Michael Bliss

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Michael Bliss
Michael Bliss.jpg
Born
John William Michael Bliss

(1941-01-18)January 18, 1941
DiedMay 18, 2017(2017-05-18) (aged 76)
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Academic background
Education University of Toronto (BA, MA, PhD)
Thesis A Living Profit (1972)
Doctoral advisor Ramsay Cook
Institutions University of Toronto
Doctoral students Veronica Strong-Boag

John William Michael Bliss OC FRSC (1941–2017) was a Canadian historian and author. Though his early works focused on business and political history, he also wrote biographies of physicians Frederick Banting, William Osler and Harvey Cushing. Bliss was a frequent commentator on political events and issues. He was an Officer of the Order of Canada.

Contents

Early life

Michael Bliss was born on January 18, 1941, [1] [ citation needed ] in Leamington, Ontario, Bliss was raised in nearby Kingsville, Ontario. [2] His father, Quartus Bliss, was a Kingsville-based physician who encouraged Michael to enter the medical field. In an autobiographical essay, Bliss explained that his aspirations were shattered when watching his father suture a drunk's face: [3]

[T]here was a Sunday afternoon when Dad’s and my Scrabble game was interrupted by the appearance at the office door of a policeman with a drunk in tow, the drunk having been in a fight and suffering a badly slashed face. Dad had to sew him up, suturing both inside and outside the cheek, and invited me to watch what would be a demonstration of his surgical skill ... with blood and alcohol fumes everywhere, reflecting on my own complete disinterest in and lack of manual skills, I decided that this was not what I wanted to do in life. And that was the end of my ambition to be a doctor.

Academic pursuits

Bliss entered the University of Toronto in 1958, and received his Bachelor of Arts, Master of Arts, and Doctor of Philosophy degrees there. He was appointed to the faculty in 1968 and by the time of his retirement in 2006 had attained the elite rank of University Professor.

His doctoral dissertation, which was supervised by Ramsay Cook, was a social history of Canadian business, an analysis of the "thoughts and dreams" of businessmen in Canada during the National Policy years. It was published under the title A Living Profit. In 1978 he published a major biography of Sir Joseph Flavelle, "A Canadian Millionaire", and in 1987 the first history of business in Canada, "Northern Enterprise".

In 1982, he began a mid-career transition to medical history with his book "The Discovery of Insulin". This 1982 book was the basis for the award-winning Glory Enough for All , a 1988 Canadian television movie. [4] He has published biographies of two Canadians, the discoverer of insulin Sir Frederick Banting and the famous physician Sir William Osler. In 2005, he published a biography of the American neurosurgeon Harvey Cushing, himself also a biographer of Osler.

Like J. L. Granatstein, his criticism of excessively specialized social history has made him a controversial figure in Canadian historiography.

Bliss has been a frequent commentator on Canadian politics for newspapers, magazines, and television, and has lectured widely in North America and Europe.

In a 2005 profile for the National Post , former student John Turley-Ewart writes: "In the 1990s, when I worked as his teaching assistant, it was not unusual to see 300 people from all walks of life – full-time students, business people, civil servants, journalists – packed into his evening lectures." [5] He was nominated by Turley-Ewart as Canada's "leading public intellectual", part of a series that ran in National Post.

Awards and distinctions

In 1998, he was made a Member of the Order of Canada and was promoted to Officer in 2013. [6] His books have won various prizes, including the Welch Medal of the American Association for the History of Medicine, the Tyrrell Medal of the Royal Society of Canada, three Jason Hannah Medals of the Royal Society of Canada, the Garneau, Macdonald, and Ferguson prizes of the Canadian Historical Association, and the National Business Book Award. His book on Osler was shorted for the Governor General's Award. He was an honorary member of the Harvey Club of London, the oldest medical club in Canada, for his historical biographical contributions on Banting, another honorary member of the Harvey Club. He is an honorary fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada and holds honorary degrees from the University of Prince Edward Island, McMaster University, McGill, the University of British Columbia, and the University of Toronto. In 2008 his students published a festschrift, "Essays in Honour of Michael Bliss: Figuring the Social". In 2016 he became the first historian inducted into the Canadian Medical Hall of Fame. [1]

In 2011, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Osler Society in 2010 [7]

Political commentary

Bliss frequently commented on current events, contributing essays to various magazine and newspapers, including The Globe and Mail . He opposed the Meech Lake Accord and the Charlottetown Accord and the 1999 NATO bombing of Kosovo and he advocated for the abolition of the Canadian monarchy. He also strongly criticized Stephen Harper's 2006 move to recognize the Québécois as a nation.[ citation needed ]

Death

Michael Bliss died on May 18, 2017, in Toronto, Ontario, at the age of 76. [8] [9] [10]

Works

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Insulin</span> Peptide hormone

Insulin is a peptide hormone produced by beta cells of the pancreatic islets encoded in humans by the insulin (INS) gene. It is the main anabolic hormone of the body. It regulates the metabolism of carbohydrates, fats, and protein by promoting the absorption of glucose from the blood into cells of the liver, fat, and skeletal muscles. In these tissues the absorbed glucose is converted into either glycogen, via glycogenesis, or fats (triglycerides), via lipogenesis; in the liver, glucose is converted into both. Glucose production and secretion by the liver are strongly inhibited by high concentrations of insulin in the blood. Circulating insulin also affects the synthesis of proteins in a wide variety of tissues. It is thus an anabolic hormone, promoting the conversion of small molecules in the blood into large molecules in the cells. Low insulin in the blood has the opposite effect, promoting widespread catabolism, especially of reserve body fat.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Macleod (physiologist)</span> Scottish Nobel laureate

John James Rickard Macleod,, was a Scottish biochemist and physiologist. He devoted his career to diverse topics in physiology and biochemistry, but was chiefly interested in carbohydrate metabolism. He is noted for his role in the discovery and isolation of insulin during his tenure as a lecturer at the University of Toronto, for which he and Frederick Banting received the 1923 Nobel prize in Physiology or Medicine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frederick Banting</span> Canadian medical scientist and doctor

Sir Frederick Grant Banting was a Canadian pharmacologist, orthopedist, and field surgeon. For his co-discovery of insulin and its therapeutic potential, Banting was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with John Macleod.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles Best (medical scientist)</span> Canadian co-discoverer of insulin (1899–1978)

Charles Herbert Best, was an American-Canadian medical scientist and one of the co-discoverers of insulin with Frederick Banting. He served as the chair of the Banting and Best Department of Medical Research at the University of Toronto and was further involved in research concerning choline and heparin.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Osler</span> Canadian physician and co-founder of Johns Hopkins Hospital (1849–1919)

Sir William Osler, 1st Baronet, was a Canadian physician and one of the "Big Four" founding professors of Johns Hopkins Hospital. Osler created the first residency program for specialty training of physicians, and he was the first to bring medical students out of the lecture hall for bedside clinical training. He has frequently been described as the Father of Modern Medicine and one of the "greatest diagnosticians ever to wield a stethoscope". In addition to being a physician he was a bibliophile, historian, author, and renowned practical joker. He was passionate about medical libraries and medical history, having founded the History of Medicine Society, at the Royal Society of Medicine, London. He was also instrumental in founding the Medical Library Association of Great Britain and Ireland, and the Association of Medical Librarians along with three other people, including Margaret Charlton, the medical librarian of his alma mater, McGill University. He left his own large history of medicine library to McGill, where it became the Osler Library.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Harvey Cushing</span> American neurosurgeon (1869–1939)

Harvey Williams Cushing was an American neurosurgeon, pathologist, writer, and draftsman. A pioneer of brain surgery, he was the first exclusive neurosurgeon and the first person to describe Cushing's disease. He wrote a biography of physician William Osler in three volumes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">University of Toronto Faculty of Medicine</span> Medical school of the University of Toronto

The Temerty Faculty of Medicine is the medical school of the University of Toronto. Founded in 1843, the faculty is based in Downtown Toronto and is one of Canada's oldest institutions of medical studies, being known for the discovery of insulin, stem cells and the site of the first single and double lung transplants in the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Collip</span> Biochemist; part of group that isolated insulin

James Bertram Collip was a Canadian biochemist who was part of the Toronto group which isolated insulin. He served as the chair of the department of biochemistry at McGill University from 1928 to 1941 and dean of medicine at the University of Western Ontario from 1947 to 1961, where he was a charter member of The Kappa Alpha Society.

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<i>Glory Enough for All</i> Canadian TV series or program

Glory Enough for All is a 1988 Canadian television movie directed by Eric Till and written by Grahame Woods, depicting the discovery and isolation of insulin by Frederick Banting and Charles Best. It was the winner of nine 1989 Gemini Awards. The film stars R. H. Thomson as Banting, and Robert Wisden as Best. It is based on the books The Discovery of Insulin and Banting: A Biography by historian Michael Bliss.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of diabetes</span>

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References

  1. 1 2 "2016 Inductee, Michael Bliss, PhD". Canadian Medical Hall of Fame.
  2. Bliss, Michael (2011) Writing History: A Professor's Life, Dundurn Press
  3. Li Haeman, McKeller, editors (2008) Figuing the Social:  Essays in Honour of Michael Bliss, University of Toronto Press
  4. Wright Jr., James R. (Fall 2021). "Maligning Macleod and "Bettering" Best: the discovery of insulin as depicted in film before Michael Bliss". Hektoen International: A Journal of Medical Humanities.
  5. Turley-Ewart, John (November 9, 2005). "Michael Bliss". National Post. Archived from the original on April 27, 2006. Retrieved May 18, 2017.
  6. "Governor General Announces 90 New Appointments to the Order of Canada". The Governor General of Canada His Excellency the Right Honourable David Johnston. December 30, 2013. Retrieved May 18, 2017.
  7. "American Osler - Lifetime Achievement Awards" (PDF). www.americanosler.org. Retrieved 16 May 2019.
  8. Pelley, Lauren (May 18, 2017). "Award-winning historian, author Michael Bliss dead at 76". CBC News. Retrieved May 18, 2017.
  9. "Acclaimed Canadian historian, author Michael Bliss dies at 76". The Globe And Mail. May 18, 2017. Retrieved May 18, 2017.
  10. In memoriam: University Professor Emeritus Michael Bliss
  11. Tattersall, R. (1983). "Christmas Books: Amateur, Nobel, scientists (review of The Discovery of Insulin)". British Medical Journal (Clinical Research Ed.). 287 (6406): 1695–1696. doi:10.1136/bmj.287.6406.1695. PMC   1550119 .
  12. Matz, Robert (2000). "The discovery of insulin". BMJ. 321 (7273): 1418. doi:10.1136/bmj.321.7273.1418/a. PMC   1119136 .
  13. Norris, John (1986). "Review of Banting. A Biography". Canadian Bulletin of Medical History. 3: 127–130. doi: 10.3138/cbmh.3.1.127 .
  14. Craig, M. S. (2001). "review of William Osler: A Life in Medicine". Primary Care Companion to the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry. 3 (3): 145. PMC   181178 .
  15. Sturdy, S. (2000). "review of William Osler: A Life in Medicine". British Medical Journal. 321 (7268): 1087. PMC   1118869 .
  16. Del Maestro, R. (2007). "review of Harvey Cushing: A Life in Surgery". Canadian Journal of Surgery. 50 (1): 70–71. PMC   2384244 .
  17. Feindel, W. (2006). "Harvey Cushing — a standard worth striving for (review of Harvey Cushing: A Life in Surgery)". Canadian Medical Association Journal. 174 (12): 1748. doi:10.1503/cmaj.060504. PMC   1471820 .
  18. Lederer, S. E. (2007). "revuew of Harvey Cushing: A Life in Surgery". The American Historical Review. 112 (2): 514–515. doi:10.1086/ahr.112.2.514.
  19. Day, Brian (November 2011). "Book review: The Making of Modern Medicine". BC Medical Journal. 53 (9): 492.

Further reading

Awards
Preceded by Toronto Book Award
1979
With: William Dendy
and John Morgan Gray
Succeeded by
Preceded bySucceeded by
Preceded by
Preceded by Toronto Book Award
1983
With: Lucy Booth Martyn
Succeeded by
Preceded bySucceeded by
Succeeded by
Preceded by François-Xavier Garneau Medal
1985
Succeeded by
Preceded by J. B. Tyrrell Historical Medal
1988
Succeeded by
Succeeded by