Collective
efforts
>>
Pinned
and proud
A
three-hour drive across the Great Plains from Kansas City International
Airport and 13 miles south of the Nebraska border is Marysville,
Kansas. A couple points of interest: the Pony Express Barn and,
not to be missed, the waiting room of the Community Physicians
Clinic on May Street. There, Fernando Ugarte, MD'65, keeps most
of his collection of 4,000 lapel pins, matted and framed, for
patients to admire.
And
augment. Many of Ugarte's pins are gifts from patients and friends;
his most treasured piece is a golden spike Union Pacific pin given
to him by a patient who retired from the railroad. "I refused
to accept it, but he had two of them," Ugarte explains in
a rich Peruvian accent. "The patient died later. His warmth
touched my heart." Other pins bear logos of the U.S. Navy,
Coca-Cola, Nabisco, McDonald's, and NASCAR. Pins from Europe include
a rare set he found in Madrid commemorating the parachute squadrons.
His first pin, which he acquired 20 years ago at the Taste of
Chicago, bears a tiny knife and fork and reads, "We're havin'
an eatwave."
Does
Ugarte wear his prizes? Of course. "I have pins in all
my hats," he declares-about 40 chapeaux, one of which he
sports each day. But his heart belongs on May Street. "I
keep quite busy with my practice and patients. This is my important
job."
©2001 The University
of Chicago® Magazine