{"doi":"10.1111/jgs.17214","title":"The old man in room 802","abstract":"The visit with my friend Frank was interrupted when a young medical student entered the room and informed his patient that he had developed a fever. The student was unaware that I was a faculty physician since I had left my white coat in my office; I was visiting as a friend. Lying in bed, with his reddened, swollen leg exposed, Frank did not look his best. He appeared drained from several days of being poked and prodded and undergoing numerous tests all of which were unrevealing. As I watched the student struggle through interviewing my friend, who is profoundly hard of hearing, and examining him as part of a fever work-up, I wondered how he was viewed by his medical team, all of whom were likely 2–3 generations younger than Frank. Was he merely 'the old man in room 802 with a leg infection'? I knew him as much more. Frank is 88 years old, and at 27 years my senior would seem an unlikely acquaintance. However, when we first met, I immediately liked the tall, lanky man with the wide grin and friendly, outgoing disposition. Frank had hosted a church picnic in his backyard and all was going well until dark clouds suddenly unleashed pouring rain. We grabbed the tables, chairs, and food and moved quickly into his large, sparkling clean, well-lit garage. As we finished eating, our gazes were drawn to the wood-working machinery and the interesting pictures and posters on the walls. We were curious, and luckily for us, Frank obliged. “Welcome to my shop,” he announced. “I love it here!” And then he said with a wink, “And my wife loves for me to spend time here also!” Frank is an artisan. He loves making beautiful things of wood. I have always admired the gorgeous baptismal font that Frank made for our church sanctuary—its unusual rounded, octagonal shape, the deep red-brown stain, and perfectly smooth, clear finish. I had always wondered how such an amazing piece of furniture had been crafted. Standing in his beloved workshop, Frank explained: the wood had come from thick oak steps, and the unusual shape was produced with a bent yardstick and help from his woodworking partner. The beautiful procession cross was also crafted in his workshop in collaboration with someone in the congregation who made the delicate, multicolored inlaid glass. Frank learned woodworking from his father who had a workshop that built wood frames for upholstered furniture back when North Carolina was at the center of the world's high-end furniture industry. When Frank returned home from his enlisted time in the Navy during the Korean conflict, his father insisted he go to college. The GI bill required one to declare a college major beforehand, and nothing attracted Frank until 1 day he found “Furniture Engineer” in a college brochure. Frank and his wife Pat squeezed into a small apartment near campus with their one-going-on-two children while Frank studied engineering and worked two jobs (Figure 1). He had to miss the class field trip to visit Lane, the newest, most modern furniture factory, because Pat was in labor with their second child. When the professor based an entire exam on specific features of the Lane factory, Frank got the top grade in the class, even though he had never been there. He simply imagined how a good, modern furniture factory should be laid out. Upon graduating in 1959, Frank got early offers from all the top furniture companies. But he settled in a small town with an unsightly, outdated plant because he perceived that the people there were good-hearted. With his wood-working experience, engineering knowledge, common sense, humility, and good humor, Frank rose to become manager over a large portion of the plant, with responsibility for 450 workers. The plant produced a bedroom suite every minute. In 1996, Frank retired after 36 years of distinguished service. Recently, Frank and Pat celebrated their 65th wedding anniversary. After retiring, Frank and Pat traveled extensively, as shown by the pushpins on the wall-map in Frank's workshop.","journal":"Journal of the American Geriatrics Society","year":2021,"id":224209,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":0,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9484,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2021-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":260522,"name":"Dalane W. Kitzman","orcid":"0009-0000-5274-0826","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":0,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:54:18.470602Z","pmid":"34018179","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}