AN INAUSPICIOUS START
In 1945, at age 21, Charles Hodge became head of the Department of Neurophotography at the Montreal Neurological Institute. His only credential for this responsible and exacting job was his enthusiasm for photography acquired a few years earlier through the use of a Kodak box camera. However, he certainly had a protracted exposure to medicine in general. From the age of 12 he spent 3 years as a patient in the Royal Victoria Hospital, after he was severely burned by a fire in a model airplane shop. During his recovery period he went through an agonizing series of skin grafts and reconstructive surgery. For his first job, he accepted an offer to work as an assistant in photography, without pay, at the MNI. Six months later, Peter Hayden, the Neuro's experienced medical photographer, decided to leave. So Dr. Wilder Penfield asked Charlie to take over the department, which he then headed for nearly fifty years.

     Charlie gave himself a crash course in medical photography, somewhat stimulated by the exacting demands of Dr. Penfield for special photography of the epileptic cases in the operating room and by the usually urgent requests of Dr. Bill Cone for pictures of pathological specimens, surgical instruments, operative procedures and tests on patients. Charlie read all the photography books he could lay his hands on and attended meetings of photographic associations. If Dr. Penfield was not satisfied with the pictures taken in the operating room, he would call Charlie into his office and patiently go over with him how the photos might be improved. 

During his half-century of dedicated service to the Neuro, Charlie Hodge became well known  to all the staff members, the nurses and particularly to the residents and research fellows. He provided them with endless teaching materials for rounds and conferences and for their research and publications. When shown at national and international meetings, slides and posters from the Neuro set a standard of excellence.

Neurophotography, in the original MNI building (now the Rockefeller Pavilion), was located on the first floor, just across the corridor from the information desk at which a charming secretary worked, Eileen Robinson. In 1950 she married Charlie Hodge and became his devoted lifelong companion.