Friday, March 29, 2024
Diagnosed with asthma as a boy, he was unable to attend school or leave his house without supervision throughout his childhood.
Witnessed the funeral procession of President Abraham Lincoln through New York City as a 6-year-old boy.
Overcame asthma through boxing and exercise.
Had the first phone installed in Oyster Bay so he could stay in contact with Washington while at Sagamore Hill.
Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Park, in Oyster Bay, was built by the Theodore Roosevelt Association in 1928 and donated to the hamlet in 1942.
— Will Sheeline
It was a regular night on patrol for Nassau County Police Department 4th Precinct Officer Douglas M. Bedell in February of 2018, when he came across something unusual. It wasn’t a mugging, a speeding, or anything else that might normally capture the attention of an officer on duty. Rather, Bedell discovered a large lump where his neck and jaw met.
Bedell, who lives in Bethpage, went to his dentist, thinking the problem was nothing more than a wisdom tooth or some other dental issue. What doctors found instead was a malignant mass infected with non-Hodgkin’s diffuse large cell B lymphoma, which occurs when the body makes abnormal B lymphocytes, a type of white blood cell that normally helps fight infections.
Bedell chose the most aggressive form of treatment, epoch chemotherapy, so he could be back on patrol with his fellow officers as soon as possible. On June 16 he was presented with a Theodore Roosevelt Association Police Award, and in his thank-you speech, he detailed the harrowing days he spent at Memorial Sloan-Kettering in Manhattan, hooked up to an IV machine for the chemo, while his wife, Gina, sat by his side.
“Essentially, for four and a half days straight, you’re hooked up to the chemo and it’s just running through your body nonstop,” Bedell recounted. “Each round, the strength of the chemotherapy was greater than the last, and by the later rounds I began to need blood transfusions just to keep going, as my body began to show wear.”
But the treatment forced the cancer into remission, and on October 15, 2018, Bedell returned to the 4th Precinct, and, at his insistence, to full duty. As it turned out, however, the chemotherapy irreparably damaged his liver, and Bedell is now seeking a liver transplant.
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