On November 1, 2002, The Heffter Research Institute hosted a memorial for Bob Wallace at the San Francisco Theological Seminary in San Anselmo California. About 120 of Bob’s friends gathered to eat and drink and celebrate his life and the friendship we shared with him. Dr. Dave Nichols, the President of the Heffter Board of Directors, offered the following:
Friends of Bob Wallace, good evening. Thank you all for coming. I won’t speak long because I know that a lot of you wish to share your memories of Bob. I’d like to offer you my own perspective on Bob, starting with a quotation from Leo Rosten. Leo said, “The purpose of life is to matter – to count, to stand for something, to have it make some difference that we lived at all.” I think that Leo was talking about people like Bob.
As many of you know, I initiated the formation of the Heffter Research Institute, an organization that encourages and promotes scientific research into the value of psychedelics. And, to paraphrase Nelson Henderson, we are planting trees in whose shade we do not expect to sit. We were incorporated in 1993, and for many years we were a virtual institute, with a vision but no money.
Enter Bob Wallace. Bob immediately saw the possibilities of what we were doing, and that if we were successful we could catalyze a global revolution in psychiatry. That wasn’t an easy idea to sell, especially when you started talking about psychedelics. But Bob was different. He glimpsed the power of psychedelics, and he believed that the last great frontier was the human mind. Bob often talked about ways to enhance the mind, of somehow optimizing the human mind for peace and understanding. He started Promind Books as a way to promote this dialogue.
Bob adopted our cause as his own, and became our single largest benefactor, providing one-third to one-half of our operating funds each year. If we received a small but interesting research application but we were over budget, it was typical of Bob to say, “oh, I can fund that.” And he did. We quickly invited Bob to join our board and he was a good and wise ally. As a non-physician and non-scientist he asked us tough and penetrating questions. I can’t remember another nonscientist who knew as much neuropharmacology as Bob. I’m sure all of you know that Bob had an insatiable desire to learn new things.
Bob was my friend; he was our friend. He was a kind and gentle soul who never spoke ill of anyone. If he heard negative comments made about someone, it was more typical of him to mutter something like, “oh my.” Although it may be possible to replace his seat on our board, we can never replace him in our hearts.
Wherever Bob is, there I also hope to be some day. And for Bob’s sake, I hope they have a supply of those little note cards that he always seemed to carry with him to write on because I know that wherever he is, he is asking lots of questions.
So, goodbye for now Bob, dear friend. May we all meet again in that sweet by and by.
