Monday’s memorial service for Karen Hiiemae, professor of biomedical and chemical engineering in L.C. Smith College of Engineering and Computer Science, provided an occasion for those close to Hiiemae to share stories and memories from her life.

Hiiemae, who died last month at age 66, was an internationally recognized scholar and had a special niche in the mechanical study of chewing, swallowing and the movements of the jaw and tongue.

Hiiemae paid keen attention to her surroundings and always provided comedic commentary on what she saw, said Dr. Shiu-Kai Chin, ECS interim dean.

‘I tried not to break out laughing,’ Chin said. ‘She was most struck and appalled by someone’s footwear!’

It spoke volumes about how much detail meant to Hiiemae, Chin said.

Joseph Janes, professor at the University of Washington, also vouched for Hiiemae’s strong voice and humor.

He reflected upon a favorite memory of Hiiemae when he opened a letter to her from the British Library and Museum. The letter asked if Hiiemae borrowed a set of monkey teeth from the museum, because the museum wanted them to be returned.

‘I returned it five years ago,’ Janes recalls Hiiemae saying. She brought back the set of monkey teeth a week later.

Janes met Hiiemae years ago when he was desperate for a job, but too intimidated to request a position as her teaching assistant.

‘I finally asked her, ‘Would you like to hire me as your teaching assistant?,” Janes said. ‘Hiiemae responded, ‘Well, what can you do?”

Hiiemae was known to be outspoken. ‘She was no shrinking violet,’ said Shannon Magari, senior scientist at Colden Corporation, a specialty services firm.

Hiiemae was the best person to work through a crisis, Magari said.

‘She saved my sorry tush,’ Magari said.

When Magari was notified that she was not provided the appropriate research materials to finish her master’s thesis, she immediately sought out Hiiemae for help.

‘I will be up and over next week, and we will sort this out,’ Hiiemae wrote back in an e-mail.

Hiiemae’s selflessness was evident to all who knew her, Magari said.

‘Karen helped me tremendously in my own career – she was always there,’ said Jeffrey Palmer, a professor at John Hopkins University. ‘She helped me deal with becoming a professor, and then with becoming a department head. She was always a great friend and a great ally.’

Hiiemae’s compassion left a lasting affect on her students.

‘Dr. Hiiemae is unlike any professor that entered our lives,’ said senior Mary Lindberg, reading a note from ESC senior Dominique Fufidio. ‘She had a unique sensitivity toward students.’

She was always honest and fair, and she will always be remembered as one of the greatest professors to touch our lives, Fufidio’s note read.

‘She was passionate and the life of the party,’ Palmer said. ‘She also loved to talk. I will say that again – she loved to talk.’

Hiiemae’s loyalty to friends, family and colleagues was unmatched, said professor A.W. ‘Fuzz’ Crompton of Harvard College.

‘We admire her courage, strong will, friendship and loyalty,’ he said. ‘But above all, we admire her total inability to be mean or vindictive.’

Hiiemae’s son, Simon, said that everyone’s stories were just right in describing his mother. ‘She taught us the value of beauty and ethics. Everyone who knew Mother knew she was special.’

Published on October 8, 2007 at 12:00 pm