Surgical oncologist Dr. Martin Fleming takes after his father. And his son takes after him.
Dr. Martin Fleming followed the path of his father Irvin Fleming as a surgical oncologist and faculty member at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center. (Courtesy UTHSC)
In the mid-1950s, Irvin and Anne Fleming had a big engagement party, with a Press-Scimitar reporter present to write about it for the newspaper’s society page. But as Anne walked down the stairs and leaned on the staircase’s railing, her arm broke and she tumbled to the floor.
An examination of the injury revealed a malignant tumor, and in the months that followed, she was vigorously treated and her arm was amputated.
The experience left a lasting impression on her and her fiancé, who spent the rest of their lives championing cancer patients. Irvin Fleming, who had been a medical student at the time, went onto become a celebrated surgical oncologist. Anne Fleming raised their four sons with one arm and took them door-to-door as she collected funds for the American Cancer Society.
One of those four sons was Dr. Martin Fleming — and he followed the path of his father as a surgical oncologist and faculty member at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center.
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John Klyce
John Klyce is an enterprise reporter with The Daily Memphian who writes a wide range of in-depth features, as well as profiles about local leaders, scientists, musicians, artists, entrepreneurs, and anyone else doing exciting and important work in this city. He previously spent four years with the Memphis Business Journal, where he covered public companies, startups, and innovation, and a fifth year with The Commercial Appeal, where he covered education, and chronicled how gun violence and poverty were affecting Memphis youth and their families. He has also been a fellow with the Institute for Citizens and Scholars. John has a B.A. in journalism from the University of Memphis and an M.F.A. in creative writing from Boston University.
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