In 1973, EARL D.R. KIDWELL JR., M.D., graduated from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and became the first African American resident at the Wilmer Eye Institute.
In the intervening decades, Kidwell has logged a storied career in which he has taught upward of 400 residents the art of cataract and oculoplastic surgery. Most of these residents have been at Wilmer, but he’s also instructed trainees at the University of Maryland, Howard University, and Maryland General Hospital.
One former student who definitely counts himself fortunate to be among those mentored by Kidwell is Peter J. McDonnell, M.D., director of Wilmer since 2003.
In McDonnell’s student days, Kidwell was chief of ophthalmology at Baltimore City Hospitals, which later became Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center. Johns Hopkins residents would rotate there and work under the supervision of Kidwell, who was known as a particularly excellent instructor in the operating room.
Many others share a fondness for Kidwell, as evidenced by the recent creation of the Earl D.R. Kidwell, Jr., M.D., Professorship of Ophthalmology at the Wilmer Eye Institute.
CHAIRHOLDER TO BE NAMED