Richard H. Fine

Audio

Dr. Dick Fine, Medical Committee for Human Rights (MCHR) reads a statement from SF Mayor to Dr. Shapiro of MCHR rejecting demands for immunity for medics at SFSU demonstrations in 1969

Dr. Dick Fine Moderating discussion of injuries to students and medics

Dr. Dick Fine describing medical teams, an agreement reached in 1968 on the medical neutrality of teams and access to anyone injured in a public demonstration for Medical Committee for Human Rights (MCHR), but not being honored by SF cops. 1969

Dick Fine speaks at the United Front Against Fascism conference about the Medical Committee for Human Rights (MCHR) and the need to provide the movement with medical care particularly when in conflict with the police. Dick Fine and Shari Whitehead talk with Elsa Knight Thompson about their trip to New Mexico where they investigated appalling medical conditions and their work with local organizers to create community-based medical resources. (7/20/1969)

News Articles

San Francisco Business Times article

San Francisco Chronicle obituary

Point Reyes Light obituary

Richard H. Fine People’s Clinic announcement

Books

Books where Dick Fine MD was an author, a subject or was interviewed:

Altamont: The Rolling Stones, the Hell’s Angels and the Inside Story of Rock’s Darkest Day - Joel Selvin, 2016, Dey Street, an imprint of William Morrow Publishers (pages 143-44, 146, 169, 219-20, 249)

The Good Doctors: The Medical Committee for Human Rights and the Struggle for Social Justice in Health Care - John Dittmer, 2009, Bloomsbury Press (pages 200-201)

Indian Self-Determination and the Rise of Indian Activism: The Occupation of Alcatraz Island - Troy R. Johnson, 1996, University of Illinois Press (page 89)

Beat the Heat: A Radical Survival Handbook, First Aid for Activists - Ramparts Press, 1972, (illustration at p. 207 is Dick Fine)

Medical Cadre, booklet prepared by MCHR for Conference on United Front Against Fascism - published by Jellyroll Press, Oakland, 1969. (Photo at page 9 is Dick Fine at SF State Strike)

Only Human is the title of an unpublished book Kathleen Campbell wrote about Dick. Specifically his accounts of his day to day life at San Francisco General Hospital.

Dick often quoted Dylan Thomas: “‘I’m only human’, cries the man, who deep in his heart refuses to believe it.”

The full quote by Dylan Thomas is:

“I am the kind of human dredger that digs up the wordy mud of his own dead sea; the kind of pig who roots for unconsidered truffles in the reeky wood of his past. Still I gladly accept the fact that I first saw the light and screamed at it in a loud lump of Wales. ‘I’m only human’ as the man says who deep inside him refuses to believe it.”

Thank you to determined blogger Jason Kirin for finding and publishing the transcript of this talk.

A recording of Dylan Thomas himself giving the reading “A Few Words of a Kind” at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where the Only Human quote appears is available here, which gives the date as 1957. However, it is unclear what this date signifies, since the poet died in 1953. A vinyl recording of “A Few Words of a Kind” and an mp3 file are also available on Amazon, entitled Dylan Thomas Reads His Complete Poems.