A Mass of Remembrance was celebrated March 14 at St. Catherine Laboure Church, Torrance, for Dr. Richard John Lescoe, acclaimed thoracic surgeon who helped found the Mission Doctors Association in 1959, who died Feb. 24. The 83-year-old Pasadena resident had suffered for years with debilitating Parkinson's Disease.

"I remember Dr. Dick Lesco very well," said Msgr. Lawrence O'Leary, who served as the third director of the Los Angeles branch of the Propagation of the Faith and Lay Mission-Helpers after founder Msgr. Anthony Brouwers. "He was a brilliant thoracic surgeon and very much interested in the work of the Mission Doctors Association. Along with Drs. James Maloney and Charles Westerbeck, they were men who were trying to help the church and help Msgr. Brouwers start the Mission Doctors."

Anna Jane and Richard Lescoe were married for 26 years and had three daughters: Donna, Linda and Debbie. They had known each other growing up as teenagers in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She says he was a man of integrity and compassion, especially for the work of the Mission Doctors serving in Africa.

"After Msgr. Brouwers approached him to get it off the ground, we used to raise money galore for the missions," she recalled. "He really stayed involved over the years not only raising money but also recruiting doctors for the missions. He was so busy with doing good for other people, I never saw him. He was a very good man."

Dr. Lescoe began his career as a thoracic and cardio-vascular surgeon in Southern California. He worked at Little Company of Mary Hospital in Torrance and St. Mary's Medical Center in Long Beach. At St. Mary's he was a member of the operating team who performed the first open heart surgery on a patient kept alive by a heart-lung machine.

He was a diplomat of the American Board of Thoracic Surgery and a member of the American College of Surgeons. He served as southwest district president of the Los Angeles County Medical Association.

"He was a great guy, a great go-getter who studied law as well as medicine late in life," said long-time friend and patient Msgr. John O'Byrne, pastor of St. Catherine Laboure Church who presided at the March 14 Mass of Remembrance for Dr. Lescoe. "When he did the surgeries at St. Mary's, he would sleep on a cot that night to be available in case anything went wrong. He was tremendously dedicated."

Dr. Richard Lescoe is survived by his wife Jean Sharley Taylor-Lescoe, daughters Donna Lescoe, Linda Lescoe, Debbi Lescoe-Navarro and step-son John Harvey Taylor, as well as five grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

---R.W. Dellinger