Stem Cell Research Advocate
After helping her son cope with a serious health problem while she was fully employed within her first career, she developed a passion to devote full time efforts to find a medical cure for her son’s disease. So, first she had to figure out how to support herself while advocating for medical research to find a cure.
FAMILY BACKGROUND
Susan Solomon (SS) was born in the Brooklyn borough of New York City. Her father founded Vanguard Records with his brother. Her mother was a pianist and manager of concert productions.
EDUCATION
Following her high school graduation, SS earned a Bachelor’s degree in history from New York University (NYU). Then she enrolled in Rutgers University law school, earning her Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree.
FIRST CAREER – LAW
After her law school graduation and earning her license to practice law by successfully passing the New York State Bar Exam, SS was employed by a private law firm (instead of working for a government agency or within the law department of a business), where she was assigned to work on an employment discrimination case on behalf of women who claimed they were denied the opportunity to become New York City firefighters. (Editor – The outcome of that litigation, whether by a judge or jury decision or by a settlement agreement between the city and the claimant women, is unknown to this editor.)
After four years with the same law firm, SS continued her legal career while transferring her employment from a private law firm to become counsel and director of business affairs for Warner Amex Satellite Entertainment. Later, SS continued to offer legal advice to her employers including United Satellite Communications, CBS Films, and Slotheby’s, where she was chief executive of its first effort to create an online auction platform. Still later, SS moved her inside corporate counsel skills to Lancit Media, a producer of TV programming for children, where she was chief executive.
LEGAL CAREER PROVIDES BUSINESS EXPERIENCE FOR A BUSINESS CAREER
Having gained sufficient business experience to transition from providing legal advice to starting her own business, SS established and managed Solomon Partners LLC (LLC stands for ‘Limited Liability Corporation”), which provided strategic management consulting services to other large businesses.
CHALLENGE – FAMILY HEALTH PROBLEMS
After SS’s mother died of cancer and her son developed Type 1 diabetes, a chronic condition that required him to constantly monitor his blood sugar levels and inject himself with insulin, SS began to ponder the apparent lack of medical research to fight (either find a cure or at least slow progression) such serious diseases.
FIRST CAREER SAVINGS ENABLE PURSUIT OF A SECOND CAREER PASSION
During a conversation with a friend, Mary Elizabeth Bunzel (MEB), then employed full-time as a journalist, SS disclosed her recent knowledge of stem cell research and its possibilities for breakthroughs in medial research.
Stem cells are basic cells that can generate new cells with specialized functions. For example, since the pancreas of a patient with Type 1 diabetes does not produce enough insulin on its own to help the body convert blood sugar into energy, stem cells can be transformed into special cells that produce insulin to help patients cope with Type 1 diabetes.
Stem cell research had become a political issue in the early 2000s for the presidential administration of George W. Bush because the cells were originally harvested only from fertilized embryos, which many social conservatives consider human lives. Some private research organizations also shied away from stem cell research at the time, fearing they might jeopardize their funding from the federal government.
Sharing their common interest in promoting stem cell research, the two ladies decided to learn more about stem cell research and who was – or could be – promoting it.
When they learned enough to conclude that the federal government was not then interested in making a major investment in stem cell research, SS and MEB created the New York Stem Cell Foundation, whose goal was – and remains as of 2024, research to accelerate cures for major diseases through stem cell research.
As chief executive, SS helped raise more than $400 million for stem cell research, beginning with early contributions from the former New York City mayor, Michael R. Bloomberg; the investor Stanley Druckenmiller and his wife, and a foundation run by the hedge-fund manager, the late (“late” as used here means “since died”) Julian Robertson.
Since the formation of the foundation in 2005, it has grown into an institution with a $40 million annual budget and more than 114 employees, including 45 full-time scientists, as well as its own laboratory. It has also overseen fellowships that support researchers at other institutions.
Editor – The news publication upon which this career story is based, did not disclose how SS supported herself financially during her work with the foundation, whether (A) SS earned a salary paid by the foundation which she helped to create or (B) whether SS could afford to work for free after saving enough money during her legal career, combined with a pension from any of the businesses where she had worked plus her government income via monthly Social Security payments. Since this collection of career stories only deals with employment which provides sufficient income to pay basic expenses (e.g. roof overhead, food, clothing, medical care, and transportation), earning enough to support herself through either option A or B would qualify SS’ story to be a self-supporting career.
CAREER SATISFACTION
SS has said that in helping to create the stem cell research organization, she was prompted in part by “a giant gap between the work being done at academic institutions and the delivery of pills and treatments on the commercial side. We, as a small organization, could never provide the funding that the government can. But what we can do is create a path, resources, fellowship programs and a laboratory to lead research. We are providing the ‘proof of concept’ so that when public opinion and public funding is available, then that work can be scaled up.”
SS never gave up hope that someday researchers would develop a treatment for the disease that her son Ben has been dealing with for three decades since he was 9 years old. As an adult, he became the executive editor of Time magazine.
“I’m not going to rest until we find a cure for Type 1 diabetes” said SS. True to her goal during her lifetime, she never rested.
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This career story is based on an obituary written by Sam Roberts, published by The New York Times newspaper on September 14, 2022.
