In Memoriam: Dr. Julius H. Jacobson II, Pioneering Vascular Surgeon and Philanthropist

by Michael L. Marin, MD, FACS

On December 4, 2022, Julius H. Jacobson II, MD, FACS, passed away at the age of 95.

Professor Julius (Jack) H. Jacobson II loved Cuban cigars. Like most cigar smokers, he invariably derived some simple pleasure from the use of tobacco; but for Jack it was more. The precision by which the cigar was made. The exactness of the cigar’s hand-rolled fabrication. Each cigar, permissive of just the correct amount of air passing through the tobacco leaves. And so it was with Julius H. Jacobson II, always thinking, always observing, always analyzing, and forever creating. 

Born in Toledo, OH, Jack moved to Manhattan at 8 years old and entered the New York City public school system. Graduating high school at 15, he had the credentials but not the finances to access an Ivy League education, so off he went to The University of Toledo, where he worked his way through college as an amateur photographer. 

He enlisted and served in the US Navy during World War II. After the War, Jack completed his medical degree at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, MD, and then went to NewYork-Presbyterian Medical Center (Columbia University campus) for general surgery training. It was at Columbia that Jack evolved his interests in vascular surgery, working on the service of Arthur H. Blakemore, MD. Jack marveled at the experiments searching for a durable treatment for aortic aneurysms and gravitated toward the investigative process. 

He joined the staff at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital for 2 years before being recruited to the University of Vermont College of Medicine in Burlington as director of surgical research. It was in Vermont where his research creativity expanded. Approaching a number of experiments requiring anastomosing exceedingly small blood vessels, Dr. Jacobson conceived and developed the two-headed operating room microscope (diploscope), ushering in the field of microvascular surgery and garnering him the title of “the father of microvascular surgery.” His first prototype sits at the National Museum of American History within the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC. 

Everything interested Jack. He created many inventions from specialized microsurgical instruments, to the first combined walker and sitting stool to assist patients in rehabilitation, to a simple device to hold one’s necktie in place so it did not “dangle on a patient’s bed during a physical exam.” His nonmedical interests were equally broad, from his exquisite personal collection of modern art to his writing of an in-depth volume on classical music for all to appreciate. 

As generous as he was with his knowledge and wonderfully animated stories, he also shared his wealth with many important endeavors: endowed professorships at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City, Johns Hopkins, Hebrew University Hadassah Medical School in Jerusalem, Israel, University of Toledo, and the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, MA; the Jacobson Promising Investigator and Jacobson Innovation Awards, granted annually by the ACS; and the Jacobson Complex Aortic Disease Center at Mount Sinai, founded in 2016.

Jack moved back to New York City in 1962 to practice vascular surgery and remained on staff at Mount Sinai Hospital for 54 years. He was an exceptional man who led an extraordinary life. We miss you, Dr. Jacobson, cigars and all!

Dr. Michael Marin is The Julius H. Jacobson II, MD, Professor of Vascular Surgery and chair of the Department of Surgery at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, as well as surgeon-in-chief at the Mount Sinai Health System in New York.