Gordon Maxcy, Charter Member 1956

Gordon Maxcy's biographical sketch was provided by Bob Dial

Gordon Maxcy was the second individual Bob solicited to help get SPS started and he complied. Gordon was "Maxcy" to everyone and half the city had no idea what his given name was.

At the old Tri-State Hospital located at the intersection of Greenwood Road and Virginia Avenue in the old Queensboro section, now a Willis-Knighton property, Gordon shot the first live operation from a stepladder in the operating room. He used a 16mm Bell&Howell DL70 camera. When the film was viewed, doctors "went ape". Skipping all the red tape in getting the opportunity, Maxcy made the most of it. His film was so much better for the teaching elements than actually watching from the viewing area hospitals provided for their "in training" purposes.

He then initiated photography with biopsy materials and did "before and after" pictures of unusual medical cases of vastly assorted natures. In short, he led the area and most of the state in establishing photography as a highly viable tool in medical treatment. There's so much more to add but let it suffice to jump ahead to when Gordon headed a major hospital's specialized department with a number of assistants and was given an appreciation banquet by the Shreveport Medical Society when he retired.

On a personal note, Maxcy and I became close friends in my later teens, before he married. We often did special projects, some like making huge mural prints when no one else in town was doing them. City Hall and the Chamber of Commerce used some like wall paper to adorn the walls of their meeting rooms.

We had a habit of making midnight raids on an all-night icecream, malt and coffee shop at Greenwood Rd. and Hearn Ave. that originally had been a Jo-Ann's Ice Cream business. A fellow by the name of Bruce Jones owned it later and kept a Myna Bird that whistled at all the cute girls who came in and said a few "spoken lines" he'd been taught. It wasn't unusual for some of the ladies to turn beet red with blush! Their juke box selections were then installed in the booths, and Maxcy had a thing for a popular ditty then going strong, the main lyrics "...my heart goes where the wild goose goes, mother goose, brother goose, which is best?" It brings back great memories. I wasn't able to attend Maxcy's funeral but that song should have been played very softly, in the background!

Among other things, Maxcy introduced me to the Wabash Sylvania strobe unit. He had the Studio Model. His was the first one I'd seen with enough power to replace common peanut flashbulbs. It was powered by a pair of ER-6-2B wet cell batteries and fired a flash duration of about 1/5000th second. I bought one of my own pretty shortly after seeing his. Gordon took portraits of my then girlfriend, whom I later married, with Gordon taking the wedding pictures. Our close association took a long break when Korea came. Along with a lot of other guys who belonged to the US Marine Reserves I left Shreveport to serve on active duty in August, 1950.

Photo courtesy of Bob Dial

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