Grant Taylor Lectureship

The Grant Taylor Lectureship was established by John P. McGovern, MD, in honor of his longtime friend and colleague, H. Grant Taylor, MD.

McGovern explained,

The annual Grant Taylor Lectureship was created to honor a superlative physician-teacher, noble human being, warm and steadfast friend, who in his calm and unpretentious manner consistently—by precept and deed with his patients, students, and colleagues—has fostered the inspiring twin ideals that the best of the art and science of medicine be leavened always with a pervasive and unfettered humanism; and secondly, while doing so, to help nourish and perpetuate that sense of unity concord created through cooperative attitudes and mutual endeavors between disparate units of our Texas Medical Center and all our medical community.

Taylor was a native of Canada who earned his AB in education and PhD in psychology from Stanford University. He earned his MD from Duke University School of Medicine, where he eventually served as Associate Dean. Later in his career, Taylor was Chief of Pediatrics at UT MD Anderson Hospital and Tumor Institute, Dean of the UT Postgraduate School of Medicine in Houston, and Professor Emeritus of Continuing Education at UTHealth Houston. Taylor passed away in 1995.

Each year the Grant Taylor Lectureship supports a distinguished speaker or event at UTHealth Houston. This year’s event was the Festschrift Conference in Honor of Thomas R. Cole, PhD. From April 12-14, 2023, a dozen local, national, and international scholars gave papers touching on key areas of Cole’s academic contributions, such as aging, life stories, racism, medical humanities, health humanities films and documentaries, literature, and more. Cole was recruited in 2005 as founding director of the McGovern Center for Humanities in Ethics, then known as the Health and Human Spirit Program.