ARTHUR CLEMETT ’46
ARTHUR CLEMETT, who died in November 2003 at the age of 77, had retired in 1995 as chairman of the department of radiology at St. Vincent’s Hospital and Medical Center in Manhattan, as clinical professor of radiology at New York University School of Medicine, and as professor of radiology at New York Medical College, posts he had held for 21, 25, and 15 years, respectively.
Arthur came to Wesleyan in March 1944 in the Navy V-12 program and promptly distinguished himself by winning the Ayres Prize as the freshman with the best first semester record. A member of Eclectic, he later won the Graham Prize in the Natural Sciences and the Rice Prize in Mathematics. He was elected to Phi Beta Kappa in 1945 and graduated with honors.
In 1950 he received his M.D. with honors from the University of Rochester, where he was elected to Alpha Omega Alpha, a national medical honor society. After interning at Yale-New Haven Hospital, Arthur served as a naval medical officer at St. Alban’s Naval Hospital in New York, in Japan and Korea, and at the U.S. Naval Base in Bainbridge, Md. He was honorably discharged in 1956.
Following his residency in radiology at the University of Minnesota Hospitals and a brief period of private practice in Portland, Maine, Dr. Clemett spent the rest of his career in academic medicine. His area of special interest was gastrointestinal radiology; he trained several generations of radiologists at Yale-New Haven and several other hospitals before beginning his 25-year career in New York. He was a visiting professor at more than sixty medical schools and teaching hospitals throughout North America, Europe, and Asia.
Dr. Clemett co-authored Radiology of The Gall Bladder and Bile Ducts in 1977 with Dr. R.N. Berk and contributed 14 chapters to others texts on gastrointestinal radiology. He published more than 40 articles in peer-reviewed journals and completed numerous grant supported research projects. He was a visiting professor at more than 60 medical schools and teaching hospitals throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. He was a Fellow of the American College of Gastroenterology and the American College of Radiology and received numerous physician recognition awards from the American Medical Association. He was a member of Alpha Omega Alpha and was listed in The Best Doctors in the United States in 1981.
An avid off-shore sailor throughout his life, he also enjoyed diving, flying, and traveling. He supported environmental causes.
He is survived by his wife of 15 years, Marianne Clemett-Jaillet; five children from a previous marriage, including John Clemett ’79 M.D., also a radiologist; two sisters; and four grandchildren.
The class joins me in sending sympathy and condolences to Arthur’s family.