Ralph Muckenfuss

Ralph Stewart Muckenfuss (3 February 1899 – 13 March 1979) was an American scientist who served as the first director of The Public Health Research Institute of The City of New York; he left temporarily during World War II "to take up important duties with the American armed forces."[1]

Career

"Beginning in about 1929" Muckenfuss was a Missouri hospital's lab director.[2]

In 1935, he accepted an invitation from New York City's Department of Health to become its "temporary assistant director of the city's Bureau of Laboratories." [3] The New York Times wrote that it was a "Job Local Doctors Refused", and Muckenfuss had a position as a bacteriologist of Washington University in St. Louis.[3][4] By 1947, he had become director.[5] By 1953, he had moved to the parent body, and his title was "assistant commissioner of the Health Department." [6] He stayed on during the 1960s but never became commissioner.[7]

When New York City had a smallpox crisis in 1947, Muckenfuss "telephoned officials of three drug companies in their homes over the weekend and asked them to start maximum production", and the mayor entrusted him with managing the situation.[5]

References

1. Heyman, D. M. (1942). "Annual Report of the Public Health Research Institute of the City of New York, Inc.: July 1, 1941 - June 30, 1942". Public Health Research Institute. Archived from the original on January 30, 2011. Retrieved May 13, 2021. PHRI's First Annual Report 1941-1942
2. "History of the Missouri Branch, American Society for Microbiology". American Society for Microbiology Branch Histories. January 2002. Archived from the original on May 14, 2021. Retrieved May 14, 2021.
3. "PHYSICIANS HERE SPURN $6,000 POST; Dr. R.S. Muckenfuss of St. Louis Appointed to Job Local Doctors Refused". New York Times. July 11, 1935. Archived from the original on May 14, 2021. Retrieved May 14, 2021.
4. RS Muckenfuss (1933). "Encephalitis: Studies on Experimental Transmission". Public Health Reports. 48 (44): 1341–1343. doi:10.2307/4580968. JSTOR 4580968. S2CID 79878352. Archived from the original on May 14, 2021. Retrieved May 14, 2021. RALPH S. MUCKENFUSS, Assistant Professor of Medicine, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis
5. Jimmy Breslin (November 19, 2002). "Saving Public From The Pox". Newsday. Archived from the original on May 14, 2021. Retrieved May 14, 2021. scrapbook kept by the Department of Health during the 1947 smallpox fright in New York
6. "NO EPIDEMIC OF FLU IS REPORTED IN CITY; Rise in Illness Is Not Unusual for Time of Year, Health Department Aide Says". New York Times. January 24, 1953.
7. Lawrence K. Altman (March 21, 1977). "Disease Expert Sees Threat Of Germ War". New York Times. Archived from the original on May 14, 2021. Retrieved May 14, 2021.