In Memoriam:
A Dean Remembered
Glenn Richard Lee served as dean of the School of Medicine from 1978–1984.
This portrait of Lee was painted by Randall Lake in 1985. It is located in the Spencer S. Eccles Health Sciences Library.
Glenn Richard Lee, MD
1932–2022
Glenn Richard Lee, MD, former dean in the School of Medicine, passed away at age 90 on December 17, 2022. Lee graduated from East High School in Salt Lake City, attended medical school at the University of Utah, and trained as a hematologist at Boston City Hospital (Harvard Service). After service as a clinical associate for the National Cancer Institute, he completed a fellowship in hematology at the University of Utah School of Medicine, where he went on to research blood disorders, serve as a professor of medicine, and practice hematology. This is also where he met his wife of 50 years, Pamela Ridd Lee.
Lee loved books and dedicated his talents as both a contributor and lead editor to several editions of the medical textbook Wintrobe’s Clinical Hematology. He was appointed dean of the School of Medicine in 1978, a role he occupied for six years before becoming chief of staff at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Salt Lake City. In 1995, Lee retired.
A devoted husband and father, Lee was the son of a big band leader and developed his own skills into becoming a talented jazz pianist. He was Life Master in Bridge, a feat that requires earning 300 or more masterpoints as recorded by the American Bridge Contract League.
Lee loved spending time with his family and is survived by his younger sister, Linda Lee Fox; his two daughters, Jennifer Lee Todd and Cynthia Lee McAllister; his grandchildren, Glenn Michael Todd, Matthew Joseph Todd, Sarah Lynn McAllister Kauer, Emily Jane McAllister Brown, Abby Lee McAllister, and Joshua Adam McAllister; and two great grandsons: Oliver James Kauer and Kalvin Samuel Kauer.
“Dr. Lee was the dean for my last two years of medical school. He was highly respected and well-liked by all. I never formally met Dr. Lee, but during my second year of medical school, I was invited to present a research project at the student meetings in Carmel, California. Dean Lee sent me a handwritten personal note congratulating me on what was a very modest recognition. In it he said that such an honor “predicted great things” for my future. As a pretty average student in a class of superstars, I appreciated the unexpected encouragement from the leader of the medical school, and obviously I never forgot it.”
—Dean Wayne Samuelson