This Week's Nominee
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While the challenges continue, so do the good works done by our neighbors, our teachers, our health care providers, our volunteers and so many others. This is their story. Ledyard National Bank is proud to support the 2022 Hometown Heroes, who were nominated by members of the community and selected by editors of the Concord Monitor. Nominate your Hometown Hero Today. |
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| | Hometown Hero: You might recognize Dr. Oge Young’s name, and his legacy won’t soon fade. A colleague has made sure of that.
By RAY DUCKLER
Monitor columnist
The doctor’s old friend and colleague, Dr. Jim Potter, retired and moved to Maine years ago, but he and Dr. Oge Young share a bond that will live forever.
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| They don’t speak as often as they once did, of course, but their affection and respect for one another remain strong, as was seen recently when Dr. Potter nominated Dr. Young for a slot on the Monitor’s Hometown Hero list.
“Dr. Young has served the community as an obstetrician/gynecologist for the last some 40 years,” Potter wrote, “birthed thousands of local children, served as a preceptor/professor for hundreds of OB residents, an advocate for women and children before the legislature, and a great human storyteller.”
Young, who retired 4½ years ago, now travels the country with his wife, Pam, to visit their three sons and their eight grandchildren. And, as Potter noted, Young made more deliveries at Concord Hospital than a postal worker could during the holiday season.
Beloved by a huge section of the Greater Concord Area, a doctor who probably delivered some of you, Young has attracted headlines through the decades simply because of his unmatched bedside manner and the incredible number of babies he’s brought into the world.
In Young’s view, he’s old news.
“I am surprised he nominated me,” Young said. “I love those Hometown Hero stories because they’re about people who have quietly done things and never got any credit. Obstetricians get more credit than we deserve. The women deserve the credit; we’re just there.”
But Young’s progressive nature, what he introduced to the medical community, spearheaded breakthroughs in postpartum education for single or first-time mothers.
He helped create the Healthy Beginnings Endowment in 1996 and through donations has raised $1.5 million to fund a program that prepares young mothers for the task ahead, instead of merely releasing them from the hospital with their babies, to a scary time and place.
It’s his prized contribution, one that he readily admits he’s “proud of.”
“The community understands the importance of support and education for new parents,” Young said. “It’s so important, the first few years of life. I don’t care how well educated or motivated someone is, the experience of having a baby is at times overwhelming, and imagine a young mom going home with no support, a single mom with no family.”
The unexpected publicity he’s receiving here, while unsolicited, gives Young a chance to promote the Healthy Beginnings Endowment, perhaps bolstering its fundraising efforts.
“The more we get the word out,” Young said, “the more we can do with it.”
He remains on the agency’s board, but has retired from practicing medicine. He recently returned from a family ski trip in Oregon. He also visits Austin, Texas, and Brunswick, Maine, to see his other two sons and grandchildren, whom he loves to watch play basketball.
“I’m liking retirement more than I thought I would,” Young said. “I miss everyone I worked with, my delivery nurses and old colleagues.
Most if not all miss him right back.
Just ask Dr. Potter.
“He’s one of the old guys that were here when I came to town,” Young said. “We’ve tried to keep that going. I need to reach out.”
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