John W. Michael was a leader in prosthetics and orthotics, and he spent several decades working to combine education and research as the field matured.
Michael spent more than a decade leading Northwestern University’s Prosthetics-Orthotics Center, and in his work, he helped the university develop a formal master’s degree in the field and co-edited two textbooks. Always interested in working with his hands, Michael became a national figure in prosthetics and orthotics, which essentially are braces, inserts or other items that are aimed at influencing and improving the neuromuscular and skeletal systems.
“There was about 20 years there when the name John Michael was probably the most recognizable in the profession of orthotics and prosthetics,” said J. Martin Carlson, the former director of Habilitation Technologies at Gillette Children’s Hospital in St. Paul, Minnesota, and a longtime friend. “He traveled all over, and was in high demand for public speaking on technical issues and products and things like that.”
Michael, 74, died July 25 at Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis of a subdural hematoma that he suffered after hitting his head while on blood thinners, said his daughter, Kathryn.
A longtime Edgewater resident, he had been in Minnesota visiting his son at the time.
Born in Indianapolis, Michael spent his earliest years in that city before moving with his family to Ogden Dunes, Indiana. He graduated from Portage High School and then earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology in 1971 from Michigan State University.
After college, Michael was a psychiatric caseworker before deciding to earn a certificate in prosthetics and orthotics from Northwestern University in 1976, his daughter said. His first job was with Scheck & Siress, a prosthetics firm in Oak Park.
Michael then joined the staff of Northwestern University, where he was the assistant director of prosthetics education from 1978 until 1981. After that, he returned to Scheck & Siress for a year, and while there, he picked up a master’s degree in education from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He then took a job at North Shore Orthopedics in Highland Park.
“He liked working with his hands and machines, and he loved helping people, so developing prosthetics and orthotics was a good fit for him,” Kathryn Michael said.
In 1985, Michael left North Shore Orthopedics to take a job at Duke University in North Carolina, where he was director of the prosthetics and orthotics department. He left Duke in 1992 and moved to Minnesota to work at Ottobock, which makes orthotics and prosthetic devices for patients with amputations, injuries or neurological diseases.
In the late 1990s, Michael decided to strike out on his own, running his consulting firm, CPO Services, while still based in Minnesota. He and his family then returned to northwest Indiana to care for elderly parents while he still ran his own firm.
Before long, Michael began working at Northwestern again, and in 2009, he was named director of the university’s prosthetics and orthotics center. As part of his work there, he helped Northwestern transition its educational offerings from the certificate program, in which he had earned his certificate, to a full-fledged master’s degree program.
“Dad had a real dedication to his profession, to helping it grow and mature,” Kathryn Michael said. “Northwestern was so life-changing for him as a young man and a professional, so I think it really meant a lot to him to see that program and to be on the team that actually moved it to a master’s program.”
Michael’s son, David, said that “to connect education and research in one shared goal was something he really was proud of.”
Mindy Thorpe, an assistant professor and director of online education at Northwestern’s Prosthetics-Orthotics Center, said Michael’s “knowledge and impact touched every corner of the profession.”
“John led by example, never shying away from the hands-on, challenging tasks that others might avoid,” she said. “His commitment to his work was unwavering, giving 100% in everything he did. He was generous with his time and knowledge, always ready to guide and support me in becoming a better educator myself.”
With John Bowker, Michael co-edited a widely used textbook, “Atlas of Limb Prosthetics.” The book made an appearance in the 1993 film “The Fugitive,” which features actor Harrison Ford playing a wrongly accused surgeon, Dr. Richard Kimble. At one point in the film, Ford is shown dozing on a bed holding that textbook.
Later in his career, Michael also co-edited another textbook with Donald Shurr, “Prosthetics and Orthotics.”
In 2019, Michael retired as the director of the Prosthetics-Orthotics Center. He stayed on for another year after that to assist in the leadership transition.
Outside of work, Michael enjoyed gardening and working on an Avanti car, his family said.
In addition to his daughter and son, Michael is survived by his wife of 54 years, Linda; two grandchildren; a sister, Sue; and a brother, Don.
A service is being planned for fall in Chicago.
Goldsborough is a freelance reporter.
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