September 20, 2001-- Paul Wesley Ambrose, MD, a 1995 graduate of the School of Medicine at Marshall University, will be remembered in a memorial service at 2 p.m. Sunday at the Joan C. Edwards Performing Arts Center, President Dr. Dan Angel announced today.
Ambrose was a passenger on American Airlines Flight 77 that crashed into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, after being hijacked by terrorists. Everyone aboard the plane, bound from Washington to Los Angeles, was killed. Ambrose was 32.
"Dr. Ambrose loved Marshall and he loved the state of West Virginia," Angel said. "We're very proud of his accomplishments and his desire to help people. He was an outstanding representative of Marshall University, one who was taken from us far too early. Our hearts go out to his family and many, many friends."
Ambrose, a 1987 graduate of Barboursville High School, was the son of Dr. and Mrs. Kenneth Paul Ambrose of Huntington. His father is chairman of the sociology/anthropology department at Marshall, and his mother is director of nursing at St. Mary's Hospital in Huntington.
Ambrose earned a B.S. degree in Zoology and Spanish Language and Literature from Marshall in 1991, graduating magna cum laude; his MD from the Marshall School of Medicine in 1995, and his MPH from Harvard University in 2000. He also studied for a year at the University of Salamanca Medical School in Salamanca, Spain, and spent three years as a resident at Dartmouth College.
Ambrose was senior clinical advisor with the office of the surgeon general in Washington, D.C., at the time of his death. Last year, he was named the Luther Terry Fellow of the Association of Teachers of Preventative Medicine.
The memorial service will include a 10- to 12-minute video, produced by MotionMasters, that celebrates Ambrose's life. Broadway star and Huntington native Mark McVey will sing at the event. Other special guests, including representatives from the surgeon general's office and the Koop Institute, have been invited.
Two years ago, Ambrose was instrumental in bringing former U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop to Huntington to discuss obesity and health concerns facing Americans. Koop visited Marshall and St. Mary's Hospital at that time.
Dr. Robert Walker, Associate Dean for Clinical Affairs and professor and Chairman of Community Health at Marshall, remembers Ambrose as "a joy to be around." Ambrose not only was a former student of Walker's, but his former neighbor on Gideon Road.
Ambrose has been described by his parents as a person who "loved life and loved his friends." He also, Walker said, loved his work.
"He was so excited about what he was doing, so much in love with what he was doing," Walker said. "There are very few people in this world that I can think of whose talents and gifts seem almost irreplaceable. He is pretty close to that."
Dr. Patrick Brown, associate dean for student affairs at the Marshall School of Medicine, had known Ambrose since Ambrose's sophomore year at Marshall. He said Ambrose had a passion for the social side of medicine.
"Above all he was a humanitarian," Brown said. "That is what made him such an outstanding physician. He could identify with the common man or woman as he could with those in the upper socioeconomic levels. He understood people and had a magnetic personality and people were drawn to him."
A scholarship is being established in Ambrose's memory by the School of Medicine, according to Linda Holmes, director of development and alumni affairs with the School of Medicine.
Holmes said the medical school is accepting gifts for the scholarship. They should be sent to Holmes' attention at the medical school at 1600 Medical Center Dr., Huntington, WV, 25701. Checks should be made out to the Marshall University Foundation, and earmarked for the School of Medicine in memory of Dr. Paul Ambrose.
In addition to his parents, Ambrose is survived by his grandmother, Dorothy M. Norwood of Huntington; fiancée, Bianca Angelino of Washington, D.C., and nieces Alexandria Kyle Ambrose and Britany Miller. Ambrose was preceded in death by his brother, Kenneth Scott Ambrose, in 1998.