When the phone rang at the home of the Edwards on October 4, 2010, a life of remarkable accomplishment, extraordinary struggle and equally impressive perseverance, finally came into a blinding focus. We will never know why it took the Nobel Committee over thirty years to recognize the midsummer birth of the world’s first “IVF baby.” What we do know is that delays have consequences. For one, Professor Robert G, Edwards, now gravely ill, is unlikely to be in a position to celebrate this well deserved recognition.  For another, Professor Patrick C. Steptoe, IVF’s other proud parent, departed since 1988, has been deprived of the likely prospect of sharing the 2010 Nobel Prize in Medicine.

For those of us born after 1978, IVF is just as plain a fact of life as any other dazzling medical technology. True as such statement may be, it does not begin to do justice to the subject matter. Lest it be forgotten, history was made and barrenness vanquished forever when Louise Brown was born on July 25, 1978 at the Oldham General Hospital in Oldham, England. Weighing in at 5-pound, 12-ounce shortly before midnight, this midsummer baby could not have been more glorious. Now married and the mother of a four year old (naturally conceived) son, Louise Brown has rightly earned a storied spot in this special human enterprise and for that matter in the annals of mankind. And so did Patrick Christopher Steptoe and Robert Geoffrey Edwards—the pioneering scientists who made it all possible.

Oft forgotten in the haze is the personal triumph of Lesley and John Brown, Louise’s parents, whose primary infertility (attributable to Lesley’s blocked fallopian tubes) remained unrequited through Lesley’s 30th birthday. Having endured untold hormonal tests, multiple painful radiologic assessments, several surgical procedures, and a complicated high-risk gestation, Lesley finally prevailed. To those who say that infertility is not a disease, we point out the hurt of childlessness, the agonizing wait, and the all-too-frequent letdowns.

More familiar is the personal triumph of Edwards and Steptoe, whose dogged 12-year collaboration and daring conviction finally resulted in success. Indeed, Edwards had gone down that road several times before only to be rebuffed. Although one can only guess how the physician-scientist pair felt that fateful evening, it must have been grand. This was after all a real game changer. The Lasker Award Committee reached similar conclusions as it selected Edwards to receive the 2001 Clinical Medical Research Award “For the development of in vitro fertilization, a technological advance that has revolutionized the treatment of human infertility.” They were right of course as they often are in that Lasker Awards routinely presage future recognition by the Nobel committee.

Talk about “disruptive” innovation. Defined by Harvard Business School Professor Clayton M. Christensen as an innovation that creates a new (and unexpected) field of endeavor, IVF fits the bill: a radically creative innovation meeting an unfulfilled need. Indeed, prior to 1978, there was precious little one could offer the Browns in their desperation. The ascent of IVF changed all that. However one characterizes the nature of the innovation involved, to many, the abolition of infertility for all practical purposes ranks right up there with the greatest medical discoveries of all time. Dito, say the proud parents of the 4 million “IVF babies” in our global midst.

In retrospect, Louise Brown almost never happened. The odds for a “take” were hardly favorable, perhaps even quixotic. And yet, success knocked when a single egg—laparoscopically retrieved by Steptoe in the course of a natural menstrual cycle—was fertilized in vitro by Edwards to yield an implantation-worthy eight-cell embryo. But what, one must ask, were the odds of a single embryo transfer yielding a viable pregnancy with 1977 technology? Impossible to tell of course but likely below 10 percent per embryo transferred. After all, the very best which today’s technology has to offer in this context (i.e. of natural cycle IVF) is unlikely to exceed a 15 percent ongoing pregnancy rate per embryo transferred. It stands to reason that neither Edwards nor Steptoe paid any attention to the odds. Toughened by multiple prior letdowns, it was too early for the pair to call it a day. Failure was not an option. Such was their power of conviction. And the world has never been the same since.

At the time of this writing, well over 4 million “IVF babies” will have been born worldwide. What this means is that innumerable barren couples have been spared the agony of Lesley and John Brown. This also means doing away with the painful physician utterance: “So sorry but there is nothing more we can do for you,” standard fare prior to 1978. Hard to imagine but it was not all that long ago that the walking child-less were quietly suffering in our midst. To think about the countless couples doomed to a child-less life is to realize a collective pent up pain, only occasionally relieved by adoption when elected. Parenthood is a presumption after all: one we are led to expect; one we mourn if denied. It is a big piece of what we are here for. And so, let us never forget the magic of that distant midsummer night in old Oldham the echoes of which are guaranteed to reverberate for a long time to come.