• July 12, 1999
• Vol. 52
• No. 1

Tick Tock

Identical Twins Robert and Richard Tenniswood Shared Many Things: Clothes, Pals, Jobs—and Now Coronaries

Richard Tenniswood had finished mowing his Rochester Hills, Mich., lawn on June 3 when he felt chest pains. His wife, Joyce, rushed the 67-year-old retiree to the hospital, where doctors confirmed that he was having a heart attack. Soon, Richard's identical twin, Robert, showed up at his bedside. "I thought he was coming to visit me," Richard says. "But I wondered why he was in a wheelchair." The reason: Robert, while mowing the grass at his home, had also suffered a heart attack that afternoon.

To the astonishment of hospital staff, the brothers' synchronized tickers contained nearly identical blockages. Robert underwent quadruple bypass surgery; Richard had two angioplasties. The chances of such a coincidence, marvels Dr. Angida Asfaw, who operated on Robert, "are virtually nil."

The brothers also find their coordinated coronaries hard to believe. While their two hearts may seem to beat as one, "we've never felt the same feelings," says Richard. But they've shared almost everything else. They worked for 30 years as machinists at the same General Motors plant. Richard married Joyce in 1961, but the twins kept a joint bank account until Robert wed Nancy in 1962. Now recuperating at home, the Tenniswoods find the attention they're getting "amusing," says Joyce. Adds Richard: "It took some of the pain out of it."