A Medical Man Of 'Courage, Perseverance, Vision' --------------------
By ANNE M. HAMILTON Special to The Courant
April 10, 2005
Dr. Evans H. Daniels Jr., 80, of Wethersfield, died Feb. 11.
A quiet, unassuming man, Dr. Evans Daniels Jr. dedicated his life to helping the poorest and most medically needy families in Hartford. He left behind a clinic - now the largest in the city - that continues to do his work.
Daniels was born in Kansas City, Mo., and moved around the Southwest as a child. His mother, Lessie James, died when he was young, leaving him and a sister to be raised by their father, Evans Daniels Sr., a chicken farmer.
The younger Daniels was so unassuming that not even his children know many details about his early life. But they know he ended up at Howard University, the prestigious black college in Washington, arriving with one cardboard suitcase.
By the time the U.S. entered World War II, Daniels was a first-year medical student at Howard.
"It was very limited what you could do as a black man," said his youngest son, Scott Daniels of Wethersfield. Medicine, law or education were the most promising options. "Being a doctor was very prestigious." Money was extremely tight; Evans Daniels Sr. father used to send his son eggs in medical school to sell for tuition and spending money.
Evans Daniels Jr. became a medic with the 92nd Infantry Division, a black unit, and served in Italy. He was awarded two Bronze Stars. Years after the war, he told his children about some of his experiences, such as the wounded white soldiers who would rather suffer in the field than be attended by a black medic.
Daniels finished medical school after the war and married Helen Jones, a Howard undergraduate who became a teacher. They had three sons.
In 1952, after his graduation from medical school, Daniels came to Connecticut at the invitation of Dr. Arthur Wilson, his commanding officer. Wilson had a medical practice in Hartford, and Daniels opened an office on Main Street to treat the patients Wilson could not handle.
The practice grew quickly. Daniels treated families as a general practitioner. Sometimes his patients could pay him only in produce.
Patients would wait hours to see him, and often he didn't return home until 11 or 12 at night.
"Dr. Daniels was very tolerant of everyone. I never heard him speak a harsh word," said Nellie Mason, who worked as a nurse's aide for Daniels for 30 years. "He was a very kind and gentle man."
Daniels and his wife divorced in the early 1960s, and he later married Geraldine Nelms, who had four children. The couple had two more children of their own.
Other children also filled the Daniels' Wethersfield house. There was Trung, a Vietnamese friend of Scott's; Khadra, a Somalian girl who is now a doctor; and Nina, a diabetic who needed medical supervision. Many of the children stayed at the family's home for years.
"He cared not just for his family but for anyone he thought needed help," said son Austin Daniels.
Although Dr. Daniels worked long hours, he was home for supper on Thursdays and Sundays, spent two weeks on Cape Cod with the family every summer and had lobster picnics on the beach at Rocky Neck. In the fall, the family would pile into the car to see the foliage along the Mohawk Trail in Massachusetts.
For his children, growing up in Wethersfield in the 1960s was sometimes a challenge.
"We were one of the first black families in town," said his daughter Karen Lewis, and there were several incidents tinged with racism, such as the father who ordered Lewis out of his house after a play date, or a woman who offered Geraldine Daniels a job as a housekeeper because Daniels' children were so well behaved. After they started driving, the Daniels children were often pulled over by police.
Decades later, Daniels expressed his own feelings about stereotypes in his typically low-key way. He went to the Wethersfield Country Club with his VIP tickets for the annual Greater Hartford Open golf tournament. Leaving his own Mercedes at home, he drove up to the valet parking in his son Chuck's junk car.
"They decided to shake things up a little," recalled Scott. "`I am who I am. I don't need any trappings.'"
Daniels' medical practice continued to grow. A group of Hartford leaders encouraged him to start a multi-practice clinic, and Community Health Services, or CHS, opened in 1971 on Albany Avenue in Hartford. Today, the facility is in a new building that serves 16,000 patients a year. Daniels was the first medical director and chief executive officer.
Many patients were uninsured and could not afford to pay, but Daniels never turned anyone away. He went to Mexico to learn Spanish so he could communicate with his Hispanic patients.
"He was easygoing and very polite," said Chet Parboo, a physicians' assistant at CHS. "He tried to teach the staff that money wasn't everything and that serving people was important."
"It was his courage, his perseverance, his vision that made this possible," said Michael Sherman, the current CEO. "Only a remarkable man could have done it. It was clear that the love of his life was CHS."
Daniels and his second wife divorced in the 1980s, and in recent years, he spent much of his time in Puerto Rico with his companion, Elsie Esteves. Daniels, who died of cancer, left 13 grandchildren.
Daniels traveled to such countries as Guyana, Honduras and the Dominican Republic to hold clinics in underserved areas, often accompanied by Parboo. They paid their own way, stayed in churches or people's homes and sometimes had to rely on speedboats for transportation.
"He had a great desire to provide care to people," Parboo said. "He was never in a rush."
Dr. Terri Ashmeade, his youngest child, is the only one who followed him in the medical field. She accompanied him on one of his visits to Guyana, where they treated patients together. "We got to be a little bit competitive in our diagnoses," she recalled. "I was trying to stump him, but I never could."
David Daniels, the oldest son, weaves bits of his father into his plays.
"Love and compassion: This is what drove him," David said. "He was a quiet person. ... He expected excellence." Copyright 2005, Hartford Courant
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