Leaders and Innovators
Electronic Device Pioneer Reflects on a Life of Wonder
A 15-year-old boy walks down to the local dump
in Depression-era Newark, NJ, to scavenge for
the spare parts he needs to assemble a bicycle.
First he spots a wheel that just might do the
trick. Then a chain. Before long, he has uncovered
enough pieces to cobble together a makeshift
bike that he can ride around this desperate town.
What he doesn’t realize yet is just how far this bike will take him.
 With an unbridled curiosity and a passion
for electronics, Morris Tischler
would go on to create a great number of
things with his talented hands, including an
early cardiac pacemaker that would one day
reside in the Smithsonian Institution in
Washington, DC.
But despite leading a remarkable life in
which he obtained nine patents for his creations;
rubbed shoulders with a couple of
heads of state; and worked, taught, or lectured
in more than 90 countries, precious little
information is available about his work.
That is, unless one were to pay a visit to
his office in Baltimore, MD.
Now 84 years old, Tischler is reflective
about his career and his journey, which,
without even a hint of bitterness, he says“got lost in the woodwork.” But his meticulously
maintained scrapbook — which
Tischler has titled My Journey — tells the true
tale of a man whose contributions to
medical technology have perhaps been
overlooked.
“I’ve prepared this book for my children,
and their children,” says Tischler, thumbing
through the pages of the scrapbook.
Tischler is believed to be the inventor
of the first “solid state” — or transistorized —
external cardiac pacemaker. In
1958, he provided one of his devices to
Howard M.C. Snyder, MD — personal
physician to President Dwight D.
Eisenhower — three years after the president’s
heart attack. Although Snyder
sent a letter of thanks to Tischler for the
instrument, it is not known if the president
ever used the device.
Developed in the 1950s and patented
in 1963, Tischler’s “Cardiac Pacer”
resembled a small transistor radio of
that era, and weighed two and a quarter
pounds. It had two knobs, one to
control pulse-rate settings and another
to regulate the strength of the electrical
current supplied to the heart. It came
complete with wires and two chest
plates, which could be removed and
replaced with surgical needles.
To accompany the pacemaker,
Tischler developed a cardiac monitor to
keep track of a patient’s pulse, to activate
the pacer, and to send an alert signal
to a doctor or nurse. He was awarded
a patent for the monitor in 1964.
But just how does a teenage boy sifting
through a dump during the Great
Depression become an inventor of
novel medical devices?
An Innovator is Born
“Life in Newark was horrible in the
1930s,” recalls Tischler. “So in 1937, my
family moved to the little fishing town
of Crisfield on Maryland’s Eastern
Shore. My father was a tailor, and he
opened up a men’s clothing shop
there.”
Young Morris quickly became skilled
with hand tools by helping his father
repair the shop’s parquet floor. And
while his father nurtured Tischler’s
general handiness, his brother, Louis,
sparked his fascination with electronics.“Lou was an amateur radio operator,
back in the early years of radio,” says
Tischler. “He taught me how to repair
radios, and even helped me build my
own ham radio station. I was absolutely
fascinated with it.”
“I’ve seen the various technologies
that have come along in my lifetime,
from the television to the computer to
the new hand-held devices. But I doubt
that anything could be more fascinating
than building an old crystal radio. It
was so magical at that time to hear —
without using electricity — people talking
and singing, with their voices just
coming out of the air. I can close my
eyes now and still hear those sounds.”
To satisfy his growing curiosity,
Tischler taught himself all he could
about transistors, electricity, and radio
transmissions, and eventually became
an electronics and radio instructor.
Over a period of about 20 years, he
taught the principles of electronics,
circuit design, radio transmission, and
other related subjects to students of all
ages, from children up to adults.
From the School to the Hospital
By the mid-1950s, he had acquired a
degree in electrical engineering from
Johns Hopkins University and a master’s
degree in technology education
from the University of Maryland, and
was an electronics instructor at Forest
Park High School in Baltimore. Tischler’s grasp on electronics had
grown so firm that he began spending
his evenings teaching the principles of
electronics to medical doctors. The idea behind the course — which Tischler
taught at the University of Maryland —
was to help doctors better understand
the evolving medical technologies they
suddenly found themselves responsible
for.
One of Tischler’s students in the
evening course was a cardiac surgeon
named R.Adams Cowley, for whom
the University of Maryland’s shock
trauma center is now named.
Cowley, who was quickly taken by
Tischler’s unique knowledge, encouraged
Tischler to come work with him
at the University of Maryland Medical
Center.
“I didn’t know anything about hospitals,
but I took the job anyway,” says
Tischler.
Because he understood electronics,
Tischler’s first assignment at the hospital
was to fix a faulty oximeter. After he
successfully completed the task, an
intrigued Cowley said to him, “Ok, if
you’re so smart, why don’t you build
something that will make the heart
pump?” He then handed Tischler a
stack of reading material about the
heart and its function.
“I read the materials and learned
about how the heart works,” recalls Tischler. “Although I found the heart to
be a magnificent organ, I didn’t really
think of it as an organ at all. To me, it
was just another electronic circuit.”
In 1955, Tischler began developing
his first cardiac device. Between 1955
and 1957 he tested it only on animals,
until one day when Cowley called for
Tischler to quickly bring the instrument
up to the operating room.
“When I arrived at the OR, I saw Dr.
Cowley on the floor with a patient. He
was squeezing the man’s heart, trying
to get it to pump. I had never seen the
inside of a man’s chest until that
moment. But Cowley instructed me to
use the instrument on the man, and I
plugged the needles into the ventricle.
Next thing you know, the man was
shouting, ‘turn it off, it’s hurting me!’”
That year, Cowley and Tischler started
a business called Electronic Aids.
But while they had a workable, lifesaving
device at hand, they did not
have backgrounds in marketing or
sales.
“We started Electronic Aids, and we
manufactured a few of the pacers,”
says Tischler. “The device worked for
us. But the problem was we had to talk
to doctors about the product, to market
it. Some were interested, and some
could care less.”
Tischler presented the instrument to
Westinghouse, which saw its potential
and began distributing it under the
Westinghouse brand.
A Special Recognition
Although sales of the device were
not overwhelming even after
Westinghouse began distributing it, an
early version of Tischler’s Cardiac
Pacer now makes its home in a place of
honor — the study collection of
Smithsonian Institution’s National
Museum of American History.
“A student of mine contacted me
back in the 1960s,” remembers Tischler,“and said, ‘you’re not going to believe
this, but your device is in the
Smithsonian.’ I couldn’t believe it.”
Donated to the museum by the
University of Maryland in 1965,
Tischler’s device enjoyed a rebirth in
1977 as part of an exhibit calledTriumph Over Disability.
Today, Tischler is the president of a
company called Overseas Marketing
Group. His company develops — among
other things — biomedical training tools
and electrical training equipment for
technical schools. He is also working
with school districts in the Baltimore
and Detroit areas to provide simple,
educational biotechnology programs
for children, so that they might experience
the same wonder he felt when he
experimented with his first crystal
radio.
“People always say to me, ‘you must
have made a lot of money over the
years,’” Tischler chuckles. “The truth is
I really didn’t. But I am happy that I
was involved in work that a lot of people
are enjoying today.
“I recently had a former student
come to me and tell me that he owes
his career to my teaching. That made
me feel so good.”
Opening Tischler’s scrapbook, one
would find several old newspaper articles
discussing his work — including a
1963 New York Times piece about his
Cardiac Pacer. One would find letters
of commendation written to Tischler by
a variety of “important” people. One
would even find an old photo of him
lecturing students overseas, with the
Shah of Iran listening intently to his
words.
But today, Morris Tischler is not
interested in sharing his scrapbook
with the world. This book is for his
children, and their children. SOURCE: AAMI News: September 2006, Vol 41, No. 8
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