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For decades, a ‘compassionate saint’ watched over Springfield

Revered by patients and colleagues, Dr. Howard Ingling gave every bit of his energy to the practice of medicine

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As his office migrated from the First National Bank Building to 108 E. High St., 2000 E. High St., and finally out to Donnelsville, there was just one other thing Ingling made time for: teaching Sunday school, which he did for 35 years at Springfield’s First United Church of Christ.

His work in and out of church earned him the Clark County Association of Churches’ Christian Citizenship Award — an award that, in part, recognized his annual trips to Gonado, Ariz., to relieve his friend Dr. Starr, for a couple of weeks each year.

Working out of Sage Memorial Hospital, he delivered babies, set bones, and otherwise cared for Hopi people in what was always a working vacation.

“He never let up,” said son-in-law Bruce Everhart.

“I think (Ingling’s wife) was the only one who could get him to settle down and keep him at home,” he added.

And when she died suddenly in 1963 at age 51, his career was Ingling’s life.

‘Everyone else came first’

In an editorial after Ingling’s death, the Sun wrote that a doctor’s life and career are filled with judgment calls.

“Early in his life, Dr. Ingling made a decision, a judgment call, so to speak, about himself.

“Everyone else came first,” the paper said — and that included a nurse who mistook him for a habitual drunk and locked him in a room at Community Hospital.

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This is a wonderful article about a wonderful man. Thanks Tom and News Sun - we need more positive upbeat articles like this!

Mitzi
12:22 PM, 6/22/2009

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Those were the days of total care and compassion. As a child in Jefferson County Ohio, I experienced the same attention from our hometown doctor. Granted there is much more medical and scientific technology today, but nothing beats what we got way back then.
Thanks Tom for another great article.

Dee
9:27 AM, 6/22/2009

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