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TigerNet Alumni Directory |
Bruce E. Furie (1944-2025)
The class learned of Bruce's death on December 3 when David Williams received this message from Bruce's wife, Barbara:
"I know that to reach the Boston PU66 group my son Gregg let you know that Bruce’s health had worsened significantly. Sadly I am writing to tell you that Bruce passed away on November 22nd. We are grateful that with the help of the exceptional and compassionate staff at the hospital that was his professional home for so long we were able to respect Bruce's wishes - to be comfortable at the end of life, to find peace, and die with dignity. "Discovering the Boston PU66 group was a gratifying aspect of Bruce’s post retirement period. He continually marveled at the good fortune of forming new friendships with classmates more than 60 years after becoming a Princetonian and relished the lively on-line conversations on all manner of things. He found great satisfaction in working on forming the class medical advisory network and in its success."
Bruce came to Princeton from Milburn, NJ High School with his cousin and life-long friend, Larry Eron, majored in Biology, and joined Dial Lodge. He was in the Princeton Yacht Club, and was also participated with the sailing team, orchestra, and concert band. Roommates included Larry, Chuck Kulczycki, Charlie Martin, Andy Sears, and Stu Steingold.
Bruce and Barbara were probably the first Princeton couple (marriage between students), having married before house parties senior year. Barbara, a graduate student, was Bruce's TA in organic chemistry and had received her Master's degree in 1965. Their marriage was also a productive professional partnership. In response to the class birthday card, Bruce wrote:
"I have attached a photo of our marriage ceremony on 5 May 1966. I took an advanced organic chemistry exam in the morning at Princeton (in that suit!) then Barbara picked me up in her red VW bug and we eloped to Arlington VA and got married. This was a Thursday; we were back for Houseparties Weekend on Saturday to celebrate the first Princeton marriage. We had a “reception” with Princeton friends that evening with a barbeque at Lake Carnegie."
Following graduation, Bruce continued at the University of Pennsylvania Medical School, and Barbara completed her Chemistry doctorate at Penn. Bruce specialized in hematology and oncology, spending time at NIH and continuing his career on the Harvard Medical School faculty. He partnered with Barbara on many research projects. Here is a professional biography from the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center & Harvard Medical School. This Harvard Catalyst Profiles entry shows the scope of Bruce's research projects and publications. This 2009 interview with HemOnc Today provides a summary of Bruce's work, his awards, Christian B. Anfinsen, his Nobel Prize winning mentor, and his outside interests in sailing and woodworking. See classmate tributes below from Ken Krosin and Steve Gaal discuss Bruce's sailing and woodworking, and the Tiger Tale, Columbus Didn't Have a Radio Either, narrates a sailing adventure with Anfinsen.
The International Society of Thrombosis and Haemostasis published this obituary describing Bruce's profound and far-reaching impact as a physician, scientist, and mentor. Hemostasis Today adds this tribute.
Bruce and Barbara have two children, both Princetonians. Gregg '95 is a physician, and Eric '97 works in computer animation. Bruce, along with Barbara, were awarded the second '66 Locomotive Award on June 3, 2017. The citation reads: Bruce Furie and his wife, Barbara, a PhD, have been working in the Boston area for 40 years. They have a world respected laboratory focused upon hemostasis, the division of hematology which looks at "clots"...how and why they form in natural and disease states. Their laboratory and research work has been noted by international hematology academies with multiple honors. Their work evaluates the anatomy, biochemistry and kinetics of clotting.
Both Bruce and Barbara are on the Harvard medical staff, and at Deaconess Medical center where they do research, teach and are involved in patient care. During their careers they have worked with over 100 doctoral or post-doctoral students.
Many pre-med students at Princeton might remember Barbara as a teaching assistant to Dr. Wallis, the feared and respected professor of organic chemistry.
Class President Kit Mill presenting the second '66 Locomotive Award at the 51st Reunion dinner at Terhune Orchards
Along with Bill Leahy, Bruce conceived of and drove the development of the class Healthy Aging Committee and the Physicians Network which has been and continues to be of great service to numerous classmates. Nassau Herald
Memories and Tributes
Bill Leahy: The Class of '66 has lost one of the best. A brilliant, compassionate researcher and clinician who was dedicated to integrity and innovation in the field of hematology and oncology. His wife, Barbara has been his soul mate and co-investigator for his life since 1965. Such an extraordinary partnership professionally and personally.
Bruce and I worked on the 66 Ageing Network..it was Bruce's inspiration , and he and I spent many hours designing and expediting his visions...As was typical for Bruce, he was insightful and quiet throughout the process.
His many professional awards and national and international prizes for the research he and Barbara performed were a testimony to his clinical and scientific expertise. One of earliest Locomotive awards was bestowed on Bruce(Barbara). The past years have been most challenging for Bruce, Barbara and his family and his colleagues in the Boston medical field assisted during the journey. He is at peace and has contributed so much to '66 and the world of medicine. I will miss him for his wisdom, insights and pure brilliance.
David Williams (writing to Barbara): It is so sad that Bruce had such difficulty. I had been in touch with him all along so I know what he went through. It was just not fair. But at least he the had the satisfaction of turning 80 along with some of his Princeton pals. Many of Bruce’s classmates and friends wrote very complimentary messages. I hope you were able to send those thoughts in time. Bruce was not only a classmate and a friend, but also an important person to everyone who was lucky enough to know him. I got the benefit of Bruce’s medical expertise as did others. I am amazed that he was able to do so in the face of his illness. All of his ‘66 friends were deeply touched.
Richard (Tiny) Morgan: Bruce was a dear friend, so dear he actually saved my life. I have an incurable blood disease called ITP. While doctors here in Houston scratched their heads, Bruce (from afar) gave them the needed direction. Throughout my treatment and even today Bruce held my hand, my spirits. His generosity (and brilliance) were beyond compare. Barbara, my prayers are with you forever.
Ned Groth: Ned wrote this to Bruce after hearing from Gregg (Bruce's son) that Bruce was in hospice care: "Gregg has shared news of your recent decline with the class. I'm very sad to hear that, but you have borne an incredible load of health burdens for almost forever, with incredible strength and courage. If this is the endgame, you have had an amazing run, and a wonderful life with Barbara in so many ways. I was "in at the beginning" -- I was in that organic chemistry lab when Barbara was our TA, and we were clubmates at Dial when you were dating. What an exceptional couple you are and together you have made the world a much better place. I'm proud to have known you as a classmate and friend. I wish you peace and the blessings of family, if this is the last leg of your journey. (PS, Send the class an email to let us know what's on the other side!)."
Ken Krosin: Bruce, Barbara, Ruth and I were close friends, during our years at Princeton and afterwards. Barbara was a grad student at Princeton and Bruce’s Lab Instructor. Notwithstanding prohibitions on student/faculty relationships, Bruce pursued Barbara with a single-minded purpose until she succumbed to his charms and married him a few days after graduation. Bruce was an entrepreneur, starting “Furie Sailing” as a teenager in Beach Haven NJ with his cousin Larry Eron ’66. By the time we graduated, he had a substantial fleet of rental boats and a thriving business giving sailing lessons. At the end of senior year, Ruth and I visited Beach Haven to see the operation first-hand. Since neither of us were sailors, Bruce suggested we go “clamming” in Barnegat Bay for “delicious” cherrystones. This entailed walking around in shallow water until stepping on a clam, bending over with head submersed in the water, digging the clam out from the mud, and depositing it in a basket. After filling our baskets, we marched back to the rental office and proudly displayed our catch to Bruce and Barbara, suitable for a sumptuous dinner. Only then did Bruce announce that cherrystones filter pollutants from the water and he would never eat them. Trick on us but lots of fun. After Bruce graduated from Penn Medical School, he got a job at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, not far from our home. His research there and throughout his career focused on hematology and blood biochemistry. To obtain raw materials, he and Barbara periodically drove to Frederick, Maryland to collect blood from slaughterhouses. He once asked us to join them, but we politely declined. Bruce was the inventor or co-inventor on 17 U.S. patents, the most recent one on a method for treating sickle cell disease that issued only eleven weeks before he died. As a patent attorney, I talked with him periodically about how these inventions advanced technology and whether they could help cure diseases. His answers were always humble, with due credit being given to the contributions of his co-inventors. We visited Bruce and Barbara at their beautiful home in Falmouth, MA several years ago. He and I got to talking about hobbies--mine was golf, his was making furniture. After pointing out several of his pieces, Bruce took me down to the basement to see where the magic happened. I was blown away. He had all the machines of a professional woodworking shop, a heavied-up electrical box to handle the load, and an overhead vacuum system to remove debris. He spent hours down there, not only honing his skills in producing beautiful furniture but also clearing his mind from work at his world-renowned lab. Bruce had a terrific sense of humor. One example is when Ruth or I would ask him some crazy medical question. Bruce would respond with a cockamamie answer, and we would all burst out laughing. Needless to say, the crazy questions and ridiculous answers kept on coming. Bruce was very proud of being a member of the first all-Princeton family, since his sons Eric and Greg are also alums. Greg (aka “Furious”) and our older son Michael were both in Tiger Inn and are members of the Great Class of ’97. Rest in peace, Bruce Furie, the Krosin family will miss you.
Anthony Kulczycki: I am saddened to hear about Bruce’s passing. Bruce and I were fellow Chemistry majors in the “Biochemistry Program” and partners in Organic Chemistry lab junior year. Our laboratory instructor was a graduate student-- Barbara Cantor. I observed that there was a “chemistry” between Bruce and Ms. Cantor so at the end of the course I invited each of them to join me for dessert at a restaurant on Nassau Street. I believe that was their first encounter outside of Frick and their first “date”. Senior year I roomed with Bruce and his cousin Larry Eron and Charley Martin in Walker. (Larry and I were fellow clarinetists in the Tiger marching band.) I found Bruce to be very smart, sensible, good natured and kind—an ideal roommate. After Bruce and Barbara eloped near the end of our senior year they arranged a memorable “wedding reception” at Lake Carnegie on Houseparties weekend. Bruce, Larry and I all went on to medical school, medical internships and residencies, and eventually Public Health Service fellowships at the NIH during the Vietnam War.One day Bruce in 1972 excitedly walked into the NIH lab that I was working in and told me to come down the hall with him because his mentor (Chris Anfinsen) was just informed that he had won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry . We witnessed the cameras and media frenzy. After the NIH our careers involved various degrees of research and clinical medicine. Bruce and Barbara have had spectacular research careers in bleeding and clotting disorders. I was happy to reconnect with Bruce when he recruited me to the class medical advisory network, when we were both spending more time at home during the COVID epidemic, and at some of the Tiger talks. Bruce achieved success in so many areas that he truly embodies what it means to have lived a good life.
Steve Gaal: I didn’t know Bruce at Princeton. It was only after the PU’66 Lunch Group got started during COVID that I became aware of him. Bruce somehow discovered that I had spent the last 20 years as a furniture maker and he would connect from time to time on the best way to execute some facet of a woodworking project he was working on. The last one I recall was coffee table of his own design that presented some unusual challenges. Despite his illnesses he had an intellectual curiosity without equal. We also shared an interest in sailing and he never concluded a discussion about sailboats without an invitation to sail down and visit. He was a remarkable man in so many ways: an intellectual giant with a generous soul. I wish I had time to know him better.
Dave Lee: I didn't know Bruce as an undergraduate, but met him through the Boston Lunch Group and our activities with our New England classmates. Bruce lived in Quissett, a beautiful village of Falmouth on Cape Cod, in a large, lovely home overlooking picturesque Quissett Harbor. Hallie and I had summered in West Falmouth, another village just north of Quissett, since we were married in 1990, and in 2021 we bought a condo in East Falmouth. Bruce and I discovered we both loved sailing, and each had sailboats in our local harbors. His son helped him with his, and our son helped us with ours. We also discovered that we had grown up on the Jersey Shore, he on Long Beach Island and I in Toms River. It was always a pleasure to see Bruce and his lovely spouse Barbara, with whom he had shared so much since they met at Princeton, where she was his lab instructor! Barbara and Bruce were early pioneers in the days of Caribbean charter sailing, and knew the founders of the famous charter company, The Moorings. Bruce had sea stories that were always fun to hear! He and Barbara were fearless! In his youth Bruce founded a sailing school on Long Beach Island, an intrepid entrepreneur. The proceeds helped put him through Princeton. Hearing about how he built and grew his sailing company, I was impressed and amazed. He was amused but still not OK with the fact that the Princeton sailing coach kicked him off the sailing team because "he was a sailing professional". In fact he was not a professional racer and wanted to learn racing! So we were two boys who loved sailing and the Jersey Shore. Bruce's professional life and credentials came to light during our Zoom discussions with our fellow Boston and New England classmates. Bruce's global connections and his eminence continually impressed us, and we finally asked "Bruce, is there anyone you don't know?!" His global reputation as a top hematologist put him at the epicenter of medical progress, and we can be assured that he moved his field forward over the years. His work setting up our class Healthy Aging Network benefitted me when I was diagnosed with prostate cancer. Talking with classmate Roger Evans helped guide me through the diagnostic and treatment process, with a positive result from recommended radiation treatment at MGH. Bruce told me I could have real confidence in the diagnosis and treatment procedures at MGH and major Boston hospitals. Thank you Bruce, and Roger for reassuring me during a fraught period. Your words of wisdom were priceless. Dear Bruce, may you always have fair winds and following seas.
John Hart: I didn't have the good fortune of knowing Bruce at Princeton and first met him during the 2017 P-Rade and his Locomotive Award ceremony that evening at Terhune Orchards. At the same time, we were just starting our '66 Boston (later "New England") lunch group and Bruce joined our in-person lunches and then became a mainstay of our Zoom meetings and email discussions.
It didn't take long to realize that Bruce was a guy worth listening to, and his soothing, measured voice and his informative email responses could bring reason to the most raucous discussion. His voice was especially effective during Covid. Bruce knew the people doing the research, he could explain the differences between PCR and antigen tests and how they worked. He'd email papers on those topics, and with a bit of encouragement, I was able to understand some of the biology and chemistry, and PCR appealed to the computer scientist in me. During a period of worry, fear, and misinformation, Bruce brought calm and understanding.
He shared his knowledge and advice selflessly, and the class Healthy Aging Network is the result of his leadership and high standards. He could listen to a classmate's specific medical issue and explain what was happening and how to evaluate alternatives. Bruce could recommend specific physicians and helped one classmate locate a new PCP. In short, he cared and acted.
In any discussion about nearly anything, you could count on him for interesting insights. As half our group liked to sail, Bruce was often in his element. Woodworking? Heat pumps? The best sources for classical music? No problem. I did score one "victory", however. "This Old House" had featured a project that intrigued Bruce, and he wanted to get in touch with the owner to discuss technical issues but had no idea how to proceed. With the clues of: 1) Old house in a specific MA town, 2) on a river, 3) a photo of Nassau Hall above the fireplace, I thought "Elementary, Dr. Furie". With those clues and the help of the Alumni Directory and maps, I located the exact house and the name of the owner, who had a Princeton architecture degree. Bruce got in touch with the owner, and they apparently had a great conversation.
I just looked at my email inbox, and, sure enough, there are several challenging emails from Bruce that have been sadly neglected. One contains an Oct 9 paper from the New England Journal of Medicine on Restoring Confidence in Public Health by Peter Marks (a colleague and until recently in charge of vaccines at the CDC). I told Bruce I'd read it ASAP and finally did yesterday (it was worth the wait). There's another email recommending and commenting on a book on the Manhattan Project. It's time to read and absorb that email as well.
Farewell, old friend. You left us the gift of knowledge, wisdom, and caring, which will always be remembered.
Stu Steingold: Bruce, Andy Sears, Charlie Martin, Larry Eron and I were roommates sophomore year in one of those large end of the hall suites in Dod. Sadly, only Larry and I survive. I met Bruce early freshman year and we became fast friends. We bonded on the squash court, though keeping him off the T was a challenge. Sophomore year, we echoed the CP Snow divide between the sciences and the humanities. Bruce and Larry were pre-med, suffering through organic chemistry (orgo) as if each exam would determine their fate for med school and beyond. Charlie was an A-list physicist in training, en route to a career in nuclear propulsion for the Navy. Then we had Andy (Philosophy) and myself (WWS) reading stuff not requiring a slide rule. I'm making my way through a calculus class, focused one night on some problems that didn't want to be solved. Here comes Bruce with a 30 minute presentation on the overall analytical framework of calculus making his way eventually to my set of problems. Thanks to him, a light bulb finally went off. It was the intellectual way Bruce's laser-focused mind approached problems - from the macro to the micro. Bruce and Charlie became frequent late night visitors to the then new computer center and mastered Fortran. They'd leave anonymous messages of sophomoric humor on old-style printout paper to greet the staff in the morning. A fan of classical music, Bruce played the French horn. Unfortunately, there's only one piece in the French horn repertoire, a Mozart concerto. It reverberated all through Dod all through sophomore year. Took me years to get it out of my mind. Fast forward to senior year. Barbara and he get serious and tell us they're planning something special for Houseparties weekend and they did. They elope and get married in Virginia (no blood test for social diseases) and come back for Houseparties. We had a celebration down near the boathouse. A pleasure for Celia and me - we then stayed in touch throughout the years. We visited Barbara and Bruce wherever, whether Philadelphia, Beach Haven or Woods Hole. They came periodically to DC, as Bruce often made presentations at NIH or similar. Sailing was a big part of Furie family life. His pride and joy was a magnificent sailboat he helped design. If you went out sailing with him, he'd first give you a 30 minute tutorial on how and why sail boats sail. He'd take out a piece of paper and break it all down with vectors and wind dynamics. Then when you took the helm, woe is you if you let the telltale flutter. He was also an accomplished furniture and cabinet maker. He visited several of the leading California designers for inspiration. He'd order these massive pieces of wood and fashion them artistically into a base for a dining room table or a coffee table. In my last email from Bruce, not over a few weeks ago, he told me that son Eric '95 had come back so excited from Reunions and insisted Bruce attend our #60. He reserved a block of rooms for his entire Princeton family. So sad he can't make it.
Carol Eron Rizzoli (Larry Eron's former wife): Bruce possessed a rare blend of formidable intellect along with deep kindness and acerbic wit. He was supremely devoted to family and friends, though he never held back in telling you if you'd made a mistake—or were about to make one. Meeting him first in 1965 at Princeton, I did not know that he would become a lifelong friend. Bruce and Larry Eron, my former husband, had grown up together from earliest childhood. They were cousins but as close as brothers, loyal and naturally a bit competitive. How fortunate, then, that they both were admitted to Princeton, both played in the marching band, both were premed, and both went on to the medical schools of their choice. Anyone fortunate enough to be a friend of Bruce's was truly blessed. |
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