Former Delta Doctor named top rural physician

Really nice story here:

 Dr. John “Rob” Marsh was already more than 12 hours into his workday last Tuesday when he rolled up to a tiny darkened house in Vesuvius, an out-of-the-way town in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley.

The homeowner, a woman with tired eyes, opened the door and apologized for the clutter. She’d been trying to get the place decorated for Christmas while also tending to her mother, who suffers from dementia and is bedridden by an arthritic knee that grinds painfully.

Marsh went into the back room and bent over the elderly woman, administering some gentle words and a shot of cortisone.

Marsh’s readiness to make nighttime house calls after a full day at the office has been a lifeline for her mother, said Carolyn Terrell.

“His willingness to come out here when we need him — well, it’s the kind of attitude you don’t find that much anymore,” she said. “We’re just fortunate. One of these days he may be coming out to see me.”

You should go read the whole story about Doctor Marsh, it really is inspirational.

For my part, I was just happy to see this part:

When Marsh recruited him to Delta Force in the early 1990s, Perkins only knew the doctor by the large reputation that preceded him. He also knew that Marsh’s father, former Virginia U.S. Rep. John O. Marsh, had served as Secretary of the Army throughout most of the 1980s.

When my unit came home from Afghanistan I had about a week from the time I got out to the time I had to go back to law school.  As fate would have it, we had a guest speaker at our homecoming, the Honorable John (Jack) Marsh.  Despite truly wanting to get out of dodge the minute we were released, I stuck around for a half hour to go thank Secretary Marsh for his coming to our event.  We talked briefly about Afghanistan and we talked about how he had been Gerald Ford’s Chief of Staff.  Then he asked me what I planned on doing.  I told him that I had 1 week and then it was back to law school and a full time job.  

That was when he told me that he was actually a law professor at my school, and he wanted me to enroll in his class, despite the fact there was already a waiting list to get in.  It’s an understatement to say it was my favorite class in law school:  Technology and Counter Terrorism law.   I ended up doing a paper on using private military firms for anti-maritime priacy efforts off the coast of Somalia and in Malaysia.  Not only did I get an A on the paper, but a few weeks later I got an email from the International Maritime Bureau in Kuala Lumpur asking if I was interested in working for them.

Now, I really wasn’t, since I had a great job at the Legion, but I was always so very grateful to Secretary Marsh for taking time to mentor to me.  Just a wonderful man.

And it looks like his son is a wonderful man too.  Just a wonderful story all around.

Congratulations Doctor Marsh.

Category: Politics