Washington neurosurgeon Norman Horwitz was on duty March 30, 1981, in MedStar Washington Hospital Center when an ambulance arrived carrying police officer Thomas Delahanty, who had been shot in the neck by a man attempting to assassinate President Ronald Reagan. With another surgeon and despite warnings that the explosive bullet might detonate, injuring him, Norman removed it.

Norman graduated in 1948 from Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons, studied neurophysiology at Yale, interned in surgery at Massachusetts Memorial Hospital, served in neurosurgery in the Air Force during the Korean War, and entered private practice in Washington in 1956. In the 1960s, he taught neurosurgery in Afghanistan, India, and Iran, then taught at George Washington University medical school. From 1987 until his retirement in 1995, Norman was chairman of neurosurgery at MedStar Washington. In 1967 he and a co-author published the influential book Postoperative Complications in Neurosurgical Practice: Recognition, Prevention and Management.

When he died of complications from Parkinson’s disease Oct. 2, 2012, Norman was survived by his wife of 62 years, Elinor Lander Horwitz; children Erica, Joshua, and Tony; sister Annetta Kushner; and seven grandchildren. To them all, ’46 sends its deepest sympathy.

Undergraduate Class of 1946