Sports Physician - Athlete 1890-1891
1890
Jacques Forestier (1890-1978) competed in the 1920 Olympics in Antwerp and won the silver medal with the French rugby team. In addition, he was also an excellent swimmer and skier. He graduated as a doctor and specialized in Internal Medicine in l'Hopital Cochin in Paris. He trained in Rheumatology and founded in 1928 ‘La Société Française de Rheumatologie’. He introduced the gold salts as a treatment for rheumatoid arthritis and became best known for his work on polymyalgia rheumatica or muscle rheumatism and spinal canal stenosis or Forestier's disease. The Forestier's bowstring sign and the Forestier-Certonciny syndrome have also been named after him
1890
John Leonard 'Doc' Lavan (1890-1952) was a professional baseball shortstop who played for twelve seasons in the US Major League Baseball. He played 1.163 games for consecutively St. Louis Browns, Philadelphia Athletics, Washington Senators and St. Louis Cardinals. He graduated from the University of Michigan in 1911 and served as a City Health Officer in New York City, St. Louis, Kansas City, Toledo, Kalamzoo and Grand Rapids. He also served as Director of Research for the National Foundation of Infantile Paralysis. During both World Wars he served as a surgeon in the U.S. Navy.
1890
At the 1924 Winter Olympics in Chamonix, Howard Somervell (1890-1975) was awareded a gold medal by Pierre de Coubertin (1863-1937) for his achievements in Alpinism. After studying Medicine in Cambridge, Somervell began training as a surgeon at University College Hospital of London. During World War I he was one of four surgeons operatng in a tent in France during the battle of the Somme. From 1923 to 1949 he worked as a surgeon with the London Missionary Society Boys Brigade Hospital at Kundura, which became one of the largest mission hospitals in the world. He was also one of pioneers in leprosy treatment, which until then had been considered incurable. Somervell became an associate professor of surgery at Vellore Christian Medical College in 1949, a post he would hold until his retirement in 1961. He returned to England and became President of the Alpine Club for three years. He painted six hundred paintings, 200 of which were representing the Himalaya or Tibet.
1891
From 1910 to 1922 Dutchman of Indonesian origin Just Göbel (1891-1984) was the goalkeeper of first-league football team Vitesse. He played 22 matches for the Dutch team and was rewarded several times as best European goalkeeper. At the 1912 Olympics in Stockholm he won the bronze medal with the Dutch team. He graduated as a doctor but suffered an eye injury in the laboratory, whereupon he decided not to play football anymore. He specialized in cardiology.
1891
Shot putter Rex Woods (1891-1986) represented Great Britain at the Olympics of 1924 and 1928 in Paris and Amsterdam. He also excelled in other sport like rugby, he was a noted golfer and also an excellent quarter-miler. During World War I he became a captain-physician in the Royal Army Medical Corps in France and during World War II he served again as a Major and Surgeon in Mauritius and Madagascar. He shared a medical practice with Edward Bevan (1907-1988), the Olympic rowing gold medalist at the Amsterdam Olympics in 1928.
