Dr. Ulisse "Lee" Cucco was on call but at home, riding out the last hours of the worst blizzard in the city’s recorded history in 1967, when the phone rang.

At the other end of the line was the panic-stricken voice of a patient — pregnant, at full term and having contractions — explaining that she and her husband were trapped inside their home.

Nearly 23 inches of snow had already blanketed the city and suburbs from the two-day storm during that last week in January. Most roads were impassable, with drifts as high as 10 feet and winds reaching 45 mph.

Cucco, then one of the younger members of the staff of the department of obstetrics and gynecology at what was Holy Family Hospital in Des Plaines, was given a police escort to the hospital. But the pregnant woman and her husband couldn’t get out of their home, so he had to talk the husband, step-by-step, through the delivery process over the phone.

"I can only imagine the pressure he was under in that situation," said former colleague Dr. Jim Eggers, a longtime partner in a medical practice with Cucco, who likened it to a pilot talking someone through an emergency landing. "Every word had consequences."

But on that bleak, wintry day, a healthy baby was born, thanks in large part to the efforts of Cucco and the calming effect he had on the shaken father.

"What mattered most was giving his patients the best care possible," Eggers said.

Cucco, 87, died of natural causes Jan. 24 at his home in Northbrook, his family said. He had retired at age 70, having delivered thousands of babies during his long career.

"He was a kind, compassionate and gentle man," said his daughter, Toni. "At the hospital, they called him a teddy bear. In fact, a nurse gave him a teddy bear dressed like a doctor that was made to look like him."

In 1997, at what is now Presence Holy Family Medical Center, Cucco founded The New Beginnings Maternity Program to provide holistic, affordable care to pregnant women, particularly those who were disadvantaged.

"A person’s financial status shouldn’t be a barrier to obtaining this kind of care," he wrote in describing the program for the Tribune’s Voice of the People in November 1997. "Lab tests, office visits, parenting and childbirth classes, education, counseling, social-work services, access to high-risk specialists, labor/delivery/recovery, post-partum and pediatric care are all provided by highly trained, caring professionals including a bilingual (Spanish/English) office and clinical staff."

Cucco grew up in an apartment above his Italian immigrant parents’ coffee shop in Brooklyn. "Growing up, he was very much into his Italian ancestry," his son Mike said. "He was also an avid Yankees fan."

He earned a bachelor’s degree from Long Island University in 1950 and a medical degree from Loyola University’s Stritch School of Medicine in 1954.

After an internship in New York, he returned to Chicago and completed a residency in obstetrics and gynecology at Mercy Hospital in 1958. For the next two years, he served in the Air Force as a captain and physician on a military base in South Dakota.

In 1960, Cucco opened his practice in Mount Prospect and later joined the staff at Holy Family Hospital, where he served as chairman of the department of obstetrics and president of the medical staff. He was also on staff at Resurrection Hospital and Northwest Community Hospital in Arlington Heights.

During the 1960s and 70s, Cucco was an early advocate for regular health evaluations for women, especially on issues related to fatigue, and supported extended maternity leave for working women.

"We find out her medical history, her background," he told the Tribune in 1968. "We want to know how many children she has, what she does all day, and, if she works, what it’s like on the job. If a woman lives in suburbia and has five children, makes six or eight trips to chauffeur her family, does the laundry, cooks, cleans, and works part time, she should be tired."

After retiring, Cucco embraced the slower pace of life, watching sports and fishing and spending time with his family at their vacation home in Lake Geneva, Wis.

"He liked saying, ‘Not too bad for a boy from Brooklyn!’" recalled his daughter.

Cucco’s wife of 47 years, Antoinette, died in 1999.

Other survivors include his second wife, Bobbie Gene, whom he married in 2002; four sons, Carl, Richard, Francis and James; 12 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Private services were held.

Giangrasse Kates is a freelance reporter.

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