During the Council meeting on June 6, the Society's Charter gold medal for 2000 was presented to Professor Alexander Florence (dean of the School of Pharmacy, University of London), who had been unable to attend the annual general meeting (PJ, May 20, p754) to receive his medal.
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The President presents Professor Florence with his Charter gold medal |
Professor Florence had been elected a fellow of the Society in 1987 and had been awarded a CBE in 1994.
Professor FLORENCE, in response, thanked the President for the honour and the magnificent medal. The award had come as a great and pleasant surprise. He was sorry that he had not been able to be present at the normal venue to receive the award.
Even after the passage of time, reflecting on the award, he was still not sure that he had done enough to deserve it. although his colleagues at Strathclyde and London had done enough.
It was specially pleasing that the award was from the Society, which had been in his blood for a long time. The Pharmaceutical Journal had been entering the Florence household since at least about 1935. That was slightly before his time but he thought he had absorbed some of the content prenatally. He had not learnt to read through The Journal, but it had always been present and had been read at the breakfast table.
Professor Florence felt he had been very lucky in his career and with his colleagues and even with his adversaries. Adversaries sometimes spurred one on to better goals. Some adversaries were imagined, and he wondered whether pharmacy sometimes imagined its adversaries.
Pharmacy had given him the opportunity to be involved in many interesting things, such as the CSM, the Nuffield inquiry and the long fight for the four-year degree, which was a struggle at times with the merry-go-round of the Department of Health and other bodies that disclaimed any knowledge of the process.
The pharmacy degree then and now was one of the best undergraduate degrees available. Professor Florence said his research had kept him sane. Research of whatever kind was the bedrock of a profession.
There were individuals to whom Professor Florence was greatly indebted. The late Professor Peter Elworthy, who had been his PhD supervisor and mentor, had taught him how things could and should be done. And Professor John Stenlake very early on had given him opportunities in the University of Strathclyde.
There were still things to do, Professor Florence said. As a practitioner who happened to work in academia, he hoped to witness the profession going from strength to strength. If they worked together, whatever part of the profession they were in, he was sure they would succeed. He thanked the President and members of Council most sincerely.