When I was a graduate student at Iowa State in the eighties it came to
pass that we were joined by Terry Ireland who served as electronics
guy in charge of instrumentation, especially NMR. Terry had been a
field service engineer for Bruker but he had heart problems and these
necessitated a change to an easier lifestyle.
Terry was a *real* Irishman with wavy red hair who, upon passing you
in the hall, always had a smile and often an uplifting something to say.
Our Dee-Hua Huang was there at Iowa State at the time,
too, and can attest to this. Terry was truly a wonderful
person.
I, having a fair amount of Irish heritage, had instituted a
tradition of always having Irish whiskey in the lab on St.
Pat's and Terry was one of those who joined me on that
day for a sip. On the last occasion he brought me a
shamrock blossom sent to him by a brother in Ireland for
the occasion.
Not too long after, Terry's canoe capsized during a
recreational outing and Terry, swimming after it, suffered a
heart attack and died. He was very young (late thirties?).
Since then, it has been my annual tradition, on St. Patrick's
Day, to lift a glass of Jameson to Terry's memory. This
tradition has survived 2 years at Iowa State, 2 years at UAB
(with Dee!), 1 year at Loyola, and 4 years since I arrived
here. Last year St. Pat's came during the ENC and I
performed the ritual with MR's Bob Crosby, who knew
Terry well when they were together at Bruker.
If anybody knows Bob, let him know that the thing is done
again, that the tradition is unbroken. For those of you who
knew Terry and were unaware of this thing I do, I invite you
to lift a glass to his memory.
Somehow, I expected this to get easier over the years, but
it doesn't.
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Bill Stevens NMR Facility voice:618-453-6498
Director Southern Illinois University fax-6408
Carbondale, IL 62901
U.S.A.
wstevens@c-mols.siu.edu
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