Over the course of his 44-year relationship with the medical school, Miller School Dean Emeritus John G. Clarkson, M.D. ’68, has variously been described as “low-key,” “humble,” and “even-keeled.”

All those attributes were on display during Clarkson’s induction into the Medical Alumni Hall of Fame. Dean from 1995 to 2006, his standing among the Miller School’s most illustrious graduates was acknowledged during an awards banquet that was part of Medical Alumni Weekend 2008, held in March.

“This is a personal honor, and I understand that,” observed Clarkson, who still hasn’t viewed his portrait hanging in the Louis Calder Memorial Library. “But to some degree, I’m embarrassed by it. Because it focuses on me! And that detracts from the fact that whatever I’ve accomplished, it happened because I was working with a group of people that were willing to roll up their sleeves and get things done.”

To hear Clarkson tell it, his Miller School successes—which include his service as Bascom Palmer Eye Institute director and Department of Ophthalmology chair—can all be ascribed to being in the right place at the right time.

“Because we were a relatively young school, there were more opportunities here than there might have been at a school that was more staid and more steeped in tradition,” Clarkson said on a breezy Biltmore hotel terrace just prior to his induction.

His wife and the mother of their two grown children, Diana Clarkson, had a different explanation for her spouse’s achievements. “He works very hard,” she said, noting that she came to appreciate her husband’s calm, unflappable nature while he was attending medical school.

“I can remember some of the other women married to medical students complaining that their spouses were stressed out, were staying up all night, and were always in a bad mood,” she added. “John was never like that. I always say it’s because he was the middle of six children.”

Originally from Pennsylvania, raised in West Palm Beach, and possessing a B.A. degree from Princeton University, these days Clarkson is the executive director of the American Board of Ophthalmology and still sees Bascom Palmer patients every month.

“John is a spectacular individual who’s also extremely humble,” noted Pascal J. Goldschmidt, M.D., senior vice president for medical affairs and dean, at the Medical Alumni Hall of Fame ceremony.

Anyone who has encountered John G. Clarkson during his more than four decades with the Miller School would be inclined to agree.