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Phillips receives E.R. Frank
Award from K-State College of Veterinary Medicine
Source: Cheri Ubel, 785-532-4043,
ubel@vet.k-state.edu
News release prepared by: Joe Montgomery, 785-532-4193,
jmontgom@vet.k-state.edu
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Dr. Robert M. Phillips, retired, has been selected as the 2007
recipient of the E.R. Frank Award by K-State’s College of Veterinary
Medicine and its Veterinary Medical Alumni Association. This award
will be presented at the 69th Annual Conference for Veterinarians on
June 4.
The E.R. Frank Award is given to a faculty member who displays the
same professional essence as Dr. Frank, a longtime faculty member in
equine surgery and K-State alumnus. Nominees must have at least a
15-year relationship with the college, possess a noteworthy record
of service and display an unassuming and unpretentious manner
throughout their careers.
“I was fortunate to study surgery from Dr. Frank,” Phillips said.
“Dr. Frank wrote the textbook used in class; it was used in other
universities in the United States. It is an honor to receive this
award in memory of a distinguished and respected faculty member like
Dr. Frank.”
Phillips was born in 1924 in Saskatchewan, Canada. When his father
suffered a work accident, the family moved home to Elk County, Kan.
After a few years, they moved to Wichita, where Phillips graduated
from East High School in 1942. He worked in the defense plants and
attended Wichita’s Friends University before enlisting in the Army.
After serving in World War II as an air corps mechanic and assistant
crew chief, Phillips returned from Europe and earned a doctor of
veterinary medicine degree from K-State
in 1951.
Phillips along with classmate Dr. Gene Porter purchased a mixed
practice in Fergus Falls, Minn. Phillips then moved to Oberlin,
Kan., in 1953 where he ran a mostly large animal practice until
1969.
Because of the advances in the veterinary field, Phillips decided to
enter graduate school. He earned a doctorate in medical microbiology
at the University of Georgia, Athens, in 1972. He then took a
position at Jensen-Salsbery Laboratories, Kansas City, Kan., where
he developed a trivalent equine encephalomyelitis vaccine and
supervised many vaccine testing procedures.
In 1975, Phillips accepted a virology position at the diagnostic lab
at K-State’s College of Veterinary Medicine. Phillips, with
cooperation from Dr. Harish Minocha in veterinary medicine and Dr.
Richard Consigli in the Department of Biology, established a
functional virus diagnostic lab. Over the years, many new diagnostic
tests and virus-isolation procedures were developed and new
equipment was installed.
Phillips retired in August 1994 and became a very active professor
emeritus. In January 2000, Dr. Deborah Briggs, director of the
rabies lab, left on sabbatical and eventually quit, leaving a
difficult vacancy to fill. At risk of closing, Phillips was prompted
out of retirement to reassume directorship of the lab based on his
expertise in rabies diagnostics. A one-year commitment stretched to
2 1/2 years before his replacement was appointed and trained.
“I enjoyed that group in the rabies lab,” Phillips said. “I was
supposed to be the director, but they did all the work. They knew
what to do and how to do it. I felt fortunate to be there and
enjoyed my whole time.”
Phillips published numerous articles on microbiology and served on
or chaired several committees on large animal diseases. He received
the SmithKline Beecham Award for Research Excellence in 1999 and the
prestigious E. Walter Morrison Award from the
K-State Student Foundation in 2002.
Robert and wife, Opal, raised four children, Thomas, Jeffrey, Mary
and Paul. The couple has six grandchildren.
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