Rand's last public appearance on video

[Backlighting]

http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pag...k5qeqm171.app5a

The above link is a video of Rand's last public appearance, shortly before her death (The Sanction of the Victims)

I couldn't help but notice (sadly) how winded she was throughout the speech, no doubt due to the lung cancer she had.

You can clearly see her gasps for air.

I was fortunate to hear her speak at the Ford Hall Forum in 1970. The topic was the Anti-Industrial Revolution.

I prefer to remember her that way.

[Brant Gaede]

http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pag...k5qeqm171.app5a

The above link is a video of Rand's last public appearance, shortly before her death (The Sanction of the Victims)

I couldn't help but notice (sadly) how winded she was throughout the speech, no doubt due to the lung cancer she had.

You can clearly see her gasps for air.

I was fortunate to hear her speak at the Ford Hall Forum in 1970. The topic was the Anti-Industrial Revolution.

I prefer to remember her that way.

The lung cancer she had had. "No doubt" is also questionable. The medical specifics of her last months, weeks and days are not available.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Las Vegas,

Rand died of a heart attack. She was cured of lung cancer by surgery.

Michael

[Ellen Stuttle]

The medical specifics of her last months, weeks and days are not available.

One medical specific which is sort of "available" is that Kathryn Eickhoff, who accompanied her in the train car on the trip, said she had flu. I heard this from a friend of Kathryn's shortly after the trip. I have a dim recollection of Leonard Peikoff's also saying this somewhere; sorry, I'm not sure where. Maybe in his "My Thirty Years..."?

Ellen

___

[Brant Gaede]

Las Vegas,

Rand died of a heart attack. She was cured of lung cancer by surgery.

Michael

What is the reference for this? I think congestive heart failure would be much more likely.

--Brant

Edited March 5, 2008 by Brant Gaede

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Brant,

I was using the term "heart attack" in the popular sense of covering all heart failure. But you are correct and that's a bad habit I have. There is a difference between myocardial infarction and CHF. Rand most likely had the latter. Here is one source from the Objectivism Reference Center's Ayn Rand Biographical FAQ (with the two footnotes):

6.10 Did Rand die from lung cancer?

No. The reported cause of Rand's death was heart failure.[*]

A few authors, apparently careless with their research, have stated that Rand died of lung cancer. Rand was diagnosed with lung cancer in 1974, but she underwent surgery, which she reported to be "a complete success." She also stopped smoking at this time. There is no evidence that she experienced any recurrence of the cancer or that it was directly involved in her death, which did not come until 1982.[*]

[*] Section 6.10, note 1: Harry Binswanger, "To the Reader," The Objectivist Forum 3:1 (February 1982), p. 1. See also Sense [Ayn Rand: A Sense of Life by Michael Paxton], p. 184, Rand [Ayn Rand by Jeff Britting], p. 118, and Passion [The Passion of Ayn Rand by Barbara Branden], pp. 402-403.

[*]Section 6.10, note 2: Rand's lung cancer is discussed in Passion [The Passion of Ayn Rand by Barbara Branden], pp. 379-385, and Rand [Ayn Rand by Jeff Britting], p. 108. (It is also mentioned in a number of other places, such as Ronald Merrill, The Ideas of Ayn Rand, p. 147, but it is likely that these authors got their information from Branden rather than from an independent source.) Both Branden and Britting indicate that Rand had surgery to treat the cancer, and that her death several years later was from heart problems. Rand did not reveal in public that she had cancer, but she did refer to an unspecified "illness" in The Ayn Rand Letter. In the issue dated August 12, 1974, she said that "the operation was a complete success."

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

That was her surgeon's evaluation. She couldn't know what she was talking about. That was just pablum for her readers. It's not like there weren't permanent, debilitating consequences. There always are with that type of surgery. My Father's lung cancer was inoperable. Two months from diagnosis to death. Of course she was speaking in shorthand and trying to preserve her privacy. For long-term lung cancer survival she beat serious odds.

--Brant

[Chris Grieb]

In a conversation with someone who was close to Ayn Rand he told me that Miss Rand knew she was dying. I must add that an operation with the removal of a lung would led to long term consequences. Miss Rand was probably suffering from depression.

[Jerry Biggers]

http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pag...k5qeqm171.app5a

The above link is a video of Rand's last public appearance, shortly before her death (The Sanction of the Victims)

I couldn't help but notice (sadly) how winded she was throughout the speech, no doubt due to the lung cancer she had.

You can clearly see her gasps for air.

I was fortunate to hear her speak at the Ford Hall Forum in 1970. The topic was the Anti-Industrial Revolution.

I prefer to remember her that way.

I believe the correct description would be the lung operation was a success, but the patient died anyway.

No, doubt, complications from the lung cancer affected her heart.