Robert Hepburn, 94, last sibling of actress Katharine Hepburn dies
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Robert Hepburn, the last sibling of actress Katharine Hepburn still
alive, died of a heart attack Monday at Hartford Hospital, where he
headed the urology department more than 30 years ago. He was 94.
The youngest brother of the film legend, Hepburn was one of six
children of Katharine Houghton Hepburn, an early proponent for birth
control, and Dr. Thomas Hepburn, the head of urology and chief of
staff at Hartford Hospital whom Robert would emulate.
A graduate of Harvard Medical School in 1939, Hepburn took an
internship at Hartford Hospital and began a residency at Massachusetts
General Hospital in 1941, before being fast-tracked into service in
the World War II Pacific theater in 1943. He was appointed chief of
urology aboard the U.S.S. Repose, a naval hospital ship that served at
the Battle of Okinawa, and later was stationed at Shanghai serving
both the American and British navies.
After being discharged in 1946, he began practicing at Hartford
Hospital, where he was known as a caring doctor who often did
surgeries pro bono, once taking shoes as payment from a cobbler and a
birdhouse from a woodworker, said his son-in-law Robert Kravitz.
"When he did his rounds, he spent an inordinate amount of time so that
he could understand his patients well at the front end," Kravitz said.
Hepburn's political activism peaked during the Vietnam War, when he
served as a lead delegate for anti-war presidential candidate Eugene
McCarthy in 1968 and wrote several letters to The Courant, including
one in 1967 contending that American policy in Vietnam "can never be
accepted by Americans who remember their own history."
Hepburn retired from medicine in 1973, staying in a home in West
Hartford along the Hart Meadow Brook. A man who once partied with
Charlie Chaplin and flew in an airplane with Howard Hughes, Hepburn
later moved in with his daughter Susanna and her husband, Kravitz, in
Canton.
Kravitz described Hepburn as a humble man who was known for his
intelligence and spiritual guidance. Kravitz said that out of all of
the Hepburn siblings -- which included local historian Marion Hepburn
Grant; Margaret Hepburn Perry, former head of the Canton Public
Library; playwright Richard Hepburn, and older siblings Thomas and
Katharine -- Robert was known to his parents as the most focused.
"He [Robert] was probably the glue that held the family together,"
Kravitz said.
Hepburn is also survived by his son, David P. Hepburn of Glastonbury,
and his grandchildren Jarrett, Naomi, Owen and Olivia Kravitz of
Canton. There will be no calling hours for Hepburn, and the family
will hold a private service.
By TANVEER ALI
Courant Staff Writer
November 29, 2007