Special Feature: Presentation of Morris F. Collen Award to Dr. Marion J. Ball

Abstract

The Morris F. Collen Award is given each year, when appropriate, to pioneers in the field of medical informatics who best exemplify the teaching and practice of Morrie Collen. This year's recipient, Dr. Marion Ball, has devoted her career to building bridges, trying to bridge the gaps that divided countries and regions, professions and disciplines, colleagues and co-workers, public sector and private entities. Marion Jokl was born in Johannesburg, South Africa in 1940, where her parents had settled in 1933 after leaving Nazi Germany. Her father, Ernst Jokl, was an international leader in sports medicine, and her mother was a sports teacher and corrective therapist. Both of her parents were on the 1928 German Olympic team and her mother was a gold medalist in track and field. In 1951, when the oppressive apartheid policy was proclaimed in South Africa, the family quickly left and returned to Germany. In 1952 they immigrated to the United States. In 1953, at the urging of famed University of Kentucky basketball coach Adolph Rupp, Dr. Jokl joined the medical faculty at the University in Lexington to develop a sports medicine program. Both Marion and her younger brother, Peter, graduated from high school in Lexington. Marion, who had attended eight schools on three continents, completed one year at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, before returning to …