they said, \u201cLook to your left and look to your right, \u2018cause they will be here for you.\u201d That kind of thing. And I was a member of one of the White fraternities where you had the exams from 50 years back.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And you didn\u2019t have a program or a discipline set up for you to study to negotiate such a huge machine as that university. So, it was difficult, especially the first year.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: It got better as time went on. And so, the last two years were the best of the time there. I was able to get my grade point up reasonably during that time. But it was another experience that was educational and important.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah. Were there many other African American students at Ohio State?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Not so many. Most of the ones that were there were day students that lived in the city.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, they came to class. You might occasionally see them in the student union. And then, they went back to the city.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: The ones that were there were athletes. Football players, for example. And I lived in the dorm where the football players stayed, so most of them were friends. There were few in-state students who were African American. Very few. And some of those were my fraternity brothers. Because our fraternity brothers. And so, that formed the nidus of my cultural experience within such a huge White university.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Right. That segways nicely to a question that I had about the sources of support within an environment as big as that one. And it sounds like your fraternity was helpful that way.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Absolutely, because there weren\u2019t many alternatives really to that. My dad had a friend \u2013 well, my parents \u2013 not just my dad, who an attorney at Glasgow became a judge in Columbus. And he had a son who was about my age, who actually went to OU. Didn\u2019t go to Ohio State.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: But he was a backup if I needed anything. But I never saw him except when dad would come to town, or my parents would be there. But he was a potential resource. But it was the fraternity really, which was my cultural nidus there, so to speak. Yeah. I\u2019m gonna have to say that.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: What did you major in?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: I majored in Microbiology, and minored in Chemistry. And that was interesting and difficult, because when I would stay on that side of the campus where the science was, there was hardly any African Americans there. I mean, it was only one of the students in pre-Med that I knew who played basketball at that time. His name was Delphis Richardson. And he\u2019s the one that said, \u201cYou know, look at Microbiology as a major.\u201d<\/p>\n
I mean, you didn\u2019t have really anybody to tell you what to do, or how to \u2013 you know. \u201cOkay, you gonna be in Pre-Med.\u201d But what major in what? And I remember Delphis was a guard for Ohio State, and a very smart guy. And he said, \u201cMike, why don\u2019t you consider Microbiology? That\u2019s what I\u2019m majoring in.\u201d And it fit for me, because I love Biochemistry, physiology and metabolism. And so, that\u2019s what I did.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Delphis became a pediatrician. He didn\u2019t work draft in the polls, but he became a pediatrician.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Huh. But you were already thinking about medicine as a career as an undergrad?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah, always.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: How did that come up?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: How did that come up? It came up when I came out. I never thought of doing anything else. When I was a kid, my parents used to remind me that I\u2019d always have these doctor kids with the stethoscope in the bag and stuff when I was a kid with the toys. I never really felt an urge to do anything else. There was a period of time when I considered other things. But I remember when it firmly became set in my mind, I was in high school. I was in 11th grade, and I was sitting in chemistry class. And I was saying, \u201cWhat can I do that I can go anywhere in the world I want, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 that I can help people, and I didn\u2019t have to worry about money?\u201d<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And \u2013 medicine. Be a doctor.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And so, there\u2019s that time. Then, I began to chart the course, in terms of college. What I had to do in college. What I was gonna do after college and med school.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: But things you have to do to achieve that became more solidified in my consciousness.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Did you have a plan B in college? You get exposed to lots of things, lots of new people.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: No. No, I never looked at any other major \u2013 well no, I liked philosophy, as I said. That was my dad and stuff. But \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: What?!<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 when I took philosophy, when I knew one Black student who was a philosophy major. And I took philosophy class with more than 1,000 students, right? I thought I would have an opportunity to expound on some of my philosophical views or ideas. My dad and I used to talk some of that. And we had an assignment to read a manual comp, right? Critique of pure reason, right?<\/p>\n
So, on the first part of the critique, it takes a principal and proves it beyond all doubt logically. And then, the second half of the critique takes the same principal and proves it wrong. And I said, \u201cWell, that\u2019s not for me. Philosophy is not going to enlighten anybody. It\u2019s an exercise \u2013 intellectual massage. That\u2019s about it.\u201d And so, if I had any inkling of going into philosophy, it faded after that course.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: That\u2019s great. So, tell me about a great experience and a not-so-great experience of yours at Ohio State.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Great experience. Well, it\u2019d have to center around my fraternity and the friends that I met through that. I had a lot of not-so-great experiences, just trying to survive the system. And running into various aspects of racial inequality. I\u2019ll never forget when I was in \u2013 it was probably the first microbiology course I took. And there was an Indian student who sat behind me, and he was always looking over my back. And he had an exam to see what I was writing down, right? So, I turned in my paper, and I get a \u2013 I don\u2019t know if it was a B or a C. And he\u2019s copying everything, and gets an A! And so, I said, \u201cWhat?\u201d And so, I took my paper up and his paper, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 and I took a look and said \u2013 it was a graduate assistant who\u2019s teaching this class \u2013 and I said, \u201cWhy am I getting this grade and he\u2019s getting this grade, and it\u2019s basically the same thing on there?\u201d And she turned red and flustered, and she couldn\u2019t disagree with what I said, and she changed the grade. That\u2019s an example of the kinds of things you have to put up. Some more subtly. But nonetheless, they\u2019re there.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: That\u2019s the thing about the subtle slight, right? You just never know if they are really meant that way, or what is going on there. And it can gnaw at you.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Oh, absolutely.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Absolutely. It\u2019s the not knowing that creates self-doubt. Yeah. And so, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 I think if there\u2019s any time period where you have to deal with self-doubt, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 it was during that time. Coming from a segregated system to an all-White system. You don\u2019t really know. Can I compete? Are they any smarter than me really?<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And so, you deal with those questions during that time. At least, I did \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 more during that time frame.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Hmm. So now, moving on to you applying to medical school, did you apply to a large number of schools, or just to a few?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah. You have to realize that \u2013 oh, that\u2019s \u2013 1968, 1969. There weren\u2019t a whole lot of options with other medical schools. And I didn\u2019t have a lot of counseling either.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: I knew about how Howard and Meharry. And those were the schools that if you were a Black student wanting to go into medical school, you applied to those schools. And so, I applied to Howard. I didn\u2019t apply to Meharry. I applied to Carolina only at the encouragement of my dad, and because it was my state school. My home state school.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, I was accepted to Howard early on before I actually graduated. Well, just after I was graduated, I didn\u2019t hear right away from Carolina. And I wasn\u2019t hopeful necessarily. I mean, there was no one to look to that was going there that I knew at that time.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And so, they put me on a wait list. I was told \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 I was on the wait list. So, I was all set to go to Howard. And then, in the middle of that summer before, I got a notice from Carolina that they accepted me. They expanded the class a little bit to 60 students, and they\u2019d had 50-something before that. And I got accepted.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah!<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Congratulations then! I mean, you must\u2019ve been really really pleased by this!<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, I was, \u2018cause having come from a large White university, and knowing what the educational opportunities that that provides to you as opposed to going to a Black medical school, I was happy to do that, yeah.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: What reputation did UNC have at the time among people who mattered to you?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, it was always an excellent school, Chapel Hill.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Even when I was in high school, everyone knew about Carolina being an excellent school. But there were no Black undergraduates when I graduated in 1965. It was a known fact they didn\u2019t take Blacks on the graduate school campus.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: They were beginning to take them the next year or two at Women\u2019s College. UNCG we called it that. It was called Women\u2019s College then, because it was only women students in Greensboro.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: It\u2019s now coed. So, they were beginning to take one or two students there in the following year. But the year I graduated in \u201965, there weren\u2019t any \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 at UNC Chapel Hill.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Do you remember if anybody discouraged you from applying to UNC?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: No. There just wasn\u2019t any encouragement to do that.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And I wasn\u2019t looking to stay at home then.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: I was curious about the world. And so, I wanted to go far away from home.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: In fact, I had applied to UCLA and got a partial scholarship at UCLA. But my parents thought that was too far, it was gonna be too expensive traveling, and a bunch of other things. I was a scholarship finalist in North Carolina for Yale.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: I didn\u2019t get a scholarship for it, but I was accepted. But my parents couldn\u2019t afford it.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, that eliminated that. So, Ohio State.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Right, right. So now, you\u2019re here at UNC School of Medicine. First day in class, you are amid 60 other students \u2013 well, 59 other students.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Do you remember how many African American faces you saw there?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, there were only four of us in the class.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And that was the first year that they took more than one than the previous years. Previous two or three years.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And one was Melvin Clayton. He had been at NCCU.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And one was Venita Newbie, who had been at Howard.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And the other was Kenny Banks.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And I think Kenny came out of Livingston \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 College. So, there were four of us. And it\u2019s interesting because at the first little social gathering that we had as an incoming freshman class, the Black students didn\u2019t necessarily coalesce at that time. And there were a handful of White students who did, who were anxious to know a Black student, first of all, and were in that vanguard of a little bit more socially awake students. And so, my good friends were not the Black students but a few of the White students.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: I have interviewed Dr. Kenny, Dr. Venita, Dr. Melvin, along with your friend. Dr. Graham before this, before \u2013<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: \u2013 I met you. Did you meet Dr. Sampson Harrell? Well, not yet Dr. Sampson Harrell?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah. Yeah, I did. Now, Sampson was my upperclassmen. My immediate upperclassman.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And Sampson, he\u2019s an interesting guy. Bright guy, but he didn\u2019t present well. He had a speech impediment, so to speak, which is a product of his environment growing up. And I think he came out of Ahoskie, which is the eastern part of the state. But Sampson was a good guy, he gave me a lot of good tips. But I became more close with my homeboy, so to speak, who was Harshaw. Charles Harshaw. So, Charles was from Greensboro like me, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 and he grew up only a few blocks away from me. He lived just off of Julian Street in Greensboro, which is where I lived. And so, we used to have neighborhood football teams, and he was on a rival neighborhood sandlot football team.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: We used to clank heads on it. Very smart guy.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Finished high school a year earlier, and went to Fisk, and then came to Carolina after that. So, I knew Charles from growing up. And so, we were very close. When he was doing ER on the ward in the third year, he\u2019d grabbed me and said, \u201cCome on in the emergency room!\u201d And the first IV I put in, he\u2019s showing me how to do it. And I had just come in the first \u2013 yeah, I don\u2019t think I had even started a class yet. Bless his soul. He\u2019s passed now. But he really was the main student mentor for me.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah. I mean, listening to you is also a good reminder for me of the regard that you all had for each other. For Sampson Harrell, for Harshaw, for Venita.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Right.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: It\u2019s really great to hear how these solidarities were forming, and how you were also making friends and making connections with everyone who is a part of that expanded class.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah. I mean, I think you get respect where people go through the fire, so to speak, to get \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 to Carolina. And as I mentioned earlier, certainly in Ohio State, it was an elimination process. All of the time, you were fighting, fighting, fighting to get an opportunity.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And the refreshing thing about Carolina was when you got there, they made the commitment to graduate you. And so, you didn\u2019t feel the pressure that they were trying to flunk you out. And so, that was very very important, that you felt like somebody had your back.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And if you were struggling, there was gonna be somebody there to help you.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah. Besides Dr. Charles Harshaw \u2013 well, not yet Dr. Charles Harshaw \u2013 who else were you closest to here in the School of Medicine? Not only including students, but also the faculty, administrators, and why?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, I can\u2019t remember his name now. There was an office adjacent to \u2013 I guess it was MacNider, that had to do with the admissions board. And that\u2019s how I got chosen to be on the medical school admissions board for several years to help identify and screen and orientate perspective Black students. And that was a valuable experience on both sides. I think that the admissions board got valuable feedback from me, and I learned a lot about the process and about the schools that were being evaluated, and how they evaluated you. But I can\u2019t remember his name now, and what department that was. But he was certainly a resource.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: He would\u2019ve been I guess the equivalent of our present day Dean of Admissions.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Probably so. It could be the Dean of Admissions, yeah.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: I mean, the enterprise of selecting students has become so sophisticated and complex. We have a person who has the level of Dean to take care of that, and a group that is over 30 faculty and some students who are a part of \u2013 I was a part of the admissions committee for a few years, and then \u2013<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: \u2013 I stopped because it\u2019s a lot of work.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: It is! It is a lot of work. And I went out on recruiting trips, and to various \u2013 primarily Historically Black Colleges, and spoke to pre-Med students, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 and encouraging them to apply even. Because it wasn\u2019t a given that they should even apply, or why waste the time though if \u2013 So, they\u2019re hearing from another Black student who was very in the flesh telling them, \u201cYeah, I\u2019m here, they will accept Black students now, and please apply.\u201d<\/p>\n
Interviewer: I can completely see how us as an institution having you be one of the faces, one of the new faces going out there would make a lot of strategic sense. I mean, if we\u2019re trying to recruit more African American students, having someone who is believable like you say, \u201cYes, they are accepting Black people,\u201d it\u2019s an advantage for us as an institution.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: But did you want to do it?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Did I wanna do it? Absolutely. I was still in activist mode.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, at that time, I was still in the activist mode, and there was a lot to get done yet. I mean, we hadn\u2019t \u2013 to come was the SNMA, which wasn\u2019t established at all there when I came.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And then, Project 75 happened. So, Project 75 was an AGW program funded by AGW, and was designed to increase the minority participations in the medical schools all across the country. And not only that, to ultimately develop a voice for them. An organization that represented the diversity. And in 1970 or 1971, they paid for every Black medical student in the country to come to Nashville to Meharry. And where the Student Nashville Medical Association that was only Howard and Meharry at that time was meeting and attempting to become a national organization.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, in order to do that, they had to have the presence of students from all over the country. And AGW paid for that, paid for my flight \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Oh.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 to Nashville, and from Chapel Hill, and ultimately, I got chosen to be on that first board when SNMA became then a national organization.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And that was the start of it.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: We didn\u2019t get a chapter of SNMA here until later, right? I mean, this is 1973 more or less that you were doing all of this work?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u201971. \u201971, \u201972 \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 primarily. And at that time, it was two of us. There was \u2013 I can\u2019t remember Margarita\u2019s last name, but she\u2019s a pediatric nephrologist. So, Margarita was also on that board. Now, she was there after I left, because she was an underclassman. But the chapter became establish at Chapel Hill sometime after that. But the national organization became established before that.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah. Yes. Of course. Well, and as I\u2019ve mentioned before, this idea, it was an idea that came out of discussions of SNMA students.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Right! Oh, it did. That\u2019s what I\u2019m saying.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yes! This is their baby. Well, I\u2019m executing, because I\u2019m trained as an historian, and I know how to gather things.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: But yeah. This is their inspiration.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Right. It\u2019s come a long way baby, haven\u2019t they?<\/p>\n
Interviewer: I mean, yeah. I can talk a lot about how epic they are. I love these guys. They\u2019re amazing. They\u2019re \u2013 yeah. But I mean, they\u2019re also busy, right? They are trying to become physicians. The day-to-day management of this kind of project kind of goes a little bit \u2013<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, you can imagine how it was for me doing it at the national level. I mean, we were traveling all over the country with these meetings, and trying to get it going, and developing programs for a basis of which I guess SNMA exists on today. So, it was very important work we did back then.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah. When you were a medical student, do you recall \u2013 wait, first, a really simpler question: How did you pay for this?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: How\u2019d I pay for medical school?<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, fortunately, my parents helped the first year. \u2018Cause I was just coming out of college, no job. I couldn\u2019t get a job that Summer working anywhere before I went into med school. So, I couldn\u2019t help that first year. But the second, third and fourth years, I paid myself. And I did that by \u2013 because I graduated with a commission in the army from Ohio State. So, I was a second lieutenant. And in the summer between my first and second year of med school, I was an extern at Walter Reed, and I made officer\u2019s pay plus temporary duty pay, which is a lot. Like $150 a day even back then.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And I could pocket some of that money, because my brother was living in Washington at that time. And so, I didn\u2019t have to pay that expense. And so, I took that money, and I paid for my tuition in the second year. And then, the year between the second and third year, I worked as an extern again at Letterman Hospital in San Francisco, and again, made enough money to pay for the next year. And on the third year. And then, in the fourth year, the army had what was called a \u201cSenior medical program,\u201d which is they would pay your officer salary in your fourth year as a first lieutenant. And so, I made that money. I got paid a regular salary, and so I was able to pay my own expenses in my fourth year.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Huh.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And also, I worked in the psych ward as a \u2013 what would we call it? Student something. Oh, nursing assistant! So, I was a psychiatric nursing assistant. And that was a great job. That may have been \u2013 Harshaw might\u2019ve turned me on that. Somebody. Or Sampson. Somebody turned me on that. Because it was right next doors with \u2013 psych ward was right off the hospital. So, I was at the hospital all of the time anyway, or a midnighter.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah. I had the evening shift from 3 \u2013 11. And all I did was sit there and play games with the patient, and you write a little note toward the end of the day what they did or didn\u2019t do, and you had time to study. So, it was a perfect job, and I did that until I graduated in the fourth year. Yeah. Up until my fourth year.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Oh! How do you remember your years in Carolina? I mean, it has this combination of really intense study schedule that one needs to \u2013 I mean, you need to invest in that time, especially during your first and second years. And then, that gradual move into doing more clinical wards work. What do you remember liking the most, or being challenged the most by?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: At Carolina?<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, I think you have to discipline yourself. You have to learn how to study. And it\u2019s a discipline because you weren\u2019t studying necessarily with anybody. You had to set your schedule. And it wasn\u2019t like I was a part of any other groups of students. There weren\u2019t any study groups at that time. So, I had to develop a discipline of a schedule studying and stick to it. So, that was one of the most challenging things I had to do.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Obviously, when you get on an award, that\u2019s a whole other area of challenge and pressure and dealing with that. And I remember one of the reasons I did pediatrics away from the hospital was because my perception of the Chief of Pediatrics was a racist. And so, I didn\u2019t wanna do pediatrics here.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And so, why I went to Greensboro, and then Moses Cones and did it there. So, you run into sometimes people who \u2013 and as African Americans, we sometimes refer to it as a sixth sense about people. You have a sense of who is harboring certain feelings. I don\u2019t know how to describe it, and how you get it. It\u2019s a self-defense mechanism. But you know how to perceive it in people. And it was a lot of that that you had to exercise during that time.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah, yeah. Was there ever a time, as you recall, that you ever came to doubt your own abilities as a med student?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, not really. I mean, I always thought I was just as smart or intelligent as anybody else in the class. I think as I said, it helped me coming from a large White university, having already gone through that soul searching regarding that. But it\u2019s always challenged sometimes. And I remember \u2013 and this is an example \u2013 but I remember one of my fellow medical students coming up to me, and he asked me a question. And I answered it, and he said, \u201cI knew I should\u2019ve known that.\u201d And what it said to me was if this Black student knew it, naturally I should\u2019ve known it, right? \u2018Cause he can\u2019t be smarter than me. You get that kind of subtle feedback sometimes.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And it can weigh on you. I mean, so much to the point that one time, I did consult \u2013 there was a new Black faculty member in psychiatry that came on. His name was Dr. Dabney. I remember it was something like that.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And I went to him, \u2018cause my head was about to explode. And just to vent. I mean, you needed to be able to vent things sometimes. Physically, I did it playing basketball in the gym. Especially Harshaw and I. He was a real athletic guy. And we played basketball, and we\u2019d run till our tongues hung out. And then, I remember I had started doing taekwondo. So, I was able to kick and punch. So, that helped physically get that kind of emotion out of you.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Huh. Well, you\u2019ve answered another one of my questions. I was gonna ask you, what do you do to keep sane? To keep steady. And you\u2019ve got your friends, you\u2019ve got your kick and punching, and \u2013<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah, yeah.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: I guess you\u2019re right. Sometimes you know someone that you can vent to is a good resource.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah. I mean, you need that especially more in the last two years, where your pressures have increased when you\u2019re on the wards, and you\u2019re spending longer hours, and the knowledge base for me was more demanding.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: I had an apartment with an undergraduate student who eventually became a law student. And in Carrboro. \u2018Cause you mentioned Carrboro. I had to smile, \u2018cause right? So, we had an apartment in Carrboro. And there was a group of undergraduates. Now, Carolina by this time had a big crop of undergraduate Black students. And one or two in the dental school, a few in the law school I calls friends. And so, we had a nidus of cultural interactivity. And so, to phrase it, we partied a lot in those first two years. And it\u2019s important to have to do that. And I\u2019ll tell anybody, I said some of the best years if I look back on it that I ever had were in medical school. Some of the best and some of the most intense. So, I had a good time, and I had some very stressful, challenging times in medical school. It was a combination of both.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Right? Do you remember how you started to get turned onto endocrinology?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah. Well, that actually started at Carolina. We had a great department in endocrinology, and it was led by Judson Van Wyk. And it was a presentation of a case of male sort of hermaphrodism. And I never forgot that case. And I saw so much other stuff, and we had a guy who, especially David Ontjes. But he ran the metabolic unit.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And then, we had Richard Ney, who had later become Chief of Endocrinology at Hopkins. Was Chief there. And then, there was Louis Welt, who wrote the textbook Strauss and Welt. And he was Chief of Medicine. So, we had such a strong faculty and metabolism there. And coming from a background of microbiology just welded very well. I still wasn\u2019t sure what I was going to go into at that time. I was still looking at cardiology, because Harshaw was a big influence with that. He was a cardiologist. So, it wasn\u2019t until I became an intern that I really decided that endocrinology was the field I was gonna go into.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Let me back up for a moment there. When you finished medical school in \u201973, and you moved into residency, it sounds like you did one of those floating internships where you were working in several services in your first year. No?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: No. It was straight medicine. But the way it was in Ohio State is you get subspecialty rotations every month. So, it was one month of cardiology, one month of infectious diseases, one month of endocrinology, one month of neuro. Whatever it was. Pulmonary, and that. It went on like that.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, ER. So, it was very intense, but it was straight medicine.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And then, I did the one year because I remember I had graduated with a commission in the army. And I had to give them three years.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Oh.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, they allowed me to do my internship, and then I had to go in. And I was sent to Germany as an officer in the medical. And I spent three years in Germany before I could come back and finish my residency training.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: So, what were you able to do in Germany? You had one year \u2013 well, one full year of clinical experience under your belt. What were your main activities?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: I was a general medical officer. I did everything.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Huh.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: I did pediatrics, I did medicine, I did traumatic surgery \u2013 not surgery, but surgical repairs, lacerations, that kind of stuff. Suturing. I did OB and delivered babies. I did everything.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Huh.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: I was even a flight surgeon for a period of time. The director of the medical system in Germany \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 sent me to Saudi Arabia, and I did three months there as a flight surgeon for \u2013 it was called a medical assistant group there. And so, that was during the days when Saudi Arabia was just beginning to… it was like the wild wild west in terms of development. Everything was just booming everywhere.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah, cool.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, I took care of all of the department of defense members and dependents throughout the country. And that was all over the country, from Dhahran, which I was stationed out to Jeddah on the Red Sea. So, I did that for a number of months before I came back to Germany. And I had a decision to make, whether I was gonna \u2013 I\u2019m now three years deep in this, right?<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Right.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: I\u2019m a captain in the army. I was offered to come back and complete my residency at Walter Reed in Washington which was where my brother was living. And plus, they\u2019d give me a financial bonus to do it. And I had a patron, so to speak in the army. I used Colin Powell as an example. Colin Powell didn\u2019t become Chief of Staff by accident. He was guided through it. He had a sponsor that brought him through the ranks. That\u2019s the way the army works. So, there was a brigadier general who happened to be an African American in Germany, became my sponsor, and he was willing to take me on his wings and accelerate my rise in the military, \u2018cause I wanted to do that as a medical officer.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Uh-huh.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And so, it wasn\u2019t till my brother came over visiting me once in Germany, and smacked me a couple of times and said, \u201cSnap out of it!\u201d<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Wait, hold \u2013 why not? Sorry, I just don\u2019t know enough. It sounds like you\u2019re discarding a very nice deal.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Exactly! That\u2019s how I looked at it. And by that time, three years away from the states, and your idea of the world changes. And I didn\u2019t see myself just as a citizen of the United States, but as a citizen of the world. I had been all over the world by this time. And then, I felt a little bit divorced from it. I figured I could live anywhere in the world. There were some places in Europe that I contemplated even staying and practicing medicine there as a general medical officer. But anyway, these were things that went through my head at the time.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Uh-huh.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: But my brother convinced me that I needed to part with the army.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: So, it was a metaphorical slap?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah. That\u2019s right. Metaphorical slap. \u201cSnap out of it!\u201d<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Come back to the US. And you did. You completed your \u2013 well, where did you complete your residency then, Dr. Robinson?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: At Detroit Medical Center in Wayne State in Detroit. And the way that happened was Ohio State had a pyramid system in their residency program. So, the same number of slots that they had in the first year, they didn\u2019t have in the second or third year. So, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Oh.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 the Chief of Medicine at Wayne State had been the Chief of Cardiology at Ohio State. And so, he arranged for me to come there, and to complete my resident at Wayne.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And I did that, and I completed the two years there, and then I planned to do a fellowship. I thought at first I would do it at Michigan, and I was accepted to go to Michigan and do my fellowship. And then, I said, \u201cLet me just \u2013\u201d I heard all of this stuff about Mayo Clinic, and I said, \u201cI\u2019ll just go and see what it\u2019s like up there.\u201d I didn\u2019t expect to get accepted, but I went there, and they accepted me.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Wait, where was this?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: At Mayo Clinic, in Rochester, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Oh, oh!<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 Minnesota.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, I went there, and I did three years fellowship there.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: So, the residency was at Wayne in Medicine.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: And what was your fellowship in at Mayo?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Endocrinology.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Okay. So, by then, you were I guess all in? Is that the right term? Or \u2013?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah. I mean, when I did my internship at Ohio State, there was a doctor. His name was Ernest Mazzaferri. A real cool, slick Italian, who was a brilliant endocrinologist. He was constantly a clinician and an academician. And the first two months I had as an intern were on endocrinology. And I said, \u201cWell, this is it. This is what I\u2019m gonna do, ultimately.\u201d<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Huh. When you were between residency and your fellowship, was there a special moment or event when you felt that you had come into your own as a medical professional?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Between residency and fellowship? No. Not really. When I had looked at the question, I think coming into your own as a professional maybe only now.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Oh.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And after years, my philosophy was you never peak, you just keep getting better and better.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: That\u2019s interesting.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 maybe now, I feel like I\u2019m the most competent than I\u2019ve ever been at any stage of my professional career. And that\u2019s a product of time and experience.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: I was \u2013 okay I think the reason \u2013 I\u2019ll tell you this incident. When I went to interview at Michigan for my fellowship, I was still a resident in Wayne. They take you around, and three or four different professors. And the last professor was in charge of the metabolic unit there. And he presented a case of a woman who had a cardiomyopathy, and they were thinking that it was secondary to Cushing\u2019s syndrome, and they were gonna write this up in New England general as the first reported case of Cushing\u2019s induced cardiomyopathy. And so, it was a Black woman. So, I approached her and asked her a few questions, and \u201cWhere you from?\u201d She said Detroit. Oh, oh!<\/p>\n
And I said, \u201cSo, when did you start having these problems?\u201d And I said, \u201cHow many kids do you have?\u201d And she said, \u201cOh, I\u2019ve got six, seven kids.\u201d And I said, \u201cWhen did you start having a problem with your heart?\u201d She said it was after the birth of one of her kids and stuff. And she went on and talked and talked. And so, I looked at the professor, and I said, \u201cYou know, you\u2019re gonna have a hard time making the case that this is Cushing\u2019s Induced Cardiomyopathy when the diagnosis in my view is post-partem cardiomyopathy. And I was confident about that because as I said, our chief was a cardiologist, and Detroit was just rapid with post-partem cardiomyopathy.<\/p>\n
I had seen tons of cases as a resident by this time. So, I just got all red and stuff. But I figured that I might get offered the place. I had good references. I did well in my residency there. And then, I had exposed this case with them. So, sure enough, a couple weeks later, I get called by Dr. Stefan Fajans. He\u2019s the chief of endocrinology, and he said, \u201cWe\u2019re pleased to offer you a place.\u201d<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And I told him, \u201cWell professor, I\u2019m sorry. I\u2019m gonna have to decline it.\u201d And he said, \u201cWell why?\u201d And I mean, it\u2019s like you don\u2019t refuse an offer from Michigan, right? And by that time, I had gone to Rochester and Mayo, and I said, \u201cWell, I\u2019ve just accepted Mayo Clinic, and I\u2019m gonna take that.\u201d And so, he said, \u201cWell, congratulations, and the best of luck!\u201d And then, he couldn\u2019t say anything about it, \u2018cause he was a Mayo graduate himself.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Right.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, that was an incident that made me feel like, \u201cWell, maybe I had accomplished something, and I had learned something in those residency years.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: That\u2019s cool! Now, wrapping up, here\u2019s a few questions that all of our students are really keen to learn from all of their partitioners. Their \u2013<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: \u2013 first one is how does being a Black physician matter in your workplace, in your community?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, one of the things I wanted to be was not just an excellent Black physician, I wanted to be an excellent physician that happened to be Black. And here at least, and in the environment of that practice and in California had a diverse population of patients. It does matter to many Black patients however, in terms of their confidence and what you\u2019re advising them, and their comfortability with you that you are also Black or African American. And so, from the patient perspective, it can be very important.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: But I think rather than if I give advice, not to focus on being a good Black something, but being a good professional, a good physician in any circumstance, in any and all circumstances and any place. And if you choose to focus on the African American population, that\u2019s okay. But try to see yourself as larger than just that.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm. That answers one of the other questions that I had about advice that you would give to our current African American medical students. And another question that I have is what is your experience now? This was what? Like four or five decades of working as a doc. What was this taught you about good ways to support our present day minority students?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, I think development of the programs like you have there now is important. That you recognize the particular requirements to the diverse student population required, and provide the support mechanisms that that entails. Because you are gonna have people coming from difficult backgrounds that might need a particular kind of support, or particular problems that have to be recognized. So, I think it\u2019s important to have programs like Carolina has obviously developed on the administrative side, but also have representative groups like the SNMA that provide a voice for minority students to vent and to bring up things that the administration can approach.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah. And okay, this is a hard one, but if you\u2019re looking at your whole unfolding career, of what would you say you are proudest?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: In my medical career, what I\u2019m proudest of most?<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Easy, huh? An easy question.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, it\u2019s the body of work, okay?<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, you look back coming out of high school of a segregated system, and you get through a major university in Ohio, you get through an excellent medical school, and Carolina has provided an excellent medical education and background, which is respected everywhere.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: We never went any of those places, including the Mayo Clinic, where Chapel Hill Carolina wasn\u2019t respected. And so, I look back at the body of work over time, including having finished at Mayo Clinic, and developed a successful endocrinology practice in California. I mean, it\u2019s not one thing. So, it\u2019s all of them combined, I think, that I feel satisfied. And my senior year, I said, \u201cOkay, it wasn\u2019t bad. There\u2019s some that had better, but it\u2019s okay.\u201d<\/p>\n
Interviewer: You can say that again, Dr. Robinson.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Okay. Yeah.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: By the way, how long have you been out there in California?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, I came out here in \u2013 \u201982. Right. So, when I left Rochester, I drove right out here to California, and I met my wife two days after I got here \u2013<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Wow!<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: \u2013 through an old friend from North Carolina who had been her roommate in college.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Oh.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And she was living in Palm Springs teaching school. And we were never apart after that.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Wow!<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So, I stayed out here ever since, and then when my daughter came of age, we went back. I thought maybe I would move back to North Carolina then, when she was in Chapel Hill an Undergraduate. And I looked at her job with a guy in \u2013 who was practicing \u2013 and he was a nephrologist, but he had a big practice out of Raleigh out of Cary, and he had offices in Cary and Fuquay and a couple of those \u2013 there were little nothing towns, and I was growing up. But they would become very upscale communities now. And he offered me a position to come out there. And I would\u2019ve come back home, had I not been able to \u2013 the real estate market was just horrible here at California at that time. So, it just shows you how destiny works. And I could not liquidate my house to come out there. And so, I ended up staying here.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: But that was the only time my wife would\u2019ve considered moving.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: When was that more or less?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Let\u2019s see. Marsi graduated \u2013 let me see \u2013 Yeah. It must\u2019ve been in the mid to late \u201880s.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: No, not the \u201880s, the early \u201890s.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Oh, okay.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: So, why did you go to California in the first place?<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Why?<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Well, because \u2013 that\u2019s interesting \u2013 because one of the guys who was with me on the first board of SNMA, his name was Don Henderson, and he was from the University of Florida.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Uh-huh.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: I met him at that meeting that we had all of those medical students in Nashville. And we became good friends. And he came to California, and did his gastroenterology fellowship, and started a practice out here. And right across from the forum when the Lakers were king, and they had Jabbar and all of those people worthy, and they had a great purpose. And they knew I was coming out of my fellowship in Rochester, and he said, \u201cCome on out here and join our group.\u201d<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Oh!<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And that\u2019s how that worked.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Wow! And then, two days later, you found an even better reason to stick around.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: And then I found a better reason. That\u2019s right. I married my wife, and then I\u2019ve been here ever since. Wow.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Yeah.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: So now, we have grandkids, and we tried to get one of them to come to Carolina, but we\u2019ll see if they do.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: We\u2019re still here!<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Still recruiting!<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Right, right, right! We\u2019ll see.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Yeah. Well, thank you! Thank you so much, Dr. Robinson! This was tremendously enjoyable, and illuminating!<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: Yeah. Well, for me too! I\u2019m glad you asked me to do this, and it opened up some memories that I was happy to relive again, and I hope that this helps in some way students who are coming after me, and that they will help the students that come after them. So, in medicine, we always say see one, do one, teach one.<\/p>\n
Interviewer: I think there\u2019s gonna be a whole lot of reflecting that they\u2019re gonna be able to do, thanks to all of this project. Thank you again.<\/p>\n
Dr. Robinson: You\u2019re most welcome! Take care!<\/p>\n
Interviewer: Let me stop the recording now.<\/p>\n[End of Audio]\n
Duration: 77 minutes<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Interviewer: Hello! It is 4 p.m. on Thursday, August the 4th. This is Dr. Raul Necochea from the Department of Social Medicine at the UNC School of Medicine, and I am interviewing Dr. Michael Robinson, UNC School of Medicine class of 1973. Hello, Dr. Robinson! Dr. Robinson: Hi! How are you? Interviewer: I\u2019m well. Thank … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":2394,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"acf-tax-class-year":[14],"class_list":["post-2372","alumni-interview","type-alumni-interview","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","acf-tax-class-year-14","odd"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/md\/baep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/alumni-interview\/2372","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/md\/baep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/alumni-interview"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/md\/baep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/alumni-interview"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/md\/baep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/md\/baep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2372"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"acf-tax-class-year","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/md\/baep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/acf-tax-class-year?post=2372"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}