archives collection - American Academy of Family Physicians ...

Stoeckle, John D.
Toney, Carl M.
Tuckson, Reed V.
Tudor-Hart, Julian
Wilson, Rodman
Winklmann, John
Yindra, John
Young, Quentin
Nixon, Sam A., Jr., M.D. (1927-2003)
1969, 1974, 1981
1 box – See also: Audio-Visual Collection and Photograph Collection
Sam A. Nixon, M.D. was born in 1927 in Galveston, Texas to Sam A. Nixon, Sr. and Margaret
Sandel Nixon. Nixon graduated from Abilene High School at the age of sixteen and from Texas
A&M with his Bachelor’s Degree in 1946, at age nineteen. By twenty-three he had earned his M.D.
from the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston. He then completed a rotating internship
at Fordham Hospital in New York City. Nixon served in the U.S. Army Medical Corps for four years
from 1950 to 1954 as a battalion surgeon in Korea and as an artillery surgeon in both Korea and
Japan. He joined the AAGP in 1955 and the next twenty-three years of his life were devoted to
Family Medicine; he worked as a family physician in both Nixon and Floresville, Texas. During this
period he was involved in the Gonzales County Medical Society as president in 1957 and secretary
from 1962-1977. He also contributed greatly to the Texas Medical Association (TMA) as 5 th District
President in 1968 and as an alternate delegate and delegate to the American Medical Association
(AMA) from 1969 to 1977. Moreover, Nixon served as the vice-president (1965-1966), president of
the Alamo chapter (1967), and president (1968-1969) of the Texas Academy of Family Physicians
(TAFP). He also received his first teaching position in 1972 as a clinical professor in the Department
of Family Practice at the University of Texas Medical School. In 1977, Nixon chose to relocate,
leaving his private practice and clinical professorship behind, and join the University of Texas
Medical School at Houston as a professor in the Department of Family Practice and Community
Medicine. In 1979 he was president-elect of the AAFP and served as president the following year.
Nixon held the post of Director of Continuing Education at the University of Texas Health Science
Center at Houston (UTHSCH) from 1977 to 1992, at which time he also retired from teaching. He
was also the assistant dean for continuing education from 1985 to 1992. Nixon also served as
president of the Texas Medical Association in 1991 and he received the Distinguished Service
Award, their highest honor, in 1999. In 2002, one year before his death, the TAFP honored him with
the first Lifetime Achievement Award for service to the specialty of family medicine.
The Sam A. Nixon, M.D. Collection contains a few receipts for services rendered by Dr. Nixon and
two short articles in which Nixon explains his academic titles and how a “country doctor” like
himself found his way to Houston. There is also a large binder and one file pertaining to a one week
seminar presented by the Menninger Foundation in Topeka, Kansas on Psychiatry for General
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