Robin Carew Bret Day

Robin Bret Day died suddenly on 16th September while awaiting the London train for his day's work at his Harley Street practice He was born in 1926, son of a distinguished father from Australia who was the personal dentist of HM King Farouk of Egypt and a French mother from Normandy. Although the family home was in France, he shared his early years between Egypt and Normandy.

He was entirely fluent in English and French and, indeed, never completely lost his captivating continental accent. He lived in France during the Second World War and was interned at the age of 16 but conditionally released after a year. When the allied armies began their drive across Northern Europe Robin liased as interpreter and scout with General Patten's armoured divisions.

After a year at the Sorbonne he entered Guy's Dental School where he became an extremely popular and highly successful student, qualifying in 1951. He obtained the FDS in 1954 and returned to Guy's as a medical student in 1955, qualifying MRCS, LRCP in 1958. He completed training appointments at Guy's and the Eastman and in 1964 he was appointed part time consultant at Hillingdon and in 1965 at Guy's. He then built up a flourishing private restorative and oral surgical practice in Harley Street which he maintained until his death. Robin Bret Day's first love was always Guy's, which he served tirelessly. He was an outstanding clinician whose opinion was widely sought. His clinics were always well attended by both undergraduate and post graduate students who greatly appreciated his painstaking and lucid explanations of cases. He served on most of the main hospital and school committees and, unusual for a dentist, found himself often appointed as Chairman, a role for which his patience, wisdom and light sense of humour ideally suited him.

Despite his medical qualification and the trend for oral surgery to move away from dentistry towards medicine, Robin Bret Day remained proud to be a dentist and a member of the dental profession.

He was married to Joan for almost 50 years and to her, their two sons and daughter and three grandchildren, his many friends and colleagues both in the UK and overseas will wish to extend their deepest sympathy.

M.N.N.

E. Desmond Farmer

Desmond Farmer, who died on 7 October 1999, was born in Longton, Staffordshire in 1917. He was educated at Newcastle-under-Lyme High School and Liverpool University. He graduated, with honours, in 1941 and for the rest of the war served as a Surgeon Lieutenant (D) in the Royal Navy. In 1948, he was awarded a Nuffield Fellowship at Queen's College, Cambridge where he researched in pathology and microbiology. He was appointed to the Louis Cohen Chair of Dental Surgery at Liverpool in succession to Professor H.H. Stones in 1957.

Farmer had a distinguished career. In the Dental School, he worked closely with his professorial colleagues Frank (now Sir Frank) Lawton and Ronnie Hartles in the planning of the new Dental School and Hospital that was opened in 1968. He played an important role in the change in direction of undergraduate dental education, from one of technical orientation to one in which students were provided with a superior scientific background as a preparation for their clinical studies. He collaborated with Frank Lawton in the rewriting of Stones' Oral and Dental Diseases which for many years was a standard dental textbook.

In 1967, Farmer was appointed Pro-Vice-Chancellor at the University of Liverpool and in 1977, he became the first dentist to be appointed Dean of the Faculty of Medicine — a post he held until 1982 when he retired from the university. This honour demonstrated the confidence his medical colleagues had in his abilities.

Nationally, Farmer served as president of a number of dental societies and was a prominent member of the Dental Committee of the Medical Defence Union. On the international scene, he was a past chairman of the Commission on Dental Education of the Fédération Dentaire Internationale. He was well known in Europe for his enthusiastic and dedicated work that led to the formation of the Association for Dental Education in Europe. He was its first president and was involved in the promotion of convergence towards acceptably high standards of dental education and training throughout the European Union.

Desmond enjoyed golf, gardening and painting. He was well known for his love of nature and his garden in Heswall gave delight to his wife, Mary, and himself. Desmond was quietly reserved and dignified, but always contributed to the happiness of social occasions. He was a man of compassion and was transparently honest in all he did. He is survived by his loving wife Mary, his children Andrew, Caroline and Annabel and by his six grandchildren.

R.S.