Robert ‘Bob’ Draper, one of Baltimore’s first Black orthopedic surgeons, dies

Robert “Bob” Draper Jr. had a way of putting things in perspective.

Take, for example, the time one of his neighbor’s kids fell out of a tree and broke his arm. The boy was playing with some older children who scooped him up and ran him over to the Draper house, knowing the people inside would never turn away someone in need.

Draper, a surgeon, assessed the situation quickly, then headed to the closet. He grabbed an expensive sheet set, tore off a big piece of fabric and turned it into a makeshift tourniquet before taking the child to the hospital.

His wife, Wanda Draper, said nothing. She knew she would just buy another set of nice linens.

“If something happens, you can’t get upset, yell, scream, curse, or anything,” Wanda said. “You just gotta figure out how to fix it. … That was the way we went through life.

Bob, a “gentle giant” at 6-foot-4, showed her what patience and kindness looked like every day, she said. Aside from his contributions to medicine, he will mostly be remembered for his heart, his wife said.

Bob Draper, one of Baltimore’s first Black orthopedic surgeons and a former chief resident at Johns Hopkins Hospital, died Aug. 29 after a blood clot traveled to his heart. He was 79.

He was born Sept. 24, 1946, in Martinsville, Virginia, a tiny mill town once known for a local towel factory. He spent much of his early life outside, climbing trees, jumping in sawdust piles and playing in a nearby stream.

After Bob’s father died when he was 6 years old, he felt responsible for the family, his wife said. The eldest of three looked after his sister, Kaye, and brother, Clyde. He also cared for the family dog, Tan, named for the color of his fur.

In school, Bob was a bookworm with a knack for science. Martinsville was segregated in his youth, but by high school, Black students were allowed to visit the public library. Bob recruited his grandfather to take him there all the time.

He grew close with his high school chemistry teacher and talked often of the experiments he performed in class. After graduation, he majored in chemistry at Howard University in Washington, D.C., where he performed so well that his name was carved into the school walls, Wanda said.

He attended the University of Maryland School of Medicine before starting his career at Hopkins. He worked his way up from an intern in 1972 to chief resident of orthopedic surgery in 1976, according to a professional biography. He was the first African American to hold that role, his wife said.

He specialized in joint replacements and had his own private practice. One of his proudest career moments was when he devised a surgery to separate the fingers and toes of a child born with webbed hands and feet.

But Bob never made a big to-do of his accomplishments, Wanda said. She and her granddaughter recently found about 30 plaques and awards that he’d never hung up.

He handled professional challenges, including blatant discrimination, similarly. Early in his career, he was standing in an elevator and overheard doctors gossiping about a “new colored guy in orthopedics.” The fair-skinned Bob turned to them and said, “Really?” then resolved to grow out an Afro so they could tell he was Black.

“He took that because he decided he had a greater vision, he had a greater picture,” Wanda said. “He always knew how to persevere.”

There it was again — that perspective that Wanda had come to know and depend on. The two met in 1986 at a mutual friend’s party. Bob got lost on the way there and called for directions; the host handed the phone to Wanda, a longtime journalist in the region. When he got there, he recognized her voice from the call.

She invited him to a group dinner a little while later, and he stayed until everyone else left.

They both had children from previous marriages and bonded over their love of music and traveling. They scheduled date nights almost every Friday or Saturday. Bob was so excited to propose that he did so without a ring.

They blended their young families, with Bob’s twins Robert III and Cherie and Wanda’s son Vincent, and built their lives together in Green Spring Valley.

When Wanda told her husband one day that the children had flooded the basement, he responded, “I guess we’ll have to take care of that.” Another day, she came home from work to find her husband and a colleague huddled over the kitchen table, testing orthopedic devices that might suit one of their patients.

While Wanda was building her career, she was offered a job that paid more than her current role, but she wasn’t thrilled about the proposed work. Bob told her: “Happiness is more important, and it’s my responsibility to take care of the family. Your responsibility is to be happy. So you do what it is you want to do, and then let me take care of everything else.”

Bob was her rock, especially after Vincent died in 2000, Wanda said. He was just as wise, compassionate and cool-headed with everyone else who entered his life, she said.

In recent years, that was most evident in Bob’s interactions with his grandchildren. He would get on the floor to play with them and spoiled them with Disney cruises.

In July, as Wanda’s 75th birthday approached, she told her husband that she didn’t want to celebrate. He schemed with his granddaughter to plan a dinner for her at Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse. It was a beautiful party, where Bob told stories from their life together, Wanda said.

Two weeks later, he was admitted to the hospital for kidney failure. Two weeks after that, he was gone.

“He did not like to see people suffer,” Wanda said. “And when I walked in the room [after he died], he just looked so peaceful, like he was asleep. I was just thankful that he died the way he lived.”

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