Celebrating The Fifty-Year Career of Doctor Donald Bicknell: A Community Says Thank You

By Cookie Steponaitis

photo provided Practing medicine in the little city for 50 years, Dr. Don Bicknell was never without his sister Ann Hodgman at his office and by his side.

photo provided Holding his two month old son, Dr. Donald Bicknell celebrates his graduation from the University of Vermont College of Medicine and his entrance into the field he called his chosen profession for fifty years.

   On a wintry day afternoon in December 2012 Doctor Donald Bicknell walked out the door of the Little City Family Practice and quietly ended a career that spanned fifty years. Dr. Don, never one to seek the limelight simply retired and thought that he had closed the door on a memorable chapter of his life. The community he has called home since begs to differ and could not let him go without reflecting on his impact both in the lives of people and the field of medicine in Vermont.

    Don Bicknell was in the ninth grade when he first expressed his desire to go into medicine. “I admired the M.D. in my hometown of Richford,” reflected Dr. Don, “and I like science. So medicine was a good fit for me. I attended UVM for both my B.A. degree and my M.D. and then I interned at the Upstate Medical Center in Syracuse, New York.  Afterwards I spent two years in the U.S. Army at Fort Douglas, Utah and at Madigan General Hospital, Fort Lewis, Washington before coming to Vergennes in 1964.”

   Don met his wife Liz at UVM in 1954 when she was a freshman and he was a sophomore. They married in 1960 during his junior year of medical school. The choice of Vergennes as a place to live and practice medicine actually came about as a result of several events coming together. When the couple moved east from Utah after Don secured his residency in Radiology at UVM, their good friend Bill Pollander told the Bicknells that the town needed a general practitioner because Dr. Goodrich was ready to retire. After talking it over the couple decided to try out the town for five years and the rest is now history. Don and Liz loved the Little City and decided to stay due to the excellent schools and extracurricular activities to keep all five children excited and out of trouble. Raising their children David, Tim, Ann, Peter and Paul in the Little City fit perfectly and today grandchildren are already through high school and in college as well as young ones just entering the elementary grades. Don and Liz became woven into the fabric of life in Vergennes as the result of the activities of their children that included Girl Scouts, Scouts, swim team, basketball, gymnastics, wrestling, music and church.

    Dr. Don calculates that he has seen over 250,000 patients during his career and advises young physicians today, “to listen to the patients!  They know their bodies better than you do.”  No one knows this better than his sister Ann Hodgman who served as his office manager from fall 1970 until the end of September 1995. “I began with helping his then office secretary Caroline Twiss, with the billing,” shared Ann. “In February 1996 Caroline left and I became secretary.  At the time my ‘office’ was in a corner of the waiting room where it was hard to get anything done since I was right out there with the patients.  I did ask to order a shelf to put on the desk so I was partially hidden which was better than nothing. The examining room was behind the wall adjoining the waiting room.   Don's office was the front of the suite.  Every day he had me type up a list of the scheduled patients for him but that was often altered by walk-in patients who were needed to be seen right away. People were very understanding when they had to wait on such occasions.”

    Dr. Don, with an emphasis on the patients and their needs also brought new technology and expanded services to his family practice. He hired another physician in 1975 and made the decision to incorporate an X-Ray department into his business. “At this time,” reminisced Ann, “the business office was moved into the former examining room and Don’s personal office was made into three small rooms. One was for examining patients and one was for his visiting with patients and other callers. The other room did several things. First we had an examining table on which we did EKGs or just had a place for a needy patient to lie down.  Later, EKGs were done in the X-ray room and in the former doctor's examining room.   I took over the EKG room for allergy injections and flu shots as well as weighing patients.”

    Dr. Don is recognized by the entire community for his honesty and sincerity and quickly became known for doing what was best for the patient above all else. He made house calls, kept his rates low and overlooked criticism. Ann also remembers him always being current on the latest in medicine. “His vacations were often taken where he could attend a seminar by some leading specialist,” Ann remarked. “He read all the latest medical journals and shared his knowledge with those of us under his employ. As the practice grew we hired someone to help me in the office. We had an X-ray technician trained by him to draw blood and do limited laboratory tests. After the other doctor left Don needed someone to cover his absences with the Vermont Army National Guard.  He decided on a Physician's Assistant who worked out well. After the first one he has hired female Physician's Assistants realizing he needed someone with whom women and girls would feel more comfortable. They were and are all outstanding professionals. We were truly a ‘family practice’ and at one time three of us were related when Don hired our cousin Joan Sergeant to work in the office and also to help in the lab for which she had been trained. We joked that we adopted Diane Rooney who was the X-ray person for many years.” Dr. Don was also instrumental in helping form both the Vergennes Rescue Squad and Addison County Home Health and Hospice.

    Another passion for Dr. Don was family and it extended beyond the Bicknell clan to cousins, friends and adopted friends as well. Don’s niece Suzanne Hodgman Hodsden remembers growing up in this family oriented environment. “Summers on the lake, riding in the motorboat, bonfires, berry picking and celebrating every Christmas and major holiday with my five Bicknell cousins and Don and Liz. It always was feeling like we were one big family that lived in two houses close enough to walk to but still in different towns. We spent a lot of time together.  I have a couple of letters that he wrote me when I was just born as I made him an uncle. They are funny and loving and full of med school anecdotes and also mention this girl he hopes I will someday call ‘Auntie’ who is Liz. This was 1957. He was about 21 years old, maybe 22. He is always so willing to put others first and I always can depend on him making everything better.”

   These are the sentiments this reporter heard expressed repeatedly as people were contacted and offered the opportunity to share their favorite Dr. Don story. Some spoke of compassion, others of skill and most reflected on his personal attention to people and their health that was the hallmark of his approach to medicine and life.

    Both Don and Liz were active in the community in numerous ways including Liz’s teaching for twenty-three years at Ferrisburgh Central School and her involvement as the Vermont State President of Delta Kappa Gamma and the Women of Wisdom Charity. Don has served on the UVM Medical School Admissions Committee and has held various positions in the Vergennes United Methodist Church. Passionate about music, Dr. Don has been in the Vergennes City Band and the LC Jazz Band for over twenty years on the saxophone and has served as the Town Moderator for Ferrisburgh. Rounding out his career Don also spent twenty years in the Vermont Army National Guard and retired as State Surgeon with the rank of Colonel.

    While retirement from medicine is at hand retirement from civic, family and church life is not. Don and Liz will be spending time in their beloved Addison County and also venturing across the ocean to see their son David and his family in Thailand. True to form, Dr. Don wanted to thank the community for all of their years of coming to his practice and sent along a message to, “be proud of all you have here and keep up our excellent schools .” And for those of you who think it will just not be the same without a Bicknell in the office, have no fear as Dr. Tim Bicknell has followed his father into the world of medicine and has been on board at Little City Family Practice for several years.

    The words ‘Thank You’ seem such a small tribute to a man who has given so much but they are heartfelt and carry with them the wishes, stories and input of a community who inundated this reporter on the Internet and in the stores when word got out about honoring Dr. Don.  Perhaps the best comment itself comes from niece Suzanne Hodsden who concluded with this thought, “Why did I use the word hero? What better word? A hero is someone you admire and idolize and look up to and aspire to be like.” Addison County has several special people who continue to serve, inspire and demonstrate what it means to be a caring professional, family person, community member and one certainly is Dr. Donald Bicknell. Happy Retirement Dr. Don from a community that says a heartfelt ‘Thank You.’