Stange Award for Meritorious Service
Larry Carpenter
DVM ‘82
Silver Spring, Maryland
Just how did an oil field roust-about, lumberjack, and a gold miner with a rural one-room school education wind up contributing to key research to develop vaccines and treatments for Hantaviruses, Rift Valley Fever, Ebola and other viruses?
For Dr. Larry Carpenter it was a long and winding road that began with his enlistment in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War.
“Although I had a student deferment, I had no clear educational goal and was running out of general courses,” Carpenter remembered. “I enlisted thinking I would at least have the GI Bill to pursue an education when I got out.”
Thus began a 25-year career which ended with his retirement with the rank of Colonel and numerous commendations. Along the way, he earned his DVM from Iowa State in 1982.
After graduation, Carpenter had a diverse Army career.
“The Army Veterinary Corps has three basic missions – veterinary public health, veterinary care of government animals and military medical research,” he said. “I was lucky to have more than one assignment in each of these areas.”
As a Laboratory Animal trainee Carpenter contributed to key research to develop vaccines in the Biosafety Levels 3 and 4 at Fort Detrick, Maryland. During Operation Uphold Democracy, his leadership was central to blunting a rabies outbreak in Haiti.
“Operation Mad Dog vaccinated over 19,000 and cats in Port Au Prince in just two weeks,” he said.
On 9/11, Carpenter was director of the Military Working Dog Hospital in Texas. He initiated the process to build a first-class, state-of-the-art veterinary hospital to treat military working dogs (MWD).
“It was clear to me after the tragic events of 9/11 that the need for explosives detection and surveillance-capable MWDs would become a high demand item,” Carpenter said. “We pointed out the shortcomings of our current hospital and brought that information to the attention of our chain of command.
“In both Haiti and the military working dog situations, I became convinced that there was something I had to get done that maybe only I could do during that timeframe. I’ve always thought that if I could do my best to take care of the small area of life where I have some control, it would make that thing better.”
Carpenter had the same philosophy after he retired from the Army and returned to his native South Dakota. He operated a solo surgery practice in Sturgis for years. He worked with the South Dakota Highway Patrol Working Dog group, taking care of their working dogs.
He became involved with the Sturgis Alliance of Churches to raise money to help people who are stuck in bad circumstances.
“What I have done in service is to try not to just walk away from a problem, but to make a start for others to build on,” he said. “I try to do what I believe to be right.
“Maybe because of that, someone, somewhere, sometime later will have a better outcome because of what I did.”
