No bones about it

Retired orthopaedic surgeon's gift to help explore children's learning differences

Thomas Castelloe spent a career mending bodies. Now he’s helping Carolina tend to the psyches inside them.

A retired orthopaedic surgeon, Castelloe has given $333,000 to establish the Thomas E. Castelloe Distinguished Professorship in Developmental-Behavioral Pediatrics in the School of Medicine’s Department of Pediatrics. Carolina has applied for another $167,000 in matching contributions from the state’s Distinguished Professors Endowment Trust Fund.

The Castelloe professorship will be used to attract or retain a top scholar-teacher to direct the Clinical Center for the Study of Development and Learning (CDL), which works to improve the lives of people with developmental disabilities.

The first person to hold the professorship will be Mel Levine, the center’s current director and an internationally noted expert on children’s mental and behavioral development.

In connection to the CDL, Levine launched a nonprofit program called “All Kinds of Minds.” It aims to show parents and educators how they can meet the needs of children with different learning styles.

Thomas Castelloe in 1961

Castelloe said he “so admired” Levine and his staff for the work they’re doing that creating the professorship made perfect sense.

“It was my honor to do it,” he said.

Castelloe can relate to CDL’s mission to help people get on track, though he dealt with the physical—rather than mental—realm.

He graduated from the School of Medicine in 1956, ranked second in his class. He spent the next five years completing his residency in orthopaedic surgery at N.C. Memorial Hospital, which since has evolved into UNC Hospitals. That stint included one year of caring for crippled children at the N.C. Children’s Hospital, then in Gastonia.

“Caring for children with problems in orthopaedics made me thankful and value the work of the Center for Learning and Development and Dr. Levine,” Castelloe said. “Regardless of whether you’ve got a child with a physical or emotional problem, if you can get this person on the right path, then you’ve got a whole lifetime to benefit.”

And the benefits also spread to families, as they see loved ones becoming able to take their place in society.

“A little bit goes a long way,” Castelloe said.

Castelloe and his grandson Jeffry — Keath Castelloe Low's youngest child (see Lessons from the field)

Along with his medical degree, Castelloe earned his bachelor’s at Carolina, graduating Phi Beta Kappa in 1952. He helped found the Raleigh Orthopaedic Clinic in 1961 after finishing his residency and practiced there until retiring in 1990. During this time, he also served as clinical assistant professor in orthopaedic surgery in the medical school.

Castelloe, who still lives in Raleigh, grew up on a farm in Winterville in eastern North Carolina. He credits UNC with getting him from there to here.

“I put the mule in the barn and went to Carolina and when I left, I was an orthopaedic surgeon,” he said.

Castelloe found much satisfaction in a career devoted to repairing people’s bodies. It also came in handy close to home.

His son, Clifton, broke his leg playing soccer for a select team in high school. Castelloe took him to his office and set the cast.

“I figured they (the team) wanted him to have the best doctor,” he said.

And around age 11, daughter Keath was at their Raleigh home playing with a new friend when a sharp pain pierced the bottom of her foot as she ran barefoot across a shag-carpeted floor.

Not wanting to make a scene in front of her new friend, Keath kept quiet and kept on playing. A few days later her foot, already very sore, began to swell. She broke her silence. X-rays at dad’s office revealed that a sewing needle had lodged between two toes and broken off. Castelloe removed it, then stitched his daughter back up.

“She was such a great girl that we went out and celebrated with a pizza,” he said.

Castelloe and Keath have gone on to celebrate many things, including an NCAA women’s soccer championship—“He attended every home game while I was at UNC and traveled to most of the away games to watch the team and cheer us on,” Keath said—as well as gifts to Carolina (see related story, Lessons from the field).

“UNC has given a lot to my family,” Keath said. “We have especially benefited from the School of Medicine and the athletics program so it was appropriate to select those programs for donations.

“It’s nice to give back to the University as a family.”

Scott Ragland

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