F. John Lewis

Floyd John Lewis was an American surgeon who performed the first successful open heart operation, closing an atrial septal defect in a 5-year-old girl, on 2 September 1952. For the next 3 years, Lewis and colleagues operated on 60 patients with atrial septal defects using hypothermia and inflow occlusion. He was best friends with C. [Walton Lillehei] and they worked together at the University of Minnesota.
In 1956, Lewis moved on from Minnesota to Northwestern University where he became the first full-time member of the faculty of surgery. At Northwestern, Lewis continued investigating the use of hypothermia in the operating room. Lewis later trained Thomas Starzl, who was completing a fellowship in cardiovascular surgery at Northwestern, and helped him to win a Markle Scholarship.
After being passed up for the Chair of Surgery position, Lewis departed for Santa Barbara in 1976 where he engaged in new careers: writing, hiking and mountain-climbing essays, and publishing a pamphlet entitled Bicycling Santa Barbara. He died on 20 September 1993 in Santa Barbara of sepsis.