Dr. Sherman P. Lipton

Dr. Sherman P. LiptonMunster, INDr. Sherman P. Lipton, 90, of Munster, IN passed away on Friday February 26, 2010. He was preceded in death his beloved wife Dorothy of Munster, Indiana, by his parents Dr. Myron I. Lifschutz and Esther Lifschutz, both of Chicago, Illinois and by his brother Dr. Earle Lipton of Syracuse New York. He is survived by his loving sons Alan Robert of Valparaiso Indiana and James Merrill of Muster, Indiana and by his adoring grandchildren Bradley, Joshua, Evan, Lauren, and Alex Lipton. To know Sherm was to know a delightful person. A kind, gentle, sweet man, Sherm was warm and loving, genuinely compassionate and caring, not just to his family and friends, but to all who knew him, worked with him or just had the good fortune to be his patient. A little smile on his face, a twinkle in his eye, to be with him was pure pleasure. His ever-present, often self-effacing humor was captivating, infectious, and always good-natured. He innocently and quite unintentionally seduced all around him with his warmth, creativity, and quick wit. One could not know Sherm and fail to love him. In a word, he was charming.Born and raised in Chicago of immigrant parents, he followed his father Myron’s path to become a dentist. Proving that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, the two dentists, both true gentlemen, practiced together in downtown Chicago for years while the old-country charm and wit of the father was transposed into the all-American charm and wit of the son. The laughter, the smile, the light-hearted good-nature, all trickled down from father to son, all except the name. In the 1940’s Sherm and his beloved younger brother Earle decided to Americanize the family name, so the Lifschutz boys became the Lipton men.A star athlete at Sullivan High School in the 1930’s, Sherm excelled at basketball and swimming. On the basketball court, he soon learned not to dive for a loose ball unless he was wearing a jock-strap. As a swimmer, he quickly learned to remember to tie his bathing suit string before diving into the pool for a race, lest his suit end up around his ankles impairing his kick. His strengths, however, were academics and the arts. A talented caricaturist for the high school newspaper, the same keen eye for precision and detail that would later make him a skilled dentist, helped him to create cleverly lampooning, distorted, but easily recognizable imagery of the victims of his pen. Also an accomplished violinist, he easily transitioned between classical, jazz and swing. Along with his brother Earle, Sherm also wrote and recorded music, but he never got “that big break.” After high school Sherm attended the University of Illinois and Northwestern University, where he earned his dental degree. A naval officer during World War ll, Sherm was stationed on Adak in the Aleution Islands, an experience he recalled frequently and fondly.After returning from the war, he was besotted by Dorothy Kaufman, a beautiful young redhead from Chicago who stole his heart and held it captive for more than sixty years, even beyond her own tragic passing in January, 2008. Living first in Chicago and later raising his family in Evanston, Sherm commuted to the downtown office he shared with his father. Later, he began the long commute to a clinic in northwest Indiana opened by his close friend, Sid Goldstone. In 1971 he moved to Munster, Indiana where the family home has remained. He instilled in his boys Alan and Jim, the same personal ethics and characteristics that his father had imparted to him. As Myron had passed down the importance of a profession to Sherm, so too had Sherm passed it down to Alan, a lawyer and Jim, the third-generation dentist. But he passed on more to his boys more than the wit and the smile, the warmth, the caring and the joy of life. As the epitome of honesty, integrity, and good conscience he also bestowed upon them strong ethical values and a deep concern for personal and social justice.Always inquisitive over the years, Sherm was well-read on the topics that held his interest. In part because of his rather unusual and encyclopedic medical history, he was particularly well-versed on medical issues; especially those that affected him directly and those of every other member of the family, horizontally and vertically for generations. Precisely what he did with this wealth of knowledge, he never disclosed, but there isn’t a disease, treatment, or medicine currently known to medical science that was not also known to Sherm! Endowed with abundant creativity, Sherm not only wrote music and sketched caricatures, but he also was an inventor. Always solving problems or dreaming of new and different ways to do things, Sherm drafted specifications for several patents complete with personally hand-drawn illustrations, but he never submitted any to be patented. It was as though it was enough to have solved the problem in great detail, a patent wasn’t really necessary. But of all of his creative passions, Sherm’s love of music was ubiquitous. Aside from writing music and playing the violin, he would inevitably and unconsciously turn any sound into a tune. Sherm would take any repetitive sound like, for example, a seatbelt warning noise in a car and sing along with it or turn it into a song. Whenever he listened to music, he would savor it and lose himself in it. He invariably would close his eyes, tilt his head and conduct the music with his hands and head. Everything was music to his ears.After more than ninety years, two sons and five cherished grandchildren, his mind was still strong and his wit sharp and quick, but his body was tired and worn. He knew his spark was running out, but he dearly missed his Dorothy; and he seemed to decide that enough was enough. It is undeniable that everyone who knew him loved him. It is also true that everyone who knew him will miss his delightful little smile, the twinkle in his eye and his wonderful sense of humor. A Graveside service will be held on Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:00 AM at Memorial Park Cemetery, 9900 Gross Point Rd. Skokie, IL.