CLASS OF 1953 WHO'S WHO & WHERE - The City College Fund

Dr. Herbert Weissbach: I graduated from the Bronx HighSchool of Science with a dream of becoming a professionalbaseball player. I had played baseball in high school and readilymade the CCNY Freshman team, coached by Hilty Shapiro, aformer basketball star. In 1951, my father passed away and mybaseball dream also ended. It became clear that I had to findanother career, and chemistry was the obvious route to take,based on my high school training and the fact that my olderbrother Arthur was a graduate student in biochemistry at ColumbiaUniversity. I started out as an organic chemistry majorbut in my senior year at CCNY, I decided to take Chem 59 and60 to learn about biochemistry.I should mention two professors who I remember fondly. The first was Professor Irani, who exposedme to philosophy and the logic course he taught (I believe it was Philosophy 12), a true gem thatI will never forget. The second professor was Abraham Mazur, or Abe, to those who knew him.Abe was not only a dynamic teacher, but took a keen interest in his students, especially encouragingthose who he thought should go on to graduate studies. Abe would call his former students in anattempt to place each of us, and, in my case, I ended up as a graduate student with Sid Udenfriendin a joint Ph.D. program with George Washington University, which allowed me to do my researchin Udenfriend’s laboratory at the NIH.I started graduate school in the summer in 1953, and in December of that year, I married ReneeKohl, also a CCNY graduate from the downtown Baruch School of Business. We have been marriedfor 60 years and have four children. After obtaining my Ph.D. in 1957, I did postdoctoral studiesin Berkeley with Dr. H.A. Barker, and then returned to the NIH for another 10 years before leavingin 1969 to help Udenfriend establish the Roche Institute of Molecular Biology (RIMB). RIMBwas supported entirely by the pharmaceutical company Hoffman LaRoche. In 1982, after electionto the National Academy of Sciences, I was appointed Director of the RIMB and a Vice-Presidentof Research at Roche.In 1967, I retired from Roche and moved to Florida Atlantic University to establish a Center forMolecular Biology and Biotechnology, which I still direct. I have been fortunate to have receivedseveral honors and awards during my career, among them: The American Chemical Society EnzymeAward (1970); the List of 300 Most Cited Authors, 1961-1976, Current Contents (July 10,1978); Elected Member of the National Academy of Sciences (1982); Honorary Election to PhiBeta Kappa, City College of New York Chapter (1990); The George Washington University DistinguishedAlumni Award (1994); Elected Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology(1997); Elected Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (2012); the Superior Service Award-DHEW (1968); Editor of the Journal of Biological Chemistry (1972-77); Executive Editor—Archives of Biochemistry and Biophysics (1972-1990); Member (Chairman)—Advisor Committee