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IN MEMORIAM
Robert Holman Coombs
Professor of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences
UC Los Angeles
1934–2005
Robert “Bob” Holman Coombs, a devoted and highly regarded member of the Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, left us quite unexpectedly on Tuesday, March 22, 2005. Born on September 16, 1934, in Salt Lake City, Utah, he was the son of Morgan Scott and Vivian Holman Coombs. Bob grew up in Salt Lake City and attended East High School. He loved playing church basketball — and freely gave his children and grandchildren pointers about how to dribble and shoot lay-ups!
As a young man, Bob served two years in Virginia and North Carolina as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Afterwards he continued his studies at the University of Utah, where he majored in sociology and philosophy, receiving his bachelor's degree in 1958. There he met the love of his life, Carol Jean Cook, who was Bob’s right arm throughout his distinguished career at UCLA. Bob and Carol Jean were married in May of 1958. Bob then served in the Army and earned a master's degree from the University of Utah in 1959, followed by a Ph.D. in sociology from Washington State University in 1964. He and Carol Jean lived in Washington, Iowa (Iowa State University), and North Carolina (Bowman Gray School of Medicine, Wake Forest University), before settling in the Los Angeles area, where they raised their seven children.
In 1970 Bob joined the faculty in the Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences at UCLA and the Neuropsychiatric Institute, now the Jane and Terry Semel Institute of Neuroscience and Human Behavior. For 35 years he conducted research, published articles and books, served in administrative and service capacities (including the IRB Committee), taught classes, and provided marriage, family, and grief counseling.
Bob’s primary areas of specialty were drug addiction, medical socialization, and marriage – all fields in which he made vital contributions. Though Bob’s work on all these topics was significant, his studies of substance abuse by professionals were especially revealing, poignant, and provocative, as illustrated by his publisher’s description of Drug-Impaired Professionals (Harvard University Press):
Robert Coombs gives as a startling picture of drug abuse among “pedestal professionals.” He discusses addiction as an occupational hazard for those with the easiest access to drugs, the greatest sense of immunity to their perils, and the most extensive means and reasons for hiding their problems. The interviewees’ eloquent and often harrowing testimony reminds us of the human drama behind the exhaustive research and analysis presented here. The bittersweet stories bear out Coombs’ contention that recovering addicts, free of their magical elixirs, can become more complete people than they were before addiction.
Bob’s sensitivity and resolve are also evident in his longitudinal study of a group of medical trainees’ wives, Seasons of Marriage. Just before Bob’s untimely death, he prepared to collect the final wave of data 35 years after the study was launched. Carol Jean is now completing the path-breaking study to be published by Lawrence Erlbaum and Associates.
The list of Bob’s professional accomplishments is long. He wrote or edited 19 books. Most recent were four comprehensive handbooks and desk references on addictions and marriage and family counseling published in 2004. He produced scores of academic articles and chapters and served on multiple national and international committees and in many advisory capacities. Just this past March, Robert P. Liberman, a friend and colleague since 1970, was inspired to send Bob the following note:
“It is simply amazing how you maintain and even accelerate your incisive and important contributions, your incredible rate of writing and publishing. Only partially tongue-in-cheek, I think you should volunteer as a unique specimen in some of the neuroimaging research that is done by Gary Small and others. I bet your hippocampus is twice as large as is the age-linked norm and that you have an enormous brain reserve capacity. If I didn't know better, I'd think you were the sociological scholar equivalent of the top-flight basketball players who are ‘amped up’ on steroids.”
Bob was in great demand as a speaker locally and nationally. He was also a talented teacher, frequently recognized for his ability here at UCLA, including receiving the Distinguished Faculty Educator Award. In his teaching, publishing and administrative capacities, Bob always sought to facilitate the careers of those with whom he was working.
Bob was a wise, proud, fun and much-beloved father and grandfather. He offered inspired counsel, and he was known for his quick sense of humor. In addition to his wife, Carol Jean, he is survived by seven children and their spouses: Robert Scott, Kathryn, Lorraine Carlston (Steve), Karen Dorough (David), Holly Ann Ormond (Chip), Krista, and David Jeremy (Kim). Bob also leaves behind nine grandchildren: Trevor, Tyler, Natalie, Zachary, Dillon, Kristina, Kyle, Landon, and Sylvie. Bob is also survived by his brothers and sisters, Shirley Petersen, Jackie Eldredge, Scott Coombs, and Douglas Coombs.
As an active member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Bob served in many positions, including bishop of two different wards: Winston Salem, North Carolina, and Camarillo, California.
More than anything, Bob loved to learn and share ideas. He liked to try new things and go new places with his beloved wife, Carol Jean. She and his children will miss him very much and they picture him finding joy in his newest adventure on the other side of the veil.
Bob will be sorely missed by his colleagues and friends at UCLA.
Kate Coombs
Hector Myers
M. Belinda Tucker
David Wellisch