Noah Gibson

Noah Francis Gibson, IV, MD, of Danville, Virginia—a loving husband, father, uncle, and friend—died on April 6, 2017, at Duke University Hospital after a brief illness. Born in 1946, the son of Noah Francis Gibson Jr. and Lydia Carroll Gibson, he grew up in Tatum, South Carolina, and graduated from Wofford College and the Bowman Gray School of Medicine (now the Wake Forest School of Medicine). Afterward he served as a pediatrician at the U.S. Army hospital in Okinawa, Japan, and as chief of pediatrics at Moncrief Army Hospital in Fort Jackson, South Carolina. In Danville, he was a much beloved pediatrician from 1978 until his retirement in 2016. He was a fellow member of the American Academy of Pediatrics and a member of the American Medical Association, the Virginia Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Virginia Medical Society, and the Danville-Pittsylvania Academy of Medicine. Dr. Gibson held leadership positions on several state committees related to children’s health; he also chaired the Danville Memorial Hospital’s department of pediatrics for five terms and later served as chair of the Danville Regional Medical Center’s Department of Women and Children. With adjunct professorships at the University of Virginia School of Medicine, James Madison University, the Virginia College of Osteopathic Medicine and other institutions, he helped train numerous young medical professionals. Dr. Gibson was also an avid violinist—a childhood pursuit he later returned to as an adult when his daughter Catherine began taking lessons—and he became a founding member of the Danville Symphony Orchestra, playing first violin from 1993 to 2017. He loved traditional Irish music, and most Sundays he could be found playing in Irish sessions in Greensboro or Winston-Salem, North Carolina. He was an enthusiastic duck hunter, fisherman, and target shooter. He was kind, funny, and generous. Dr. Gibson is survived by his wife of 46 years, Linda Johnson Gibson; and his two daughters Lydialyle Johnson Gibson of Somerville, Massachusetts, and Catherine Hall Gibson of Washington, D.C. Donations in his memory may be made to Wofford College and to the Danville Symphony Orchestra Endowment. A visitation will be held at Townes Funeral Home on Sunday, April 9, from 6 to 8 p.m. A graveside service will be at the Harrells Community Cemetery in Harrells, North Carolina at 1 p.m. Monday, April 10.