Ramon Fernandez Marina (1909–1981)

Puerto Rico has lost its pioneer in psychoanalysis. His family has lost a devoted husband, father and grandfather. He was the first Puerto Rican psychoanalyst and the island's first member of the International and the American Psychoanalytic Associations.

After pre-medical studies in Maryland, he went to Spain where he graduated from Medical School in Madrid in 1933. He was a general practitioner for eight years in small towns throughout the island, where he is still remembered with admiration for his kindness. He later trained in both psychiatry and psychoanalysis in Washington D.C., and returned to Puerto Rico in 1947 to embark on his professional career.

Dr Fernandez Marina was the Director of the State Psychiatric Hospital for four years, a position for which he was well qualified and in which he attempted to apply, sometimes with draconian fervour, heroic solutions to impossible situations. He was also the Director of the Hato Tejas Psychiatric Hospital and Co-Founder of the Puerto Rico Institute of Psychiatry, which has produced over 60 psychiatrists in his life-time. He had an active psychoanalytic practice which he maintained to the very end with a punctilious observation of psychoanalytic technique; a quixotic endeavour indeed for a pioneer.

I recall that many years ago, shortly after Dr Fernandez Marina was admitted into the International and the American Psychoanalytic Associations, we met at a party attended by many prominent physicians. He took me aside to give me the good news, upon which, after my hearty congratulations, he commented that none of our other colleagues present would have the slightest notion of the meaning either of the associations themselves or of the privilege of membership.

Dr Fernandez Marina wrote innumerable articles. His magnum opus, 'The Horizons of the Mind', demonstrates his knowledge in many fields. In spite of the triumphs of his professional life, he was most proud of the recognition and the prizes he received in Puer