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THE BIOGRAPHY OF DR. ABOL GHASSEM BAKHTIAR (1872-1971)

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"At nineteen, I was a peddler in the Bakhtiyari Mountains with thousands of hallucinating dreams. I had one guideline and that was my desire-my desire for an education and for betterment. At the age of forty-four, when I came to America, I had only a high school diploma from the American High School in Tehran. No money! No relatives! No one to back me up! But I was determined to study medicine. No one on the earth could divert me from my path. When I first met the Dean of Columbia College for admission to the college, he said I had chosen a very hard subject and I should change it. I told him that death or success was my aim and I would not change my subject even if I spent all my life trying to achieve it. " (Quoted from a letter written by Dr. Abol Ghassem Bakhtiar addressed to his son, September 26, 1953).

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