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Co-Founders
SUMMARY
H. Meredith Berry and Walter A. Wichern, Jr., as two young surgeons, met
in New York City in 1946 at Roosevelt Hospital.
H. MEREDITH BERRY, M.D.
H. Meredith Berry was born in
Newark, New Jersey on
June 9, 1916. He graduated from
Cornell
Medical
College,
in New York, in 1941. He interned for one year in surgery at the
New York
Hospital.
With the outbreak of
World War I, he quickly volunteered and was given a commission as a
First Lieutenant in the Air Force. While in the military, Dr. Berry went
to South America, Ascension Island, Africa, Morocco, Cairo, India, and
China as a liaison officer for the then secret B-29 bombers. He was the
first Flight Surgeon over the famous “Hump” going through areas where no
other white man had ever been on rescue missions. On one of his trips,
he spent a weekend as a guest of Mao Tse Tung, who was the leader of
Communist China at the time. He also went on to Iwo Jima and was the
flight surgeon for the bomber base there. He watched the first plane
with the atomic bomb land at Iwo and then take off to drop its bomb. He
also watched the second plane go overhead carrying the atomic bomb. Dr.
Berry later received three service ribbons, the Bronze Star for rescue
work in China, the Air Medal for missions accomplished (13 combat
missions), and the Soldier’s Medal for attempting to rescue some men
from a burning plane.
When he was discharged
from the Service as a Major, Flight Surgeon, his medical education
continued at the Roosevelt Hospital in New York where he completed his residency in surgery in 1948. Dr.
Berry
later moved from New York to the Lahey Clinic in Boston, MA where he
first met Dr. Samuel Goddard, and through his influence came to the
Goddard Hospital in Brockton, MA.
Dr. Berry joined the
Goddard Hospital’s staff in 1949. During his career, he served three
terms as trustee and was elected vice president of the medical staff. He
served as Chief of Surgery from 1960 until the time of his death in
1979. In addition, he was a founder of Goddard Medical Associates in
Brockton, MA.
Outside of his
profession as a physician, Dr. Berry was a member of the Big Brother
movement and became interested in participating in the program by the
example of his parents and teachers who would bring boys having
difficulties with their studies or schoolmates home to the family dinner
table.
Dr. Berry was also a
co-founder and president of the Berwick Boys Foundation. The foundation
was instituted for the selection, guidance and encouragement of boys in
need of assistance in furthering their education. Dr. Berry was totally
dedicated to the Berwick Boys Foundation headquartered in West
Bridgewater, MA, and Camp Berwick located on Dyer Island, two miles off
the coast of Milbridge, Maine. The Berwick name is derived from a fusion
of the names of the co-founders, Drs. Berry and Wichern.
H. Meredith Berry was
many things to many people, but the following statement from a former
acquaintance says it best: “Dr. Berry lived at least three lives – to his patients,
medical colleagues, doctors, nurses, hospital and clinic personnel -
he was Dr. Berry, the brilliant surgeon, the compassionate
healer, the great comforter…..in his second life the boys in the Berwick
program knew him as ‘Doc’ – the wise counselor, the inspiring leader,
the pal of hundreds of boys over thirty years. A second father to all of
the boys – the only father to many…..in his third life, he was Meredith
– the friend – a friend in the truest sense of the word. Not in just a
small circle of picked and favored acquaintances, but a broad number of
people upon whom he focused. Everyone felt that he was his special
friend and everyone was his special friend indeed.”
Dr. Berry passed
away on July 27, 1979 and is buried in the foundation of the Memorial
Building at Camp Berwick on Dyer Island.
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