Irving Stern

Dogs Tangle with Porcupine. Treated in Small Animal Clinic at Cornell.
The Ithaca Journal, Oct 17 1949, P. 5

"Porcupine can now be added to the list of wild animals in Tompkins County.
  Blackie and Brownie, collie and shepherd dogs belonging to Max Stern of Barnes Hill Rd., Newfield RD 1, tangled with one of the prickly creatures Friday evening. Stern discovered the disaster when a neighbor warned him a dog had been seen on the road frothing at the mouth and to call his own pair home. The "mad dog" proved to be one of his own.
  The two came in "looking like pincushions." Their heads, mouths, gums and tongues were full of quills. At first Stern wanted to shoot them to end their agony. Instead his son, Jerome Stern, rushed them up to the Small Animal Clinic at Cornell where he and Dr. Irving Stern, veterinarian, worked on them until midnight. Blackie, the leader, was the worst off, and for a while his life was despaired of. The doctor worked 5 hours on him Saturday and finally pulled out the last quill with the pliers.
  Blackie and Brownie were due to come home today, sadder but probably not wiser. The Sterns have a nice collection of porcupine quills on display in their tailoring shop in the State Theater Building."

Note: In 1949, the Small Animal Clinic was in James Law Hall.

Heartbeat of Dog Recorded to Help Detect Animal Ills.
The Ithaca Journal, May 12 1950, P. 2

'A terrier's heartbeat on phonograph record offers Cornell University veterinary students a new way to detect faulty "tickers" in small animals. This is the first time this type of educational device has been used by the Veterinary College.
  Credit for the recording goes to Dr. Irving Stern, medical interne in the small animal clinic, who points out that the purpose of the record is to aid students to correctly diagnose heart ailments.
  Supervised by Dr. Stern and transcribed by radio specialist T. D. Richards of the Department of Extension Teaching and Information, the record was made by means of a tape recorder connected to a stethoscope and a phonograph record-cutter. The recording is that of a 12-year-old rat terrier's heartbeat that suffers from an unusual type of cardiac irregularity.
  "The advantage of this medical recording," says Dr. Stern, "is that all students may now hear the same type of heart defect at one time and interpret it correctly. Furthermore, since animals under inspection are usually uneasy and distract students, this transcription eliminates that confusion. In this way, instructions are clearer and more understandable."
Dr. Stern also points out that formerly it was difficult to obtain an animal with the right abnormality when that type of defect was studied. This is changed now by a permanent recording of the sound on file for future use.
  These medical sounds will be as near as the classroom phonograph, says Dr. Stern.'

Obituary for Irving Stern
American Veterinary Medical Association: Obituaries. July 18,2010

"Dr. Stern (MSU '49), 91, New York, died April 30, 2010. Prior to retirement in the late 1990s, he owned a small animal practice in New York City. Dr. Stern was a member of the New York State VMS and a past board member of the VMA of New York City. He was also a charter member of the Metropolitan Veterinary Practitioners Society, an affiliate member of the American Animal Hospital Association, and a member of the American Veterinarians for Israel. Dr. Stern's daughter survives him."