Letters to the Editor

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What Healthcare Needs

I would like to thank Virginia Stuart '75, '80G for her excellent article in the spring issue about Michele Lovell Loos '90, '06G. I too am a "second career" nurse, having graduated from UNH in 1994 with a bachelor's degree in microbiology. After working in research for a few years, I decided that becoming a nurse practitioner was my true calling. Like Ms. Loos, I also work as a palliative care nurse practitioner at a community hospital. Palliative care is a specialty greatly needed in healthcare today. Practitioners manage symptoms such as pain, shortness of breath or nausea for those seeking aggressive treatment and for those for whom curative treatment is no longer an option. We also offer emotional support for the intense and difficult decisions patients and families must make. Palliative care is available regardless of prognosis and does not require that the patient enroll in hospice. Medicare and most third-party insurers cover palliative care. I applaud UNH Magazine for shining a spotlight on this new and necessary area of healthcare. I also applaud Ms. Loos for having the tenacity and compassion to bring this program to Wentworth-Douglass Hospital.

Wall Art

This Ohio UNH alum loved the foldout of the campus. I will be carefully removing it from the magazine and hanging in my office at McGuffey Hall at Miami University. It will go with my UNH banner, UNH director's chair and UNH lamp.

Daggett Revisited

As I have endured the beatification of Dr. Gwynne Harris Daggett in the UNH Magazine, I feel compelled to give the impression of the man as viewed by a returning veteran.

On Monday morning, Dec. 7, 1942, I enlisted in the U.S. Army, and by November 1943, I entered combat in New Guinea. Having become a casualty on the outskirts of Manila, I was flown, along with 25 other extremely critical casualties, back to the United States. My first three months at Fort Devens Army Hospital were spent trying to stay alive, regaining the 60-plus pounds I had lost, and trying to walk without assistance.

I left Durham in 1942 as a sheltered, naïve teenager. I returned to Durham as a 21-year-old with the maturity, worldliness and perception of a 40-year-old. (Combat does that to one.) I had hardly registered at Thompson Hall when I became aware of the seditious activity that had blossomed at UNH during my absence. The Communist Party had been busy, and successful, in recruiting staff and students. I further discovered that Dr. G. Harris Daggett, associate professor of English, was a sparkplug of this activity. Such activity was not exclusive to UNH but was, unfortunately, happening at colleges across the country. For those of us who had sacrificed to protect our country against the insanity of Hitler and the avarice of the Japanese Empire, the activities of the Communist Party were especially repugnant and unconscionable.

Prior to the arrival of G. Harris Daggett at UNH, there was already a Dr. Daggett on the UNH faculty. Dr. Albert F. Daggett was a professor of chemistry and the complete antithesis of Dr. G. Harris Daggett. He was a dedicated patriot, totally loyal, dedicated to his country, his university, his students and his family. He was an outstanding role model and credit to his profession.

Hopefully, this will enlighten some of the letter writers who have sainted Dr. G. Harris Daggett. I doubt it. When exposed to him, they were like I was as a 17-year-old freshman in 1941: immature, naïve and pedestrian—a very fertile bed to be inoculated with seditious political philosophy.


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