One of Bill’s traits was his humility, despite his success. He was devoted to his patients and students but always found, in addition to science, the time to discuss UK basketball or Major League Baseball with his colleagues. Often, there was time to enjoy a glass of good Chardonnay, classical music, books about the war in the Pacific, or go for a spin (at high speed) in his Porsche. Before his hospitalization for a fractured rib and pneumothorax (1992), Bill even occasionally played softball with SBCoA faculty and staff. As his health became an issue over the past decade and a half, he could not travel as easily. However, Bill’s enthusiasm for his work never faltered. Often, one could meet with him in his office or while he was “hunched over” his microscope to see an IV attached to his arm as part of his ongoing treatment.

His scientific colleagues will recall some of his specific research endeavors. Five outstanding areas of accomplishment (among many) come to mind. First, Bill was a leader in uncovering the role of oxidative stress and free radical biology in neurodegenerative diseases, including in lipids, proteins, and nucleic acids. With his colleagues at UK and elsewhere, he also emphasized the importance of the concept of preclinical AD. He recognized from his clinical patient care and his view through the microscope that cognitive dysfunction in aging humans is often multifactorial, and that these brain diseases often exist in a complex mixture in the brain. In the interim, he joined several of his colleagues and helped to craft the Consensus Recommendations for the Postmortem Diagnosis of AD in 1997. Finally, Bill led the charge with his UK colleagues and volunteers in acknowledging the need for rigorous data management, quantitative neuropathology, and building community trust in conducting longitudinal studies on brain aging (as epitomized in his work on the Georgia Centenarian, Religious Orders, Nun, and Biologically Resilient Older Adults in Neurological Studies projects). In terms of his approach as a scientist, Dr. William R. Markesbery epitomized the role of the gentleman scientist and clinician.