Dr. Harry Austin “Steno” Grimes did not originally choose medicine as a career. In 1946, while still a high school student (and president of his senior class), Harry Grimes set his sights on becoming an ace fighter pilot. He had received flight training at Newport Auxiliary Airfield and his pilot’s license at age 16.
Indeed, after graduating from the University of Arkansas Medical School in 1955 (and interning at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami) he joined the United States Air Force, achieving the rank of captain and graduating from Flight Surgeon School at Randolph AFB.
Dr. Grimes was assigned to the 19th Bomb Wing at Homestead AFB (in Florida) and was, at one point, sent to interesting temporary duty at Ben Guerir Air Base, Morocco.
Following his tour of duty, Dr. Grimes returned to Jackson Memorial for three more years of resident training in general and orthopedic surgery, but Uncle Sam was not finished with him—Dr. Grimes was recalled to provide air support for the Bay of Pigs affair and stayed for a short while, basing out of Barksdale AFB in Shreveport, Louisiana.
Following that service, Dr. Grimes moved to and settled permanently in Little Rock, Arkansas, where he and two colleagues founded the Little Rock Orthopedic Clinic and, later, served as president of the Little Rock Academy of Surgery.
Dr. Grimes served the patients of Little Rock and surrounding communities for more than a quarter century. Influenced by Viktor Frankel’s book, Dr. Grimes practiced medicine as both an art and a science. Even after his ‘retirement’ at age 65, Dr. Grimes continued to see patients and volunteered in St. Vincent’s free clinics until retiring from medicine at age 70.
Dr. Grimes also had another remarkable skill—drawing anatomy. After retiring from medicine, he took his first-ever art lessons at the Arkansas Art Center and then continued to study under oil painter Barry Thomas, who encouraged him to paint what he saw despite being colorblind.
Dr. Grime’s art has been displayed in local galleries, at art shows in Newport and was chosen for CareLink’s first local holiday card and for calendars of the Arkansas Governor’s Mansion Association and CARTI, where he eventually underwent 12 years of cancer care.
Harry Austin Grimes was born in 1928. The future Dr. Grimes grew up working in his parents’, Aarol and “Annie,” drug store during the Great Depression in Arkansas. He earned an Eagle Scout designation and achieved the Order of the Arrow.
As he often related to his friend, the old men of Newport taught him the game of golf during World War II, a sport he enjoyed for almost eight decades.
Dr. Grimes shot his fifth and sixth holes-in-one at age 82.
Dr. Grimes volunteered as a subject in the Physicians’ Health Studies I and II, beginning in 1982 and 1997 respectively, which tested the benefits and risks of aspirin, beta carotene, vitamins E and C, and multivitamins. He later volunteered in the Cocoa Supplement and Multivitamin Outcomes Study (COSMOS), where results are still being studied.
Austin is survived by his wife Ann Grimes, daughter Meredith McLeod, stepson Adam Wells, close-to-heart niece Bridget Rogers and nephew Seth Schulte, and cousins in Arkansas and California. He was predeceased by his parents, daughter Mardi DeBerry, stepson Patrick Wells, and step-daughter-in-law Jana Wells.
