John M. Kuldau
John M. Kuldau, MD, Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry at UF, died March 2, five days after suffering a cerebral hemorrhage. He leaves his wife, Christiana M. Leonard, PhD, Professor Emeritus of Neuroscience, four children, Gretchen and Gustav Kuldau, Andrew and Amy Leonard, as well as six grandchildren. His first wife, Erma L. Kuldau, died April 22, 1981. His second marriage took place on January 1, 1982. Dr. Kuldau was devoted to "training doctors to be psychiatrists." As Director of Residency Training from 1979 to 1997, he educated a generation of psychiatrists who serve the State and University.
Dr. Kuldau was born August 9, 1933, in Sandusky, OH. In 1954, he received a BS summa cum laude from Ohio State and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. After receiving his MD from Western Reserve Medical School in 1958, he interned at Boston City Hospital and entered a residency in Psychiatry at Harvard. He spent a year in research studying verbal messages with William F. Soskin, PhD, and later spent sabbaticals at the Institute of Psychiatry (1971-1972) and Oxford University (1982-1983) in England.
He served two years as a Naval Staff Psychiatrist in San Diego, attaining the rank of Lieutenant Commander. He became Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at Stanford in 1965 and helped establish a nonprofit corporation, DANN Services, to enable psychiatric inpatients to become gainfully employed either in the community or a sheltered workshop. He served as President from 1968 to 1974, leaving when he became Associate Professor of Psychiatry at UF. He served as Interim Chair before becoming Chief of the Psychiatry Service at the Gainesville VA Medical Center in 1992, retiring in 2002. Even though his major commitment was to education and clinical care, he received several research grants from UF, NIH and the VA.
Dr. Kuldau continued to teach and supervise residents until days before his death. He loved the Democrats, gardening, travel, music and telling bad jokes. A green burial in Prairie Creek Conservation Cemetery and a memorial service is planned. In lieu of flowers donations should be made to Haven Hospice. Arrangements by Countryside Funeral Home, Anthony.
