He was an old-school doctor, making house calls whenever he felt it was necessary.
Dr. Fisk Edwin Hallidy also was a war hero, protecting his shipmates from disaster by shooting down two Japanese kamikaze planes that tried to sink their ship during World War II.
Dr. Hallidy, a longtime resident of Portland, died from complications of Alzheimer’s disease Thursday at the Maine Veterans Home in Scarborough, where he had lived for the past four years. He was 84.
“He made a lot of house calls during his career. He was one of the few who did,” said one of Dr. Hallidy’s daughters, Jody A. Libby of Portland.
“He had a lot of indigent patients. He refused to take their money, only accepting what they could afford.”
Born in Passaic, N.J., Dr. Hallidy had virtually no ties to Maine during his youth. It was his medical career that brought him to the state during the early 1950s.
While pursuing his medical studies in Missouri, Dr. Hallidy was walking along a sidewalk with his friend, a fellow medical student named Jerry Whalen.
Two sisters, Neva and Eva Beard, were sitting on a bench and took notice of the two men. The Beard sisters were identical twins.
“They looked up and said, ‘Those are the men we are going to marry,’” Libby said. “And within the next year or two that is exactly what happened.”
Dr. Hallidy married Neva Beard. They moved to Portland and bought a home on Hollis Road, next to the former Maine Osteopathic Hospital.
Dr. Hallidy completed his internship at the hospital, which is now known as Brighton Medical Center, and converted the basement of his home into a medical office.
“He stayed in Maine because he loved being so close to the ocean,” his daughter said.
She remembers the times, especially around Christmas, when her father would take his three daughters with him on house calls. They would bring food to his patients.
“I loved it,” she said. “His patients loved him because he was always kind to them.”
In addition to operating a private practice, Dr. Hallidy served as team physician for the 1959 state champion Deering High School football team. He also served as team physician for the Portland Sea Hawks, a semi-professional football team that played in Portland during the early 1960s.
Before coming to Maine, Dr. Hallidy served in the Navy during World War II, receiving several military medals for his heroism.
He served as a gunners mate on the USS Biscayne, a group command ship that fought in the invasions of Iwo Jima and Okinawa. He shot down two Japanese kamikaze planes that the pilots intended to crash into the ship.
During the attack, his gun turret was struck by a fragment from one plane. The impact hurt his back, an injury that forced him to recover while his ship was at sea.
“After that, he always had back pain,” his daughter said.
The horrors of war that he witnessed drove him to pursue a career in medicine, she said.
Dr. Hallidy received his degree from the College of Osteopathic Medicine in Kirksville, Mo., in May 1953.
“I think he had grown sick of seeing a lot of his buddies killed,” Libby said. “It crystallized what he wanted to do with his life.”
Staff Writer Dennis Hoey can be contacted at 791-6365 or at:
dhoey@pressherald.com
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