J Lawton Smith Award Recipient

J Lawton Smith was one of the original founders of the COS. He was globally well known as a neuroophthalmologist who was charismatic in practice and his faith!

The J Lawton Smith Award is given out each year at the COS Annual Meeting to an ophthalmologist who has shown a lifetime commmitment to serving the Lord through their personal practice of excellence in medicine, academic influence, and/or missionary dedication.

One of the founding fathers of the COS

Recipient:

Ronald Seely, MD

Home:

Tampa, Florida

Specialty:

General

Award Year:

1992

I think about Ron Seeley as being “serious”: serious about Jesus!
quote from Dr. Bill Jarrett

Ron is an extraordinaily humble man. Essentially the COS was founded by J Lawton Smith, Ron Seeley and Curtis Benton. While J Lawton was charismatic, Ron was a presbyterian. Despite their differences, they gathered around a singular purpose in founding the society which would serve so many ophthalmologists over the years! While J Lawton Smith was the early mouthpiece of the society, both Ron Seeley and Curtis Benton did some of the main work of making it go. Both he and Curtis are described as quiet and humble – very Godly men.

JLS Award Recipients

Year	Name
1992	Ronald Seely, MD
1993	Hollis W Clark, MD
1994	Norval E Christy, MD
1995	David G Haney, MD
1996	Van Joffrion, MD
1997	Margaret Brand, MD
1998	Jack C Cooper, MD
1999	J James Rowsey, MD
2000	Curtis D Benton, Jr, MD
2001	Lowell Gess, MD
2002	Glen Brindley, MD
2002	Bill Rowlett, MD
2003	Frank Winter, MD
2004	J Donald M Gass, MD
2005	Roger DeHaven, MD
2006	John Costin, MD
2007	Bill Jarrett
2008	Juan Batlle, MD
2009	William Conrad, MD
2010	James P Gills, MD
2011	Robert Serros, MD
2012	Paul Palmberg, MD
2013	Brad Farris, MD
2014	Enoch Tsai, MD
2015	Bert Bowden, MD
2016	George Chin, MD
2017	Kyle Smith, MD
2018	Dan Gold, MD
2019	Glenn Strauss, MD
2020	Jono Pons, MD
2021	Robert Rice, MD
2022	Jacob Prabhakar, MD
2023	Mike Siatkowski, MD