WASHINGTON — WASHINGTON - Baltimore neurosurgeon Benjamin S. Carson said he was "humbled" when President Bush draped the nation's highest civilian award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, around his neck yesterday.
But such accolades are routine for the doctor who persevered through a childhood of poverty and urban violence to become the youngest department head at Johns Hopkins Hospital and a benefactor distributing thousands of scholarship dollars each year.
Four months ago, Carson was at the White House to receive a Ford's Theatre Lincoln Medal, awarded to individuals who exemplify the spirit of the 16th president. Last month, Hopkins announced an endowed professorship that will link Carson's name with the university's. "I'm still coming down off of that," he said.
FOR THE RECORD
An article in Friday's editions about Dr. Benjamin S. Carson Sr. receiving a Presidential Medal of Freedom incorrectly credited Dr. Denton Cooley, a previous medal recipient, with performing the world's first heart transplant. The first successful procedure was completed by Dr. Christiaan Barnard of South Africa.
The Sun regrets the error.
There is undeniable cachet, however, in an award created during the administration of President John F. Kennedy to recognize lifetime achievement and distributed sparingly enough that its value persists.
"I was just very grateful that people are starting to recognize some of the work I am trying to do," Carson, 56, said in an interview after the ceremony, referring to his promotion of reading programs and college education for at-risk high school students. He called high school dropout rates an "epidemic" and said, "Sometimes I feel people aren't paying attention."
Born in Detroit to a barely literate mother who married at age 13 and soon left her husband to raise two sons alone, Carson overcame what he has described as a temper problem as a teen and went on to attend Yale University and the University of Michigan medical school. He gained fame as a pediatric neurosurgeon for, among other things, leading the separations of five sets of twins conjoined at the head between 1987 and 2004. He is also skilled in hemispherectomies, a procedure to remove half the brain to prevent seizures.
3,400 scholarships
The Carson Scholars Fund, founded with his wife, Candy, has given more than 3,400 scholarships to high school students over the past 14 years.
Carson's mother, Sonya, was in the audience at the White House ceremony, and Bush singled her out as he summed up the doctor's life to an invited audience of several hundred.
The president praised her doggedness in ensuring that her children took their education seriously.
'Forces of nature'
"Some moms are simply forces of nature who never take no for an answer," Bush said. "I understand," he added, drawing laughter for the allusion to his own mother.
