Dr. John D. Singer correspondence

John David Singer was born on 25 December 1904, near Mogilev, in the Russian Empire. When he was around 7 or 8 years old, he immigrated to the United States with his mother, and they settled in Chicago. They lived on the northwest side of Chicago, where he attended Tooley High School. He obtained a degree as a doctor of medicine (MD) from the University of Illinois in 1931, and after that, both had a general medical practice in Chicago, where he focused on internal medicine, and he served as a lecturer in the medical school at the University of Illinois from 1939 to 1942. In 1935, he married Genise Adler, and the Singers had three children: Loren, Susan, and Deborah. During World War II, he volunteered to serve in the medical corps of the United States Army, entering service in November 1942. He was assigned to the Third Army, 773rd Tank Battalion, in the European Theatre, initially as a surgeon at the rank of captain, and subsequently as commanding medical officer in that battalion, at the rank of major. He saw action with the 773rd in France and Germany, including heavy fighting in the region of the Moselle and Saar Rivers, where he participated in the capture of a German fort and administered a hospital that treated wounded German prisoners-of-war. In April 1945, he was present at the liberation of the Buchenwald concentration camp, and supervised the treatment of liberated prisoners and displaced persons. He was honorably discharged from active service in November 1945, and was honored by the French government with a Croix de Guerre for his service with the 773rd in 1946. Returning to Chicago, he resumed his medical practice, working at Edgewater Hospital, where he practiced medicine for close to fifty years, including several years as chief of staff.