Dr. Vivien Theodore Thomas (From The Alan Mason Chesney Medical Archives of The Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions; photo subject to copyright restrictions)
Dr. Vivien Theodore Thomas dropped out of college after losing most of his savings during the Great Depression.
Later trained as a surgical assistant, Thomas in 1944 helped devise the “blue baby surgery” with surgeon Dr. Alfred Blalock and pediatric cardiologist Dr. Helen Taussig at The Johns Hopkins Hospital to correct a congenital heart defect known as tetralogy of Fallot. He was the subject of the 2004 HBO film “Something the Lord Made.”
The native of Louisiana died in 1985. He was 75.