From her apartment at Suffield by the River, Odette Makari looks toward the garden where a handcrafted tile reads, “In loving memory of Jack Makari.” Odette’s late husband died in May 2013. The tile was made by Celia Moffie’s daughter, Hannah Donnelly.
Dr. Makari was a medical researcher. He and Odette came as newlyweds from their native Lebanon to Texas where he was appointed director of immunology at the Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. Later established in New Jersey, the doctor developed the Makari Intradermal Skin test that detected cancer before it became clinically observable.
Approved by British regulators, the test received its first U.S. patent in 1988. Although Dr. Makari worked on the test for over 30 years, it never received a U. S patent.
The Makaris welcomed three children, Grace, Doris and George, each of whom became a medical doctor. Grace and Doris specialize in cancer treatment and research. Grace married a doctor and they had four children, two of whom became doctors. Odette shares these four grandchildren with Barbara Judson who also lives at Suffield by the River.
Odette and Jack Makari’s son George became a medical doctor, a psychiatrist, psychoanalyst and Director of the Institute for the History of Psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical Center where he is Professor of Psychiatry.
Dr. George received the Benjamin Rush Award in 2017 from the American Psychiatric Association for his body of work. He published Revolution in Mind: The Creation of Psychoanalysis in 2008 and Soul Machine: The Invention of the Modern Mind in 2015.
Wall Street Journal reviewer Raymond Tallis wrote, “…the writer is a superb raconteur.” (November 7-8, 2015)
Dr. Makari dedicated his first book to his wife and children. “For Arabella, Gabrielle and Jack. My kind of wonderful,” he wrote.
His second book, Soul Machine, bore this loving inscription: “For my parents, Jack and Odette Makari, and especially for my wife.”