As the youngest of five in a financially challenged family, Bill Cox had always had jobs, managing, with the help of scholarships, to put himself through college and the first three years of medical school without incurring any debt. At Temple University Medical School, the last two years were continuous with the summer being spent serving as the equivalent of an intern at Temple Hospital. The Ensign 1915 program offered a solution to his dilemma as to how to finance that last year. In June 1963, he was conferred the rank of Ensign, and in June 1964, upon graduation, the rank of Lieutenant. After completing a year of internship, he would then be obligated to three years of active duty in the Navy.

For Bill, the decision to trade one year of scholarship for three years of service was an easy one. All three of his older brothers had served in the military. His eldest brother, an Air Force pilot, had been shot down over Germany in WW II and spent 6 months in a POW camp.

 

Bill’s year of internship took him from Philadelphia to Denver. Having heard tales of the Colorado lifestyle, he and three other Temple classmates applied and were accepted at Presbyterian Hospital. Just days after their arrival in Denver, he accompanied his three friends to an Allegheny College alumni gathering held at a local neighborhood bar. As a Lafayette College grad, he was the only non-AIIeghenian there. It must have been serendipity. He met Kim at that impromptu gathering. They were engaged in January, married in March, and upon completion of his internship in June, they left Colorado to begin Bill's three-year obligation to the Navy.

 

 

He was assigned to the 1st Marine Division stationed at Camp Pendleton. Bill and Kim camped their way across the west from Denver to Oceanside, CA. The few belongings they had amassed as newlyweds were transported to Oceanside courtesy of the Navy, and they were moved into off-base apartments along with several other freshly minted MDs. They learned from the drivers of the moving vans that they were not going to be there for long. At that time, the movement of personnel and their families across the country was "top secret."

Their cheerful farewell was "See you in a few weeks!"

 

 

It was a crazy and chaotic six weeks for the newly commissioned medical corps. Under the tutelage of a Marine Top Sergeant, they were introduced to basic officer training. In addition to multiple lectures, they were trained in firing and maintaining weapons, crawling under live machine guns fire three feet above their heads, and learning how not to get their heads taken off when approaching a chopper. In August 1965, Bill's Division boarded a transport ship headed for Vietnam.

 

Their first stop was a respite in Okinawa while the base camp at Chu Lai was being constructed. Arriving in Chu Lai in November of 1965, just in time for the monsoon season, they established the 1st Marine Division Force Logistics Support Group which had an airfield and a field hospital. It was a Battalion of 1000. After a 13-month tour of duty, Bill was transferred to Sand Point Naval Air Station in Seattle, Washington, where he served as a general medical officer caring for reservists and their families.

 

After mustering out of the Navy in 1968, Bill returned to Temple University for his four years of orthopedic residency. By 1972, the Coxes had three young children and needed to decide where they wanted to settle. Having had that one-year internship in Colorado, as well as honeymooning in Vail in ‘65, the “call of the mountains" won out over the “call of the ocean" where Bill had grown up. He joined a well-established practice in Denver; the transition to Vail and Singletree followed later.

Dr. Jack Eck, a friend and fellow Temple alumni, had settled in Vail, starting his Internal Medicine practice in 1971. Jack referred his orthopedic patients to Bill in Denver and as the demand grew, Bill and his partners established Denver-Vail Orthopedics, adding first John Gottlieb, followed by Lonnie Chipman and Peter Janes to be full time partners in Vail. Each of the Denver partners bought townhomes in Eagle-Vail and took weekly turns during the ski season to assist the Vail group. With the addition of Paul Abbott to the Vail team in 1993, the Vail group became autonomous, forming Vail Summit Orthopedics while Bill continued with his practice in Denver.

 

Upon retirement in 1999, the Coxes rented their Denver home, parked their belongings in the Eagle-Vail townhome, and set off on a three-month quest to determine “what they liked best." From sailing to the Florida Keys, to camping their way up the East coast and then west to Vail, they decided that the Vail Valley was a pretty great place to call home. The move from Eagle-Vail to Singletree in 2002 was driven primarily by Kim's desire for a single-family home where she could have a studio and be able to fire a kiln safely. Singletree continues to be a great choice. They love the diversity of the community, as well as the location... “far from the maddening crowd" but not too far to enjoy all that the Valley has to offer.

 

Bill was one of the early and invaluable medical pioneers in our community and he, with his partners, paved the way for this Valley to become one of the premier orthopedic centers of the world. Those that followed him owe a lot to Bill and his crew, and we all owe him and his fellow vets our thanks for his service to our country in the early years of the Vietnam conflict. He did more than his part for our community as well our country.