Former NJSGA President, Board Member Dr. Donald K. Brief Passes Away

Donald K. Brief, a past president and longtime member of the NJSGA Board of Trustees and Caddie Scholarship Committee, died on November 9.

Brief, who was a longtime member of Crestmont Country Club and previously Green Brook Country Club, served as NJSGA President in 2002 and 2003. He grew up in South Orange, N.J., attended Columbia High School, Dartmouth College, and then Harvard Medical School from which he graduated in 1957. Brief had a distinguished tenure at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center for more than 50 years, becoming Director of Surgery for more than 20 of those years.

In 1968, he was drafted to the Vietnam War and became Chief of General Surgery at the 24th Evacuation Hospital in Long Binh, Vietnam. Brief received the Bronze Star for meritorious service in a combat zone under fire. After the Vietnam War, Donald returned to Beth Israel where he mentored a generation of medical students, interns and residents.

Brief and his late wife, Beth, had four children, Julie, Janet, Eric and Laura, nine grandchildren, and four great grandchildren. Four years after Brief’s wife Beth died after a battle with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, he married Dottie Litwin. Donations in Donald Brief’s memory may be made to the NJSGA Caddie Scholarship Foundation (NJSGA.org/donate).