Leonard S. Zegans ’55
Professor emeritus at the University of California, San Francisco, Leonard was born April 12, 1934, and died July 7, 2015, in Lebanon, N.H.
He graduated from Lafayette High School in Brooklyn. At Princeton, Leonard wrote his senior thesis on “The Human Rights and Genocide Conventions.” A Prospect Club member and Woodrow Wilson major, he roomed at 532 Laughlin Hall with Burt Abrams and Leonard Inker.
Leonard’s life story is recounted as one honor after another. At NYU School of Medicine, he worked on immunology and tissue-graft rejection and then completed his psychiatry residency at Michigan, where he received a National Institutes of Health grant to study creative processes. He later received a National Institute of Mental Health Special Research Fellowship and worked with Nobel Prize-winner Konrad Lorenz. In 1995, he was the recipient of the J. Elliott Royer Award for Outstanding Achievement in Psychiatry.
In addition to his numerous educational, clinical, and research contributions to the University of California at San Francisco and the field of psychiatry, Leonard was a beloved husband, devoted father of two, and cherished papa to five grandchildren. He will be remembered for his humor, enthusiastic pursuit of fun, penchant for storytelling, and thoughtful advice.
Paw in print
December 2025
Judge Michael Park ’98; shifts in DEI initiatives; a night at the new art museum.
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Krissy Brault Schwerin ’00
9 Years AgoRemembering Zegans ’55
Published online May 11, 2016
I was touched and saddened to read the memorial for Len Zegans ’55 in the Jan. 13 issue. I was lucky enough to have Len as my psychotherapy supervisor during my psychiatry residency at University of California, San Francisco, toward the end of his career. Dr. Zegans was most influential in teaching me how to merge the roles of “doctor” and “psychotherapist.” As I write this, I have my old supervision notes beside me with quotes from Dr. Zegans that I had furiously scribbled down because of the simplicity, clarity, and humanity that his words brought to such challenging work. We often talked about our shared Princeton connection during supervision. Last year I stopped by the ’55 reunion hoping to find Len, and ended up having a wonderful conversation with several people about him. I love my career as a psychiatrist, and Dr. Zegans’ legacy lives on with the psychiatry residents I am proud to teach.