Anastasios Dontas
Year: May 26th, 2002
Location: Bilthoven, Netherlands
Interviewed by: Blackburn, Henry
Abstract
This is a short breakfast interview taken when Dr. Dontas was attending the Seven Countries Study reunion in Zutphen and already in declining health but bright as ever and sweet in character. It describes well Dontas’s early career and conversion to field studies and his meeting Ancel Keys in Chicago and it contains details of the pilot survey in Crete in fall 1957. (Henry Blackburn)
Quotes
I was quite impressed by a half hour discussion with him [Dr. William Bean in Iowa]. But most of all, his appearance reminded me of Diogenes, the Socratic contemporary who used to give famous anecdotes. For example, when Alexander the Great came to see him and discuss with him, he said, ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ Alexander replied: ‘I’m the owner of one third of the earth. Please get out of my shade.’ (pg. 4)
Why Crete?
[An Athens colleague from Crete said:]’You should come and visit our area in Kastelli. There are two Kastellis. One is near Iraklion and the other one is all the way west where the Archbishop of Crete has his theological school. So the first one is the more known area, I can assure you they have no heart disease at all. So what you should do is go there and have a look at the situation.’
The local doctors [in Crete] were completely, ….. how do you say, out of the blue sky? They couldn’t realize what we were doing, why we were studying a disease in an area that had no such disease. (pg. 12)
Full Transcript Access
Full transcripts of interviews may be made available to those engaged with original materials for scholarly studies by contacting us.