Remembering Dr. Lowell Weil, Sr.

Podiatric medicine lost one of its true founding fathers with the passing of Dr. Lowell Weil Sr. If there is a Mount Rushmore of this profession, his face belongs on it, carved alongside the very few who didn't just practice this specialty but built it from the ground up. As past president of the American Board of Podiatric Surgery and past president of the American College of Foot and Ankle Surgeons, and as founder of the Weil Foot & Ankle Institute, his fingerprints are on nearly every advance our field has seen—all while he found time to serve as team podiatrist for the Chicago Bears.

But what made him extraordinary was never the résumé. It was the man behind it. I still remember, early in my career, running my first seminar while working at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation. I had put together what I thought was an ambitious curriculum with a strong slate of speakers—and somehow, word reached Dr. Weil. He couldn't attend, but he took the time to personally write me a note, cheering me on and complimenting the program I'd built. He owed me nothing. He barely knew me. And yet that was exactly the kind of mensch he was—a man secure enough in his own towering legacy to spend a few generous minutes lifting up someone just starting out.

That generosity was no exception; it was the rule. He was my very first guest on Meet the Masters nearly two decades ago, and he treated that early, modest show with the same warmth and respect he'd have given the largest stage in the profession. No ego. No airs. Just a leader, a gentleman, and an educator who made you feel like your work mattered.

His legacy now walks forward through his son, who isn't merely following in his footsteps but catapulting past them—carrying that same excellence, and that same generosity of spirit, into the next generation. 

I feel lucky—truly lucky—to have known him. My life, and this profession, are better for it. Rest well, Dr. Weil. Giants like you don't really leave; they just become the ground the rest of us stand on.

—Bret M. Ribotsky, DPM