Some people, and I believe Ashton Cuckler was one of them, seem to find their ideal professional niche. It is not a matter of luck. Luck may get them to the right starting point; but it takes work to make it work. It takes talent, and a number of other things, to make a success of it. Ashton C. Cuckler had talent in abundance, as well as the training, commitment, and the other necessary attributes. What is more, he enjoyed it all, and that may be what gave him such a flair for his chosen field of industrial parasitological research. When he died on 25 May 2000, at the age of 90, he left behind the memory an enormously successful career in the discovery and development of antiparasitic drugs.
A native of Nebraska, Ashton C. Cuckler was awarded the Ph.D. degree by the University of Minnesota in 1941, and briefly...