Journal of the American College of Nutrition, Vol. 24, No. 5, 305-309 (2005)
Published by the American College of Nutrition
In Memoriam Mildred Seelig, M.D., MPH, MACN (1920-2005)
Kay B. Franz, PhD
Department of Nutrition, Dietetics, and Food Science
Brigham Young University
Provo, Utah
E-mail: kay_franz{at}byu.edu
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EARLY YEARS
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Mildred Sylvia Seelig was born in New York City August 20, 1920 to Boris and Clara Glassman. Her parents were from the Ukraine. Her father had immigrated to New York prior to World War I, while her mother’s family had immigrated to England. Her parents were first cousins. After the war, her parents were married and began life together in the United States. Mildred was their only child and grew up in and around New York City.
Mildred started school in Brooklyn, New York and graduated from Larchmont High School in Westchester County, New York, where her father, a watchmaker, had his own jewelry store. Then Mildred entered Hunter College in New York City. She married Alexander Seelig when she was 19 years old. Alex was nine years older than Mildred and had graduated from City College in New York City and then Columbia University, where he completed his degree in dentistry. Mildred continued in Hunter College.
As the war years of the 1940’s occurred, Alex became a dentist in the army and Mildred graduated from Hunter College in 1942 with a pre-medical major and a minor in chemistry. Mildred wanted to be a laboratory technician, but Alex encouraged Mildred to go to medical school. Alex stated, [Mildred was a genius and no one knew it, so while I was away in the war, I sent her to medical school.] Mildred entered New York Medical College in 1942, graduated in 1945, and was a rotating intern at the Orange County Hospital, California from 1945–46. Then she returned to New York to be with her husband. Next she was a Health Officer-in-Training with the New York City Department of Health from 1948–50 and received her MPH from the Columbia University School of Public Health in 1950. Alex Seelig had a private practice in dentistry and became a Professor of Oral Histology at the New Jersey College of Medicine and Dentistry.
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LEDERLE, SQUIBB, BRISTOL AND ACADEMIA
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Mildred cared for her young children, Beth and Charles (Chuck), and as they became older, she began to work with pharmaceutical companies. She began work with Lederle Laboratories in 1951 and progressed to Director of Medical Literature (1957–1960). During these years she wrote articles for the Lederle Bulletin, researched and wrote summaries of information for investigators on new products, wrote information reports on drugs, nutrients (amino acids and vitamins), and while Director, she established and supervised the department for the preparation of summaries of information on new products that would be used for FDA submissions.
In 1960, Mildred moved to the Squibb Institute for Medical Research, where she became the Associate Director. She established the Clinical Pharmacology Department and supervised it for the development of clinical applications of new products. She investigated Candida infections and antibiotics, and also D-penicillamine. Next, she became the Associate Director of Scientific Information. Here she continued with her previous work, but now she prepared reports for submission to the FDA. Her next promotion made her Director of Medical Affairs in the International Division.
In 1967, Mildred left Squibb and moved to Bristol Laboratories, International, with the vice president from Squibb. Here she became Director of Medical Services. She turned down an offer to be Vice President of the International Division of Bristol Laboratories because she didn’t want to be away so much from her family. She would have been the first female vice president of a pharmaceutical company in the United States if she had said yes. In 1970, Mildred moved from Bristol Laboratories to Schering Laboratories. Here she was Director of Medical Affairs. She wrote analytical reports on new drugs, and also on molybdenum, iron and copper. She stayed at Schering Laboratories until she moved to academia in 1973.
Mildred was an adjunct Assistant Professor with the Pharmacology Department of the New York Medical College from 1964–1971 and Adjunct Associate Professor from 1971 to 1977. She was an Attending Physician in Nutrition and Metabolism at Goldwater Memorial Hospital, New York University Medical Center from 1971 to 1983, and Associate Professor in Clinical Medicine at the same place from 1979 to 1984. From 1985 to 1992, Dr. Seelig was an Adjunct Professor in Preventive and Community Medicine with the New York Medical College. Then Mildred was an Adjunct Professor in the Nutrition Department at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, School of Public Health, from 1992 until her passing in 2005.
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THE AMERICAN COLLEGE OF NUTRITION
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While living in New York, Mildred became a member of the American College of Nutrition, which had been established in 1959. She was a member of the Board of Directors from 1974 to 1978, then Vice President from 1978–1980, and President from 1980 to 1982. At this time, the College was still small and most members were in and around New York City. In 1982, Mildred became the first Executive Director of the American College of Nutrition, a position she held for 12 years, until 1994. Under Mildred’s direction, the College grew in numbers and members now came from all over the United States and many other countries.
In 1982, Mildred began the Journal of the American College of Nutrition and was the Editor-in-Chief for the next 12 years. A Festschrift in honor of Mildred Seelig was published in October, 1994 in the Journal she had edited. After her husband, Alex, passed in 1990, she created the Alexander Seelig Fund at the American College of Nutrition in his honor. In 1993, the Board of Directors created the Master of the American College of Nutrition and made the first award to Mildred Seelig in honor of her devoted service to the organization. Later, in 2000, the Seelig Fund was used to fund a Seelig Magnesium Award lecture. Mildred received the first award and gave a lecture on Magnesium Deficiency: Dietary Practices that Intensify the Problem. After Mildred’s passing, the Alexander Seelig Fund became the Alexander and Mildred Seelig Fund.
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MAGNESIUM
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It was during her years working with pharmaceutical companies that Mildred became interested in magnesium, and subsequently made it one of her primary interests. Her interest in this element was piqued because of the many pathways and reactions where magnesium was an important cofactor.
Dr. Seelig published her first paper on magnesium in 1964 in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition [1] while she was working at the Squibb Institute for Medical Research. In this 49 page paper, she reviewed the available literature and determined that 6 mg of magnesium per kilogram of body weight was the requirement of magnesium for the normal adult. As the years passed, she continued to evaluate literature relating to magnesium intake and its requirements. She never changed her mind about this level of magnesium being the requirement for the normal adult. Mildred believed that inadequate magnesium intake was a contributor to hypertension and heart disease and that the roots of these diseases may be started early, even in utero.
Mildred was involved with the planning of the 1st International Magnesium Symposium in Vittel, France (1971), and subsequent Symposiums in Montreal, Canada (1976), Baden Baden, Germany (1981), and Blacksburg, Virginia (1985). Mildred also spoke at the 8th, 9th, and 10th International Magnesium Symposiums which were held in 1997 in Crete, Greece; 2000 in Vichey, France, and 2003 in Cairns, Australia, respectively.
Dr. Seelig worked with Dr. Ron Elin in organizing the first Gordon Research Conference on Magnesium in Biochemical Processes & Medicine. Dr. Elin chaired this first Gordon Research Conference on magnesium in 1978 and Mildred was the vice chairman. Mildred chaired the second Gordon Research Conference on magnesium in 1979. During the following years she attended each of these magnesium conferences, except during the years when her husband was in declining health. She had organized a session for this magnesium conference in 2005, but passed three weeks before it occurred. With some slight adjustments, her session was given as she had planned.
Magnesium took Mildred around the world. She gave lectures at meetings in France, Canada, England, Scotland, Finland, Italy, Germany, Portugal, Hungary, Sweden, Austria, Romania, Greece, Australia, Taiwan, Thailand, and India. Most of these were invited lectures.
Dr. Seelig had 80 papers published in peer-reviewed journals. From her work with the pharmaceutical companies, she had become an expert at writing literature reviews. Most of her papers were literature reviews. From her knowledge of the magnesium literature, she not only wrote her review papers, but she also approached appropriate research groups and encouraged them to carry out specific projects, or research groups would have her be a consultant. From her work at Goldwater Hospital, she reported clinical cases.
In addition to her papers, Mildred edited or co-edited four books [2–5]. The first book she edited [2] was the Proceedings of the 16th Annual Meeting of the American College of Nutrition. Two of these books were the Proceedings of the second [4] and fourth [5] International Symposiums on Magnesium. Mildred authored the book, Magnesium Deficiency in the Pathogenesis of Disease: Early Roots of Cardiovascular, Skeletal and Renal Abnormalities, which was published in 1980 [6]. Her last book, which was co-authored with Dr. Andrea Rosanoff, was The Magnesium Factor: Prevention, Treatment and Reversal of Cardiovascular Disease [7]. This was written for the general public and was published in 2003.
Mildred was well known in the magnesium field for her extensive collection of papers and books that were all indexed and numbered. She had over 15,000 papers in her files. Researchers from all over the world would get in touch with her to find the reference to the paper they had misplaced, or her references for a particular topic, or to find out who was working on a particular topic with magnesium that they could contact. Now, Kay Franz has these books and files.
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PERSONAL
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Mildred passed on January 14, 2005 in Atlanta, Georgia from a heart attack following heart surgery on January 10, 2005. She was 84 years old. Mildred had returned from a trip to Taiwan, Thailand, and India in the middle of December. She was very tired from this trip and developed a heart problem on January 7th that resulted in heart surgery and her passing.
Mildred is survived by her two children, their spouses, and six grandchildren. Her beloved Alex, her children, and grandchildren were the joys of her life. She enjoyed being a mother. Both of her children are physicians and are married to physicians. One granddaughter is currently in medical school.
Mildred was a [people person.] She reached out to people and people were attracted to her. While she was the editor of the Journal of the American College of Nutrition, she would get in touch with the authors of the papers that were submitted. She assisted many authors, who had other languages as their first language, to write their papers in English. At meetings, she reached out to the new generations of researchers and encouraged them in their work. She always had kind and supporting words for family, friends, colleagues, and acquaintances. Mildred reached out to nearly everyone with whom she came in contact and took many of these people [under her wing] when difficulties occurred to them. People responded back to her in the same way.
Dr. Seelig was a brilliant, unique, and caring individual. Her contributions to the American College of Nutrition and its journal provided the foundation for the College that exists today. The legacy she provided to the field of magnesium and its researchers will long be remembered.
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Mildred Seelig is with her husband, Alex, and her son’s family. These are three of her son’s four children. The picture was taken about 1990.
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REFERENCES
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- Seelig MS: The requirement of magnesium by the normal adult. Am J Clin Nutr14
:342
–390,1964
.[Abstract]
- Seelig MS (ed): [Nutritional Imbalances in Infant and Adult Disease: Mineral, Vitamin D and Cholesterol.] New York: SP Medical & Scientific,1977
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- VanEys J, Seelig MS, Nichols BL (eds): [Nutrition and Cancer.] New York: SP Medical & Scientific,1979
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- Cantin M, Seelig MS (eds): [Magnesium in Health and Disease.] New York: SP Medical & Scientific,1980
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- Altura BM, Durlach J, Seelig MS (eds): [Magnesium in Cellular Processes and Medicine] New York: Karger,1987
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- Seelig MS: [Magnesium Deficiency in the Pathogenesis of Disease: Early Roots of Cardiovascular, Skeletal, and Renal Abnormalities.] New York: Plunum Medical,1980
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- Seelig MS, Rosanoff A: [The Magnesium Factor: Prevention, Treatment and Reversal of Cardiovascular Disease.] New York: Avery,2003
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EARLY YEARS
LEDERLE, SQUIBB, BRISTOL AND...
