Gilbert Wheeler Beebe


Gilbert Wheeler Beebe, also known as Gil Beebe, was an American epidemiologist and statistician known for monumental studies of radiation-related mortality and morbidity among populations exposed to ionizing radiation from the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 and the Chernobyl reactor accident in 1986.

Education

Beebe was born in 1912 in Mahwah, New Jersey. Beebe attended Dartmouth College and graduated in 1933. He attended Columbia University and completed graduate studies in sociology and statistics and earned the A.M. in 1938 and Ph.D. in 1942.
Beebe carried out a landmark cohort study of contraceptive services in economically depressed areas.

National Academy of Sciences

Beebe was a captain in the United States Army and served in the Office of the Surgeon General of the United States Army during World War II. He worked with Michael DeBakey to help create the Medical Follow-up Agency at the National Academy of Sciences.
Beebe directed the MFUA until his retirement at age 65.
Beebe worked with Seymour Jablon at the MFUA to reorganize the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission in Japan.
He spent several tours of duty in Japan, a total of seven years in Hiroshima and Nagasaki as the ABCC chief of Statistics in 1958–1960, 1966–1968, and 1973–1975.
The Medical Follow-up Agency was succeeded by the Radiation Effects Research Foundation.
The RERF produces epidemiological and statistical information that helps to form our current knowledge of radiation related risk of cancer and other long-term health effects in human populations.

National Cancer Institute

In 1977 Beebe joined the National Cancer Institute in what would become the Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics. During this time Beebe worked with John D. Boice, Jr.
In 1986 after the Chernobyl accident, he organized and led an international study of thyroid cancer and leukemia risk among radiation-exposed populations in Belarus and Ukraine.
In 2002 Beebe retired from the NCI and remained active as NCI Scientist Emeritus until the day he died. Beebe died in 2003 in Washington, D.C. from acute pulmonary failure.
Beebe was survived by his wife of 69 years, Ruth, four children, Alfred, Beatrice, Brian, and Christopher, and five grandchildren.

Awards and honors

In 1973 he was elected as a Fellow of the American Statistical Association.

Gilbert W. Beebe Symposium

Established in 2002 by the National Academy of Sciences Board on Radiation Effects Research to honor the scientific achievements of Dr. Gilbert W. Beebe National Cancer Institute, who was one of the designers and key implementers of the epidemiology studies of Japanese atomic bomb survivors and co-founder of the Medical Follow-up Agency. The symposium is used to promote discussions among scientists, federal staff, and other interested parties concerned with radiation health effects.
Symposia that have been held addressed a wide range of topics related to radiation and health:

Contraception