Class Note 1964
Issue
Sept - Oct 2015
After 72 or 73 years of life many of us have discovered the value of friends, family and even passersby in critical moments of our lives. In that regard, the story of one of our classmates is both sobering and inspiring. Below, John Topping describes his encounter with Legionnaires’ disease. John has been running the Washington, D.C.-based Climate Institute along with its center for environmental leadership training and tribal sustainability partnership initiative. A future article will explain these programs in more detail.
“In late August, most likely in an almost freakish development when warm water from the dishwasher in my apartment overflowed into the kitchen sink that was clogged, creating a toxic brew, I managed somehow to inhale Legionella bacteria that first disoriented me, causing me to sense that I was losing my vision and virtually shutting down my appetite. Legionnaires’ disease has a mortality rate of up to 30 percent. It is waterborne rather than transmitted from human to human. Within days I found myself prostrate on the living room floor of my School Street apartment, too weak to crawl to my bedroom or to the bathroom beyond. Fortunately, I had made arrangements with a neighbor lady who lived upstairs for her to meet me the next morning and drive me to White River Junction, Vermont, to catch the 11:15 a.m. Vermonter for a 10-hour Amtrak trip to Washington, D.C. The next morning, when my neighbor arrived at about 9 to take me to White River, I could not stand up unassisted but was adamant I was going to catch the train and not miss spending the Labor Day weekend with my family, who live in the D.C. area. Fortuitously, my neighbor relented to my seeming wild irrationality, hailed two male Dartmouth students from the street, had them dress me and lift me to stand on my feet and took me with my briefcase and lightly packed suitcase to the train station.”
As the train rumbled on John grew increasingly delirious and attracted the attention of the train crew, which arranged for him to be taken to Yale-New Haven Hospital. With a temperature of almost 104, John managed to mention the name of his brother, Trexler, a Boston retinal surgeon, who provided a personal history to the emergency room physician, Eric Carpentier. Dr. Carpentier saw signs of severe muscle wasting and the powerful pneumonia that is characteristic of Legionella. After antibiotic and oxygen treatment, eight days of hospitalization at Yale and 20 days in a D.C. rehab facility, John sufficiently recovered to move from Hanover to the D.C. area to be closer to his three children, who, in John’s words, can “redirect a father who habitually burns the candle at both ends.” The bottom line, warns John, is to keep the immune system strong and maintain a healthy work-life balance. Had he done so he may have been able to fight off the seemingly innocuous threat brewing in his kitchen sink. A lesson is learned.
—Harvey Tettlebaum, 56295 Little Moniteau Road, California, MO 65018; (573) 761-1107; dartsecy64 @gmail.com
“In late August, most likely in an almost freakish development when warm water from the dishwasher in my apartment overflowed into the kitchen sink that was clogged, creating a toxic brew, I managed somehow to inhale Legionella bacteria that first disoriented me, causing me to sense that I was losing my vision and virtually shutting down my appetite. Legionnaires’ disease has a mortality rate of up to 30 percent. It is waterborne rather than transmitted from human to human. Within days I found myself prostrate on the living room floor of my School Street apartment, too weak to crawl to my bedroom or to the bathroom beyond. Fortunately, I had made arrangements with a neighbor lady who lived upstairs for her to meet me the next morning and drive me to White River Junction, Vermont, to catch the 11:15 a.m. Vermonter for a 10-hour Amtrak trip to Washington, D.C. The next morning, when my neighbor arrived at about 9 to take me to White River, I could not stand up unassisted but was adamant I was going to catch the train and not miss spending the Labor Day weekend with my family, who live in the D.C. area. Fortuitously, my neighbor relented to my seeming wild irrationality, hailed two male Dartmouth students from the street, had them dress me and lift me to stand on my feet and took me with my briefcase and lightly packed suitcase to the train station.”
As the train rumbled on John grew increasingly delirious and attracted the attention of the train crew, which arranged for him to be taken to Yale-New Haven Hospital. With a temperature of almost 104, John managed to mention the name of his brother, Trexler, a Boston retinal surgeon, who provided a personal history to the emergency room physician, Eric Carpentier. Dr. Carpentier saw signs of severe muscle wasting and the powerful pneumonia that is characteristic of Legionella. After antibiotic and oxygen treatment, eight days of hospitalization at Yale and 20 days in a D.C. rehab facility, John sufficiently recovered to move from Hanover to the D.C. area to be closer to his three children, who, in John’s words, can “redirect a father who habitually burns the candle at both ends.” The bottom line, warns John, is to keep the immune system strong and maintain a healthy work-life balance. Had he done so he may have been able to fight off the seemingly innocuous threat brewing in his kitchen sink. A lesson is learned.
—Harvey Tettlebaum, 56295 Little Moniteau Road, California, MO 65018; (573) 761-1107; dartsecy64 @gmail.com