In Memoriam
Authors: Robert W. Schrier
Journal: Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (2012)

With the passing of Laurence E. Earley (January 23, 1931–March 13, 2012), American medicine has lost an outstanding academic leader. Earley was truly a gentleman and scholar as befits a son of North Carolina. He was a page in the U.S. House of Representatives as a teenager, present for addresses to joint sessions of Congress by Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman. He also was in the House chamber when General Dwight D. Eisenhower addressed Congress in June 1945, 5 weeks after World War II ended in Europe. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of North Carolina, then attended medical school at the same institution. He received the Isaac W. Manning Award as the outstanding member of his senior class. Larry Earley received his training in internal medicine on the Harvard Medical Services at Boston City Hospital. He pursued research training in kidney diseases and physiology at the National Institutes of Health. After this training Larry was recruited as a junior faculty member to the Thorndike Memorial Laboratory at Boston City Hospital. With an exceptional early research record in renal hemodynamics, he was recruited to be Chief of the Division of Nephrology at the University of California, San Francisco. In that position he built one of the finest kidney groups in the country. I was very fortunate to have been a member of his renal faculty in San Francisco. Larry was an extremely intelligent and scholarly leader who had exceptional personal qualities of integrity and fairness. On the background of his academic leadership and accomplishments as a Division Chief in San Francisco, he was recruited to be the chair of the Department of Medicine at the University of Texas Health Services Center in San Antonio. In that position from 1973 to 1977, Larry enhanced the academic mission of the department and the school. From 1977 to 1990, Larry was Chair of the Department of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, one of the most distinguished positions in all of medicine. He was Senior Associate Dean at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine from 1987 to 1995. In 1995 Larry returned to the University of North Carolina as Professor of Clinical Medicine, a position he held until he retired in 2000. Throughout Larry Earley’s distinguished career, he continued to provide leadership in nephrology nationally and internationally. He was elected a Councilor of the International Society of Nephrology and President of the American Society of Nephrology. The senior academic medical society in the United States is the Association of American Physicians. Larry Earley was elected President of that important academic organization. He was chairman of the American Board of Internal Medicine and was elected a Master of the American College of Physicians. He was a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies of Science. While they were college students, Earley met his future wife, Joanne Sinclair Earley, at Yellowstone National Park, where they had summer jobs. They raised their family in Ardmore, Pennsylvania, and later traveled throughout the world together, enjoying sailing in the Pacific Northwest, the Chesapeake, and the waters off Maine. His other interests outside medicine were woodworking, fishing, photography, and his family. He is survived by his lovely wife of 58 years; his sons, Laurence Jr. and Peter; and grandchildren Chris, Alex, Devin, Caroline, Cameron, Timothy, and Daniel. He was predeceased by his sons Andrew and Geoffrey.Figure