In Memorium

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Remarks at the Funeral Service for Vernon Mogensen

(Dave Kotelchuck -- 7/23/11)

A few days ago, when I got over my initial shock on learning of the tragic death of Vern Mogensen, my thoughts turned to the title of a book I read many years ago: Whom the Gods Love, on the death of the great mathematician Evariste Galois. The quote in full from Greek mythology was “Whom the Gods Love Die Young.” And indeed the gods must have so loved Vern Mogensen to take him away from us in the prime of his life.

I have known Vern for over two decades as a friend, a health and safety professional, a faculty colleague and active unionist. Since many today will pay tribute to his kindness and friendship and union activism far better than I can, I would like to speak today about Vern as a scholar and health and safety professional.

I met him in the late 1980’s when we and so many others were engaged in a public campaign to get the Clinton Administration and its Occupational Safety and Health Administration to enact a law protecting workers from suffering painful, disabling work injuries from repetitive motions on the job. We met at countless hearings and meetings to rally support for such a standard, which even then was the leading cause of workplace illness and disability conditions (and it still is). There we both met typists and garment and other factory workers who were in such pain that they could not sleep or dress themselves, or even in some cases lift up their children and grandchildren.

At the time Vern was working on his doctoral thesis on the social and political problems that stood in the way of enacting a standard for Repetitive Strain Disorders as we called them then. As we talked I became much impressed with the sharpness and clarity of his thinking on these issues, in which scientific issues were also intertwined, and a friendship developed that lasted for decades.

Happily in 2000 the Clinton Administration finally enacted this much needed standard, only to have it overturned by act of Congress only a few months later under the Bush Administration. This was a great disappointment for both of us – the Ergonomics Standard is the only OSHA standard ever repealed by act of Congress, and it remains repealed to this day.

Soon after Vern finished his thesis, I was happy when he became a fellow faculty member at the City University of New York at Kingsborough Community College. I was honored a few years later to be asked to write a letter of recommendation for Vernon for his promotion and tenure in the Department of Political Science. Let me read some of what I said there:

I was impressed with his deep understanding of both the technical and social issues underlying the standard, and their interaction. In my experience few social scientists who consider occupational and environmental health and safety issues master the important technical and workplace issues behind such standards as well as he has.

Indeed I would say now that Vern Mogensen had become by the time of his death one of the foremost scholars in the United States, if not the foremost, on the science and politics of the Ergonomics Standard.

Thus a few years ago Vern was asked by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) to participate in one of its review panels, a clear indication of the high regard with which his work is regarded nationally in this field.

I will always remember Vern as a person of good soul and kind spirit. But beyond remembering him, it is for us the living to be dedicated to and carry on the good works to which Vernon had devoted his life – to build a better and more just world, and try to help end the oppression and suffering visited on so many of our fellow human beings.

Goodbye, gentle soul, we will miss you.