Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 9, 1993 TAG: 9305090077
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CAROLYN CLICK STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
But in his determined and public battle with leukemia, he raised up and educated a small army of friends and strangers who have now lengthened the odds for others fighting the disease.
The 25-year-old Salem man died early Friday at the Roanoke Rehabilitation Center, a little over four months after organizing the region's largest bone marrow drive.
On that cold January day, he had hoped there would be one, among the 380 people who crowded into the Unitarian Universalist Church, whose blood cell proteins would be compatible with his.
It didn't happen. But those who volunteered to give the two tablespoons of blood necessary for typing are now listed with the National Marrow Donor Program, a computerized registry that seeks to match those in need of transplants with volunteer donors.
Harrison's courage, and his stubborn independence, in the face of the disease touched his family and the medical staff who cared for him.
"He never gave up being in charge and maintaining his dignity," his father, Fenton "Spike" Harrison Jr., said Saturday. "He never once, that I know of, said `why me?' "
Harrison, fresh out of Elon College and well into his first year of teaching in a North Carolina public school, was diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia in February 1992. His disease went into remission the following June and he was able to resume many of his activities, but the disease returned again last fall.
He spent much of the last months of his life enduring a regimen of chemotherapies in hopes of getting into remission again - and finding a compatible donor. He taped a picture of Clint Eastwood to his hospital door along with newspaper clippings about his fight. He also succeeded in getting cable television into the rehab center so he and other patients could enjoy ESPN.
In an interview with this newspaper in December, he explained how he coped. "Right now, I truly know what it means to live one day at a time," he said.
Staff Chaplain Bill Baker often played backgammon with Harrison and grieved that a young man with so much potential for greatness was dying.
"I thought he was an unusual person, an extremely sensitive person who cared about people," said Baker. "I think he was one of those individuals who had the capability to do anything he wanted to do."
"He was just such a remarkable person," said Debbie Roseberry, a nurse who tended to Harrison. "I will never forget walking into his room one night. I asked him if there was anything I could do and he said, `No, it's something I have to deal with myself."'
As she turned away, she saw silent tears roll down his cheeks.
"I don't think he ever gave up on the chance of getting a bone marrow transplant," said Roseberry. "In a sense he taught us a lot about the genetics of bone marrow transplants."
That education campaign has paid off for others. Now, his father said, they are hearing of Roanoke area volunteers - part of his son's army - who are getting called back for more testing, signaling that they may have the antigens that will be compatible with someone in need of a transplant.
And a woman in New York who was introduced to Harrison is getting a marrow transplant, apparently from someone in Virginia.
"In his own way, he made a mark," said Baker. "Something like a shooting star that makes a bright light and doesn't stay long."
by CNB