Harold Chafkin, M.D., of Middletown, passed away Jan. 3, 2021 at Riverview Medical Center. Harold was a beloved husband for 68-and-a-half years to Barbara; adored father and father-in-law to Martin Chafkin and Kathryn Kaufmann, Tabatha Chafkin, D.V.M. and DD Montgomery, Leigh and Phil Ober, and Michael Chafkin; loving grandfather to Julia and Will Chafkin, Michelle and Evan Ober, and Grant N. Chafkin; and dedicated caregiver extraordinaire to thousands of patients, colleagues, friends and anyone who needed that old-school medical diagnosis and care that came from hands-on diagnostics, a stellar memory, an avid hunger for knowledge and a relentless passion to ensure his patients got the best care to live a quality life.
A more generous spirit, playful soul and bigger heart one could not find. He was a fabulous joke teller and a late-in-life golfer, infamous for his relentless retrieval of every golf ball. He has left an indelible imprint on all who had the privilege and pleasure to enjoy his company.
Harold was born Oct. 30, 1926, in Brooklyn and lived in Philadelphia until he was 17, after which the family moved to Brooklyn. He graduated high school at 16 and enrolled at Brooklyn College. He enlisted in the U.S. Navy and trained at the Great Lakes Training Center as a radio technician, then served on the tanker USS Maumee from 1944 to 1946. Discharged in San Diego, he returned home and resumed his pre-med studies at Syracuse University until he graduated magna cum laude in 1949; he was also a member of Phi Beta Kappa. He went on to graduate from SUNY Downstate Medical Center in 1954, then served two internships at Beth Israel Hospital. He served his residency at Beth Israel Hospital and completed his residency at Montefiore Hospital Medical Center where he was elected chief medical resident in his final year.
He met the love of his life, Barbara Berger, while at Syracuse and they married June 29, 1952. After making their first home in the Sunnyside neighborhood of Long Island City, New York, they moved to New Jersey where Harold set up a private practice in internal medicine and practiced at both Monmouth Medical Center (until 1968) and Riverview Medical Center. Since 1967, he was an attending physician at Riverview Hospital in Red Bank, where he was also the director of the department of medicine for seven years, and founded and was the director of all critical care units at Riverview from inception to 1996.
He also served on the board of managers at Monmouth School of Nursing, and was chairman of the board of the Therapeutic Abortion Committee at Monmouth Medical Center in Long Branch. At Riverview he was also the vice chairman of the Riverview Medical Center Foundation and chairman of the Grants Committee as well as a member of the Thanatology Committee and Ethics Committee. He subsequently joined the Barnabas Health Medical Group practice in Middletown where he continued serving patients until he retired at 89.
Harold and Barbara built their home in Middletown where they lived happily for 56 of their 68-and-a-half years of marriage, raising their four children and enjoying their grandchildren.
The article originally appeared in the January 21 – 26, 2021 print edition of The Two River Times.
