Dr. Harry and Mary Rowe's Wells River Clinic is now in its historic 80th year!

By Bernie Marvin

Dr. Harry Rowe, photographed in 2000 at his original office of the Wells River Clinic, founded by him in 1946 after his return to the area from his US Army medical officer assignments during World War 2. The Wells River Clinic was the foundation which grew into today’s Little Rivers Health Care, with medical offices in Wells River, East Corinth, Bradford and Newbury. The Bridge Weekly file/Bernie Marvin

Wells River, VT - The Wells River Clinic, now part of the Little Rivers Health Care (LRHC) with offices in East Corinth, Bradford, Wells River, and Newbury, was founded by a Vermont country doctor who had fought in World War 2 and returned to Vermont to continue to take care of the sick and injured in the Green Mountain state he loved. Dr. Harry Morrison Rowe was born in nearby Peacham in 1912. He graduated from Peacham Academy in 1930 and from the University of Vermont in 1936 with his bachelor's degree. While studying at UVM, he met and married Mary Whitney in 1940, and he earned his medical degree in 1943. The popular couple raised a family of six children: David, Betsy, Susan, John, Alan, and Jane. With World War 2 raging, Harry joined the 78th Infantry Division, was promoted to Captain, and assigned to the 303rd Medical Battalion. He eventually served as a Battalion Medical Officer during the furious fight for American troops to enter Germany and bring the war to a close. During his military service, Dr. Rowe served in Texas, Virginia, and West Virginia. Also overseas in England, France, and Germany. Dr. Rowe was awarded a Bronze Star for his service at the Bridge at Remagen over the Rhine River, a battle that lasted 18 days. Americans held their positions at the bridge crossing that, surprisingly, had not been destroyed. The furious fighting in and around the crossing location hastened the American entry into Germany by three weeks. Throughout his 15-month deployment and combat duty, he and his wife, Mary, wrote letters to each other every day. Upon Mary's death in 2002, those precious letters were discovered and read again by Dr. Rowe. These letters, written over the long time she waited for the war's end, and Dr. Rowe's fight in Germany until the war's completion, inspired him to compile them into a personal memoir. Local Vermont authors Terry Hoffer and Beth Champagne collaborated with Dr. Rowe to write and publish a book in 2009 about the letters between Dr. Rowe and his wife, Mary. The book sold well locally because of interest in these two people, who were heavily involved in their community of Wells River and the surrounding towns. The book was published by Athenaeum Press in St Johnsbury. The bulk of Dr. Rowe's life's work up until that time, along with oral histories, tapes, and other researched materials used in the production of the book, is now preserved in the Harry M. Rowe Collection at the Vermont Historical Society. In April 1946, Dr. Rowe and thousands of other service personnel who had served in Europe during the war went home to be with their loved ones. As Harry told it, "I came back to New York by ship," he said, then we were transferred to Boston by train. Mary met me in Boston. Words cannot describe how glad I was to be back in the United States and finally home on leave. We stayed in a rooming house in Boston for a day or two and then went to see friends in New York. A few days later, we headed for Vermont and home in Burlington." According to comments by Little River Health Care Physician, Dr. Steve Genereaux, Dr. Harry and Mary Rowe, with no colleagues and little actual training in rural primary care medicine, settled in Wells River along with their two-year-old son, David. In 1946, they set up a small medical practice in their home, which they purchased just south of Jock Oil on Route 5, which was, at a later time, Attorney John Morale's law office. They started seeing patients in their front room. Later, as the practice grew, they moved to the present larger site of the Wells River Clinic, now Little Rivers Health Care, at 65 Main Street in 1952. During that time, Harry reported in his book, The Grass Grew Greener, "that Mary and I were running the office pretty much alone. She had given up playing the violin with the Vermont Symphony to help. She was doing the bookkeeping, and I showed her how to do some of the lab work. I was seeing patients, and she would come, if necessary, that is, if I was doing a female exam. It became quite a busy practice. Mary was actually my nurse, secretary, cook, assistant, lab girl, and housekeeper." In 1962, Dr. Rowe officially launched his Wells River Clinic with the philosophy of "Anyone who needs to be seen will be seen," meaning that if someone did not have funds for medical services, they still received them from Dr. Rowe. Dr. Elizabeth Berry joined the practice soon after that. She was the first female physician to practice in the area and remained at the clinic until she retired in 1992. She would be seen frequently throughout the area with her husband, Dr. Kenneth Berry. This loving couple presented Wells River with what is now Berry Park, a large grassy area just outside the village, on the south side of Route 5. Dr. Rowe's son, John Edward Rowe, MD, joined his father at the clinic after finishing his medical residency. He practiced with his father for more than 10 years, relocating to North Carolina in 1992. Dr. Rowe was a traditional Vermont country doctor, practicing his medicine with house and office calls, working weekends and nights. He was also the sought-after on-call physician for the nearby Grafton County Nursing Home in North Haverhill. He was very proud to have delivered more than 1,400 babies throughout the area. Dr. Rowe practiced full-time for more than 60 years, finally retiring in 2006 at the age of 93. After that, he continued to lead a busy life, serving others in many capacities and organizations. He passed away in 2012, just short of his 100th birthday. To ensure that the area continued to receive quality medical care, as it had for so many years since the establishment of the Wells River Clinic, others have joined the effort to keep the business going. Dr. Rowe's son, Dr. John Rowe, joined the clinic with his father in 1982, was joined by Dr. Fay Homan in 1993, and, shortly thereafter, Dr. Steve Genereaux came aboard. This added depth to the ranks at the Wells River Clinic and allowed Dr. Harry to step back a bit. According to Dr. Genereaux, in 2006, the business transitioned from the Wells River Clinic to Little Rivers Health Care, and over the past 20 years, offices have been established in Bradford, East Corinth, and at Cottage Hospital in Woodsville. Community members such as Al Stevens, Dr. Sarkis, Harry Rowe, Reverend Jane Wilson, and others submitted grant applications to the federal government so that the three offices could come together for the inclusive medical practice. This action took all of three years and finally included offices in East Corinth, Bradford, Wells River, with another building in Newbury on Route 5, and a new large addition constructed at the Wells River site. This allowed the practice to include behavioral health, plus at a fifth location in downtown Wells, River at the former site of Jiffy Mart, a dental office that will soon include a dental hygienist and eventually, a dentist. LRHC owns all five buildings and the grounds involved in this expansion of what was once a small medical practice established 80 years ago in Dr. Harry and Mary Rowe's living room. As for the new space recently constructed in the Wells River Clinic building, Dr. Genereaux told The Bridge Weekly in a subsequent interview, "Having the extra space here is great." He said there are six personnel working at the clinic, three or four days a week. He said that upstairs in the new wing, behavioral health staff, social workers, and counselors are tending to patients. He noted that the staff upstairs is just as busy as on the first floor. "Over time," Dr. Genereaux said, "we have seen the number of patients here slowly climb." He said that, from an economic viewpoint, the community's salaried jobs for our 90 employees approach the budget numbers of the nearby Blue Mountain Regional School district at about $13 million. Comments from friends and residents of the area about the Wells River Clinic indicated that Dr. Rowe and Mary Rowe, together, were really community-minded and would be at the clinic, along with their first clinic nurse, Betty Minot, to answer every phone call, no matter the time of day or night. They were all there to meet community needs. Mary was eventually named director of the North Country Chorus. She was teaching at the Wells River School, giving music lessons and taking care of the growing family. As Dr. Genereaux said, if anything happened in the community and help was needed, the Rowes were usually the first to know and first to be there to help. Relative to the importance of what was begun 80 years ago by Dr. Rowe and his beloved wife, Mary, is well acknowledged by Madison Culver, a staff member of the Wells River Clinic, which remains an important part of the Little Rivers Health Care organization. She told The Bridge Weekly that: “As a nurse practitioner at the Wells River Clinic, I have seen firsthand the vital role Little Rivers Health Care plays in our community. Having grown up in the North Country and living with a chronic illness myself, I understand the challenges many of our patients face in accessing quality healthcare close to home. One of the things I value most about the Wells River Clinic is our ability to provide comprehensive, evidence-based care locally. Our patients deserve the same high-quality care they would receive at a larger academic medical center, without the burden of traveling long distances. Whether managing chronic conditions, addressing acute illnesses, or focusing on preventive care, we are able to partner with patients to help them achieve their health goals in the community they call home. What makes Little Rivers Health Care especially unique is the breadth of support available under one roof. In addition to primary medical care, patients have access to behavioral health services, case management, a food pharmacy, and other resources that address the social and economic factors that influence health. This integrated approach allows us to care for the whole person, not just their medical condition. I am proud to be part of an organization that has served this community for 80 years and continues to meet the needs of rural Vermonters. -Madison Culver, APRN, FNP-C The influence and community appreciation and love for Dr. Rowe extended well out of the Wells River locus, indeed to the east and across the Connecticut River in Woodsville, his many years of devoted duty at Cottage Hospital while serving a growing community in Vermont, led to Cottage Hospital to name a new medical office building across Swiftwater Road from the Cottage campus as the Rowe Health Center. Little Rivers Health Care CEO Andrew Barter said that the Dr. Harry Rowe and Mary story on their bold plan of setting up the original Wells River Clinic after he returned from his difficult war service is a wonderful story. He said it was typical of community-centered Dr. Harry Rowe who had returned home from fighting a world-wide war and who immediately set his mind to taking care of folks at home through strong community service. Mr. Barter said that Dr. Rowe and his wife “cast the foundation for what is now a health system for the entire area, something that is needed for everyone was his vision of 80 years ago.” He noted that some of the dedicated clinicians who worked with the Rowes are still with the medical practices set up so many years ago, citing the long and dedicated service of Drs. Stephen Genereaux and Fay Homan. “The Rowe’s home in Wells River still provides a base for medical services,” he said in a recent interview. He noted that what the Rowe’s did in serving their community is inspiring “for us today. Their dedication lives in lots of ways, and it can be seen and experienced by so many.” The Little Rivers Health Care organization took three years to become a federally qualified health center, Mr. Barter said, being founded by Drs Genereaux and Homan. “The strength in that beginning was right in Wells River. It is an important part of the area’s history and the legacy of the Rowe family and others who were part of it as it grew over the past 80 years.” “For myself and many others, it is a privilege to be a part of this story, Mr. Barter said.”

Dr. Stephen Genereaux observes a 1940 photo of Dr. Harry Rowe and his wife, Mary Rowe. The photograph is part of a historic display of photos that is dedicated to the history of the 1946 founding of the Wells River Clinic that is part of the present Little Rivers Health Care organization. The building is on Main Street in Wells River Village. The Bridge Weekly/Bernie Marvin.

The main living room in the Dr. Harry and Mary Rowe home in Wells River Village as it is seen today. It was preserved when renovations were made to convert the home from a private residence and doctor’s office of the Rowe family to one of the medical buildings of Little Rivers Health Care. Although it is a meeting room, it appears much as it did in 1946 when the Wells River Clinic was founded by Dr. Rowe. The Bridge Weekly/Bernie Marvin

A large poster used during the opening ceremonies of the Rowe Health Center at Cottage Hospital in Woodsville, features the center’s dedication “To the honor of Dr. Harry Rowe, a man who embodied the Rotarian Motto “Service Above Self.” The Bridge Weekly file /Bernie Marvin