The Key to the Future Read online

  Dr. Sullivan just grinned as he watched his mother now concentrate on the starting lineup introduction. She was an avid baseball fan, especially when it came to her Brookside Pugs, a minor league team located just north of the city. Moses was already fast asleep at her side, his stomach full of gyro. He quietly cleaned up the dinner plates and headed downstairs.

  The doctor spent the next few hours in his study preparing for his lecture the following day. He would be addressing the West Philadelphia Historical Society, whose legal action to halt the destruction of the Franklin Wing was recently dismissed by a district judge. His topic was Dr. Zachary Schmidt, a physician who practiced at the Philadelphia General Hospital for twenty years, until he mysteriously disappeared. Sullivan had been researching Schmidt and his vast contributions to the medical community in preparation for the talk. As he scanned some old articles from the Philadelphia Chronicle it was obvious that his mother was correct in her description of Schmidt. The press depicted him as a quirky physician who at times promoted unconventional methods of care to his patients. The newspaper attached adjectives to his name such as dashing, whimsical and offbeat along with the occasional odd and erratic. A story from 1966 included a picture of Schmidt and his trademark handlebar mustache, next to a contraption attempting to take x-rays by using a magnetic field. Surrounding the physician were nurses and students in awe, a few staring at Schmidt and the others at the apparatus. The doctor wore a long white lab coat and bowtie.

  “John, seventh inning stretch!” came the cry from upstairs. “Hurry!”

  Sullivan bolted from his desk and ran upstairs to help his mother out of bed, her bony frame now at ninety pounds.

  “Let me go,” she said with a push of his hand. “I can stand alone.”

  Together they stood at attention as America the Beautiful played over the loudspeaker at Pug Stadium, a seventh inning stretch tradition at the park. Throughout the song she held a trembling hand across her heart. Immediately afterwards he helped his infirmed mother back into bed as Moses repositioned next to her.

  “Pugs are up by one,” said Mrs. Sullivan.

  “Great. Good night, Mom.”

  “I hope they don’t blow this one. I don’t trust their bullpen.”

  “Good night, Mom,” said Sullivan as he exited the bedroom.

  “John.”

  “Yes, Mom.”

  “Stay out of that hospital basement.”

  “Mom, please! There are no such things as ghosts.”

  “Listen to your dying mother for once… and stay out of that basement. It’s haunted!”

  Chapter Two

  THE HISTORICAL SOCIETY

  The West Philadelphia Historical Society met once a month in the home of their president, Attorney Frederick Mills. His home sat opposite the 40th Street Trolley Portal along the midblock of Baltimore Avenue. Mills inherited the aging homestead from his father, who like his son, struggled as a lawyer. The building was erected in 1900 and honored with a Historical Society Landmark plaque, allowing a tax break for the owner. The two front rooms of the aging construct served as office space for the attorney while the rest of the house was residential. The Historical Society gathered upstairs in a large, musty drawing room, complete with a mantle fireplace and heavy oak molding. A series of ornate chandeliers hung from a cracked ceiling, their light reflecting off a framed antique map of West Philadelphia on the wall.

  “I threw everything at them,” said Attorney Mills to several society members including John Sullivan. “But unfortunately in the end, the judge decided against our injunction to delay demolition.”

  “Money talks,” said a tall, skinny member with a high-pitched voice wearing a button-down sweater. “And we know who has the money.”

  “The Pagano Destruction Company,” said Mills with a shake of his head. “I looked it up. This judge has never decided against them over the past fifteen years.” Mills was a short, portly man dressed in a crumpled long sleeve shirt with suspenders holding up his trousers. Despite not drinking beer over the past ten years, his stomach protruded grandly over his waistline. He never married and lived in the house alone. “Must be on their payroll.”

  “Well, what’s done is done,” said Dr. Sullivan. “Our job now is to try and document and preserve as much history as possible over the next three weeks.”

  “Yeah. You did all you could Fred,” said another member with a walrus mustache and twitching left eye. “Thanks for all your hard work.”

  “You’re welcome, Wally,” replied the president.

  A total of seventeen members showed up for the meeting, which began with preliminary statements from the president and treasurer. Scattered throughout the room were several worn sofas and large wing back chairs. Two older members stood in the back of the room with canes, their lumbago too severe to allow a seated position. After a brief introduction, Dr. Sullivan stood up and walked to the front of the room, facing his colleagues. He held a remote control device in his right hand, synchronized to a slide projector atop a table.

  “Good evening everyone,” said Sullivan. “Today’s lecture is on the life and times of Dr. Zachary Wilhelm Schmidt, a colorful and controversial physician, whose office occupied the ground floor of the Philadelphia General’s Franklin Wing.”

  “Can you please speak up?” asked one of the members standing in the back. “Us old-timers back here can’t hear you.”

  “Sure I can, Bart,” said Sullivan loudly as he advanced the first slide, delivering the picture of a young Zachary Schmidt disembarking a ship in New York Harbor.

  “Zachary Schmidt was born in Stuttgart, Germany in 1930,” said Sullivan. “His father was a laborer who died in a factory accident when Zachary was one year old. His mother suffered from tuberculosis and to the best of my knowledge was confined to a sanatorium when Zachary was an infant.”

  “What year was he born?” asked a member in the second row.

  “1930,” responded Sullivan.

  “The great depression significantly impacted Germany,” interjected the society member while looking around at his colleagues. “A worldwide economic disaster.”

  “Correct,” said Sullivan. “With the Weimar Republic ailing and the Nazi party gaining power, a decision was made to send young Zachary to the United States with his uncle, Rickard von Steiger. This is the first known photo of Zachary Schmidt, a three-year old arriving in New York Harbor with his uncle.”

  The grainy photo on the screen was faded and projected a proud uncle with thick mustache and derby hat holding his nephew, bundled up against a cold November wind. Next to the travelers stood a stack of wood traveling chests, containing all their possessions. A woman in the background may have been von Steiger’s wife.

  “Does anybody recognize the von Steiger name?” asked Sullivan.

  Silence.

  “The Physics building on the University of Pennsylvania campus is named after him,” said Sullivan. “Von Steiger was a well-respected physicist in Germany and confidant of all the great German scientists of his time, including Albert Einstein. He fled Nazi Germany along with Einstein in 1933. Von Steiger was warmly welcomed at Penn while Einstein of course ended up in Princeton, New Jersey.”

  “He was immediately accepted by the Penn Physics department?” asked Mills.

  “Yes,” answered Sullivan. “Solely based on his name and work in Germany. He was an all-star of the era.”

  “Did he help develop the atomic bomb?” asked Bart from the rear, with the assist of a gnarled oak cane.

  “I’m not sure of his role in the Manhattan…”

  “Does anybody remember the name of the plane that dropped the atom bomb?” interrupted the veteran.

  “On Nagasaki or Hiroshima?” asked another member, the discussion starting to veer off tract. “You have to be specific with the question, Bart.”

  “Little Boy was the name of the A-bomb the plane dropped,” countered the old codger with another shake of his cane, now stepping forward. “Not Fat Man
, but Little Boy. That should give the answer away to everyone in this room.”

  “Gentlemen, gentlemen,” said Sullivan, well aware of the group’s penchant to argue over historical trivia.

  “Nagasaki was the first city destroyed,” said a member from the front row. “Or was it Hiroshima?”

  “The Enola Gay!” yelled Bart. “The plane was named the Enola Gay!”

  “I was going to say that, but you didn’t give enough time!”

  “It was named after the mother of the pilot,” added Bart. “Enola Gay Tibbets!”

  “Gentlemen please,” said Attorney Mills now standing. “Today’s lecture is on Dr. Schmidt and the old Franklin Wing. So please allow John to continue his discussion.”

  “Thank you, Fred.”

  Dr. Sullivan continued his presentation, describing in detail the storied career of Dr. von Steiger, who along with his wife raised young Zachary Schmidt. Von Steiger was credited with several revolutionary ideas within his field that originally appeared to be unfounded, yet ultimately withstood the test of time, including bold predictions regarding the use of computers in the future. Through a series of slides Sullivan painted the picture of a brilliant physicist, always thinking outside of the box until his untimely death in 1962.

  “Untimely? How so?” asked Attorney Mills.

  “An explosion in the basement of the Franklin building itself,” said Sullivan. “To the best of my knowledge, von Steiger was conducting research on radioactive gases when a spark ignited a fireball, resulting in instantaneous death. The explosion so severe they never found his remains.”

  “How badly was the Franklin Wing damaged?”

  “Several newspaper articles described major structural damage to the facility and there was discussion of razing the building, but Zachary Schmidt led a spirited charge to preserve the lab, in honor of his uncle. Schmidt relocated his office and research facilities to the basement where his uncle perished. He continued to work there until his ultimate disappearance.

  “Disappearance?” asked Attorney Mills. “Schmidt disappeared?”

  A low rumble of discussion began to fill the darkened room.

  “Gentlemen, gentlemen, please,” said Sullivan holding up both hands. “I don’t want to get ahead of myself. Let me first begin with Zachary Schmidt’s education and ultimate acceptance to the hospital faculty. The end of the lecture will touch upon his final days at the Philadelphia General Hospital, during which much has been written about.”

  Over the next twenty minutes John Sullivan outlined the story of Zachary Schmidt’s life. He was a child prodigy whose intelligence landed him an academic scholarship at St. Joseph’s Preparatory school in center city Philadelphia. He was high school class valedictorian and attended college and medical school at the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 1955 with a degree in medicine. After a general medicine residency, he joined the staff at the Philadelphia General Hospital in 1959. Over the next three years he worked closely with his uncle in the Physics department at Penn, helping to develop some major medical breakthroughs in the field of radiology and infectious disease. His research greatly assisted in the development of antibiotics beyond penicillin, and ultimately set the groundwork for a polio vaccine, thus impacting the world as a whole.

  “Is that him?” asked Mills while staring at a photo of the 1959 Philadelphia General Hospital medical staff. “The one with the bow tie?”

  “Yes, it is,” said Sullivan with a laser pointer trained on Schmidt. “He always wore a bow tie and throughout his adult life displayed a handle bar mustache.”

  Sullivan then advanced the slide show to bring a professional photo shot of Schmidt to the screen. He was wearing a suit coat and bow tie while staring at the camera, a subtle grin and twinkle in his eye. The photo captured his essence from mid torso upwards.

  “A handsome man,” said Mills. “How old was he then?”

  “This was 1962,” replied Sullivan. “The year of his uncle’s death. So he was thirty-two. Zachary Schmidt was indeed quite the ladies’ man according to several nurses who worked with him throughout his career.”

  “Was he married? Did he have children?”

  “No, he was not married,” mused Sullivan while staring at the photo. “But from my understanding, he never lacked female companionship, and that’s from a reliable source.”

  The crowd just stared at the photo, which was a bit mesmerizing, as if Schmidt was staring directly back at them. The rumble of a trolley car passing by gently shook the chandelier.

  “It was his mystique,” continued Sullivan slowly. “His mystique is what defined him, not his brilliance or foresight that helped generate some of the greatest medical discoveries of his time – but the charisma of the man. His persona was said to be intoxicating to those around him. He had a presence that suggested something extraordinary, mysterious yet magical – almost mythical.”

  “I’ve got a chill down my spine,” said Attorney Mills while staring at the photo.

  “Well turn up the heat in this barn!” shouted Bart from the rear of the room. “I’ve got long johns on and my toes are still cold.”

  “The untimely death of his uncle greatly affected him,” said Sullivan. “He suffered dearly from the loss.”

  “I can see why,” said Mills. “Von Steiger was the father he never had.”

  “Dr. Schmidt continued his contributions to the medical world over the next twenty years,” said Sullivan while advancing a series of house staff slides. “In the mid 1960s he helped develop laser technology instrumental in the treatment of retinal disease. In the early 1970s he helped set up a multilevel clinical trial which demonstrated that lowering cholesterol levels prevents heart disease.”

  “A forward thinker,” quipped Mills.

  “Exactly,” said Sullivan. “He was always a bit ahead of the curve.”

  “What about the disappearance part?” asked the now impatient veteran in the rear of the room. “It’s getting late and I’m about to disappear… if anybody cares.”

  “All was going well with Dr. Schmidt’s career until about 1973,” said Sullivan. “Up until that point he was well respected nationwide.”

  “What happened?”

  “He began to make bold predictions concerning events about to affect the entire world. Quite outlandish predictions that got him in hot water and ultimately led to his bizarre demise.”

  “The 1970s,” said Mills. “Was it a medical prediction?”

  “Perhaps,” said Sullivan with a smile. “Think now… the early 1970s in Philadelphia.”

  The congregation went into deep thought, searching their collective minds for an answer.

  “The Flyers win the Stanley Cup…. the Flyers win the Stanley Cup!” yelled a member.

  “Nope.”

  “An epidemic? Just give us a hint, John,” said Mills.

  “Yes, it was an epidemic of historic proportions,” said the speaker.

  “Disco music!” said the man with the walrus mustache. “Disco fever!” A round of laughter followed.

  “No, Wally. It wasn’t disco music.”

  “I’ve got it!” shouted Mills.

  “Let’s hear it.”

  “Legionnaires’ Disease,” said Mills with a confident nod of his head. “1976, the Bellevue-Stratford Hotel, downtown Philadelphia. Bingo!” He snapped his fingertips.

  “Excellent guess… but wrong.”

  “Spit it out already,” yelled the back row heckler. “For Christ’s sake I’m eighty-seven years old. Make it fast.”

  “Dr. Schmidt began to predict a plague of historical proportion about to fall upon a subset of the populace, perhaps in retribution for their hedonistic ways.”

  Silence filled the room.

  “Gentlemen, again think ahead of the curve. Schmidt was always ahead of the curve.”

  No one spoke.

  “Alright,” said Sullivan. “I’ll spell it out. He spoke of a horrid curse about to befall upon the gay and homosexual com
munity throughout the world. A menace that would become the bane of their existence.”

  “HIV!” yelled Miles. “Oh my god!”

  “Precisely,” said Sullivan while pointing a finger towards the president. “Human Immunodeficiency Virus, or AIDS.”

  “He used that terminology? In the 1970s?”

  “Not exactly,” said Sullivan. “But in retrospect he spoke eerily of a lethal blood borne disease with no cure, predominately affecting homosexuals and intravenous drug abusers. A malady that would claim the lives of millions of people before it was brought under control.”

  “Why?” asked Mills. “I mean… I can see why his prediction would generate outrage. But why would he talk of such nonsense back then?”

  “Schmidt spoke in broad strokes,” said Sullivan. “He was trying to generate an open dialogue within the medical community. He sensed the epidemic coming.”

  “But how?”

  “I can’t answer that,” said Sullivan with a shake of his head. “No one can.”

  “Amazing.”

  “He began to write medical editorials making reference to the safety of the nation’s blood banks. He advocated the proactive dispersal of condoms and championed safe sex practices. He even tried to open a free hypodermic needle clinic in West Philadelphia, in an attempt to protect those addicted to heroin.”

  “I can imagine the outrage,” said Mills. “It must have been brutal.”

  “It was,” said Sullivan. “He was immediately branded a medical heretic, a quack, a quirky physician gone off the deep edge.”

  “What happened next?” asked Bart.

  The greater the establishment tried to squelch him, the louder he spoke. In 1975 he wrote an editorial to the Philadelphia Chronicle imploring the medical and social community to take immediate action against a pandemic about to take hold of the gay community. He called it his “medical manifesto.” Sullivan then ran through a series of Chronicle articles with the name “Schmidt” commanding the headlines. One title in large bold print simply read – “Philadelphia General Physician Predicts Medical Holocaust!”