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Dr. Cyril Wecht: I was an only child, my parents were both immigrants. Mom and Pop owned a grocery store. I read a fair amount and yes, I would get books from the school library because we didn’t have many books in our own home. I did read and I was a good student, always in the top of my class. Yes, I was inquisitive, but not obnoxiously so. I was very active, I liked to play a lot of sports and became more increasingly active as I got into high school. So, it was an inquisitiveness that was associated with activity, I wasn’t a couch potato and it wasn’t a total intellectual inquisitiveness to the exclusion of doing things and wanting to be involved in a variety of activities.

FT: I did a little research on you and I found out that when you were younger, you were a concertmaster [first chair violinist—ed.] in an orchestra.

CW: Yes I was. All the way through high school and college I performed when I was thirteen playing an entire concerto. I played everything, Brahms, Beethoven, the whole thing. I had a teacher who studied in Russia. She had come to America, and I took four lessons a week and practiced four hours a day from Monday through Friday and six hours on Saturday and Sunday. It was all my father’s doing. (Laughs)

FT: I think it’s wonderful that you did that. It’s unusual these days to have someone who’s proficient in right-brained things in your line of work.

CW: Well, I give all the credit to my father. After I got good, I certainly enjoyed playing and being invited to perform, but if it was all emanating from me, I wouldn’t have stuck with it. I did it because I was obedient to my father and I liked my teacher. I was never deprived from opportunities to do things. I stuck with it through college but when I got to med school I gave it up.  But thank you for your comment.

FT: So, obviously you liked learning. What is it about an educator that really inspires you?  Are you pushing yourself or what is it that somebody does to inspire you and make you want to learn?

CW: Well, it’s a teacher that knows his/her field very well. It’s a teacher that commands your respect because of their expertise. It’s a teacher who is a human being in terms of being pleasant and demanding in an academic and instructor fashion, not the kind that whacks knuckles, hits you over the head, or insults you. There are different personalities when I think about high school and beyond. The ones that I just described are the ones that worked to pull the best out of me  and pushed me when I needed to be pushed. They let me know in a nice, but firm way when they were disappointed with me. I think to a great extent the attributes of a warm, strong personality coupled with the things that you are looking for and need in an academic milieu. Also, wanting to teach is very important. It’s clear that some teachers are there for their own academic careers instead of wanting to teach.  

CW: Sure, there were some teachers over the years and I remember two from elementary school, Miss Mancuso and Miss O’Malley. I remember them as two teachers that were very good to me and very encouraging. In college, there were a couple of professors who I liked very much, but I didn’t need much inspiration. My parents were wonderful, loving parents and were always there for me. I must say that my parents, mostly my father, from an age that I can remember, there was never any question that I was going to be a doctor. It never dawned on me that I was not going to go into premed and medical school. It wasn’t until I was finishing up in college, when I was student body president, that everybody assumed I was a pre-law student, because premed students didn’t mess around with that stuff.  By my third year of med school, I was beginning to think about law and I got in touch with the American Medical Association who directed me to the top medico-legal authority in the country at that time, a guy named Louis Regan in Los Angeles.

It was 1955, he invited me to New York City to the first ABA-AMA joint sponsored symposium. I went there because up until that time I couldn’t get a handle on legal medicine. This wonderful man sat down with me for 15 minutes, and everyone was waiting to talk to him after his Keynote address, and after talking to him I made up my mind that I was going to go to law school. And so I continued through with my internship and then I was thinking of what would be the specialty that would make the most sense that would fit  best with interface of law and medicine to the greatest extent, and that was clearly forensic pathology. So I just applied to law school and pathology residency simultaneously. One thing I am very proud of is I was accepted at both Harvard and Yale law schools and even though I was offered scholarships at both schools, I turned them down to go to University of Pittsburgh where I had a partial scholarship because I got permission to do my residency in pathology from both the Chief and the Chair of the University of Pittsburgh Department of Medicine. I did both for two years and I was in the Berry program, named after Colonel Berry who had the idea of letting medical students go into their residencies and specialize instead of going right into the military.

Instead of getting a lot of GPs, the military got people who were surgeons, anesthesiologists, psychiatrists, and what have you. So I did those two years and they felt I had enough pathology to function in that capacity, I couldn’t squeeze the third year out of them, they didn’t care about law school, so I served my two years at Maxwell Air Force base which was a huge center. There I got credit for my third and fourth years of pathology. When I got out I just needed my third year of law school and my fellowship in forensic pathology so I went to Baltimore because University of Maryland School of law had a good, accredited evening school and an excellent medical examiner program for the State of Maryland.  So, I went there and finished.

What I’m saying is I was inspired in a sense because I knew what I wanted to do and I wasn’t married at that time so I was able to do that.

FT: So is it fair to say that you were almost able to be in two places at one time?

CW: You’re right! (Laughs). I did hundreds of autopsies, I signed out surgical specimens. It was a very good hospital. My chief was one of the top pathologists around and I learned a lot. They told me, look you can do it but make sure you do all your work. So I would dash down to the law school that was less than a five minute ride, my biggest problem was parking my car. It was a little too far to walk so parking my car was my biggest aggravation. But I did it all.  I would cover hospitals at night and have my dates come over there and spend a couple hours with me in the emergency room.

FT: That’s certainly one way to figure out if the girl’s for you!

CW: (Laughs) Right!

FT: There are different types of learners, the people who like to see things, the visual learners; people who like to hear things; people who like to do things; people who like to talk about things. What is the best type of learning for you while you were in all your schooling?

CW: I learn best where there are good didactic lectures by people who knew their stuff and where they had a little sense of humor or a little quip once in a while.  I found law school interesting and enjoyable, but I can’t say that the Socratic method in law school was effective. In class the professor would call on a student and ask about a certain case, then call on another student, and after 50 minutes the class was over and what did you learn? There are different ways to review a case and differences of opinion. I understand that and it’s a good way of developing lawyers to think, but in response to your question I must say that the teaching I enjoyed most were the good, solid lectures. I remember the most in medical school, I took copious notes, I studied them, and I came to learn, and I took the boards. I remember to this day information from some of those lectures that I never used but I remembered it. Modern day changes include PowerPoint presentations that the teachers read to you. If the PowerPoints are used for demonstration, I understand that; for instance, in pathology if you can show different knife wounds, etc. But I’ve asked a lot of people to explain why I would want to go to a lecture and have the teacher read to me from the PowerPoint. Tell me something useful or use it for emphasizing points or in a supplemental fashion, but to put it up there and just read it, I don’t understand that.

FT: You’re right. Pathology is very hands- on. So, when you did your training did hands-on help you?

CW: Of course, you learn certain things in med school when you begin to see patients and do procedures, that are necessary, challenging, and exhilarating.

FT: What advice would you like to give our readers who are teachers of students who are unfamiliar or have a little familiarity with forensics? How can they become better teachers and get the information across?

CW: The overwhelming majority of teachers, high school and college, and I don’t mean this denigratingly, are not forensic scientists. When did they take forensics? When I was a kid, there was a time in American that not everything was forensics. There could be no area of endeavor that has the slightest possible application to the law that someone does not place the prefix forensics. What I’m saying is, up until recently, there was a time when people were just plain accountants or economists. Now, it’s so much more exciting and enticing because of all the programs on television. My advice is to get some of the good introduction books on forensic science. There are a few out there and I don’t mean to sound pushy, but I edited one with Professor John Rago from Duquesne University, about forensic science and the law, which is an excellent book because in addition to covering the forensic science field it also has chapters from law school professors. But there are other good books, too. Then, of course you can get more advanced as you go along. So, number one is to know something about forensic science yourself that is valid and don’t just get it from television programs and from fiction or novels or movies. As a teacher, learn something about it.

FT: I had a class years ago and I was able to get a judge to come in. The thing I noticed is the kids had a lot of conceptions, some right, some incorrect, from television about forensic science. But everything they learned about the law was either from TV or from rumors they heard. That was such an eye opening experience for most of them.

CW: I encourage them to watch the shows but they should be told to be careful, it’s show business. That’s why you need some people who are real.

FT: Let me ask you, do you ever see yourself retiring?

CW: That’s a good question. And the answer is NO. I did several autopsies on Saturday and Sunday, I did one on Tuesday, two yesterday, and one already today and I have another one this afternoon. Then I am going up to do my lecture at Duquesne law school on cases that I am testifying. The answer is no, as long as I am physically able and my mind is OK. What am I going to do if I retire? I don’t deprive myself of anything. I’ve traveled all over the world, have been invited to speak at different places, when my wife and I want to go to our place in Connecticut or Florida, we go and take a long weekend. I have my four children and eleven grandchildren living here in Pittsburgh area, so what more do I need? I would retire to do what? I don’t collect stamps or build boats out of toothpicks. What am I going to do?

FT: I just wondered because you are the busiest person I’ve ever known. I heard a saying that if you can find an occupation you love, you will never work a day in your life.

CW: (Laughs) That’s a marvelous saying. I never heard that one before. How philosophical.

FT: I want to thank you for taking the time to tell us about yourself and your views on education.

CW: It was my pleasure.

Interview

Pa·thol·o·gist ( pə-thä-lə-jist),

1: noun: a specialist in pathology; specifically : one who interprets and diagnoses the changes caused by disease in tissues and body fluids;

2: adjective: a title earned by someone like Dr. Cyril Wecht in western Pennsylvania who has performed over 14,000 autopsies in a career that has included the cases of John F. Kennedy, Elvis, Sharon Tate, JonBenét Ramsey, Laci Peterson, and Anna Nicole Smith. He has a medical degree and a law degree, and wields both with the skill with which he uses a scalpel. In 2000 the Duquesne University School of Law established an Institute of Forensic Science and Law and named it after him. He still performs the duties of medical examiner for several counties, and lives in Pittsburgh where he grew up. He is knowledgeable, warm, and personable to a fault. We were lucky enough to catch him between cases, and he discussed his feelings about education with us.