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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (May 5, 2016)
4 // COASTWEEKEND.COM Books, gardening, hiking, hobbies, recreation, personalities, travel & more Looking for — and fi nding — community Astoria couple Bill and Deborah Armington thrive on giving back By DWIGHT CASWELL D Dr. William Armington was a neuroradiologist with one of the oldest radiology fi rms in the coun- try, reading scans for four hospitals in the New Orleans area. “We had been living in New Orleans for a long time,” Armington says, “and we were established. We were doing things that we really enjoyed, medicine and our cultural pursuits.” Hurricane Katrina put an end to that. Hospitals closed, and New Orleans was evacuated. “We were forced to become more refl ective about our lives,” Bill says. “We looked for a place we liked,” says his wife, Deborah, “a community that was welcoming, and small enough that we could see that we were making a differ- ence.” The couple had lived in the French Quarter, a close-knit community. “We really treasured the relationships we had there,” Bil says. They began looking all over the country for the kind of communi- ty they wanted. It had to be on a coast, and it had to be a place with a thriving art scene, both visual and performing. That is what they had experienced in the French Quarter, which, despite being surrounded by a large city, is like a town of 4,000. Says Deborah, “I’m not really a city girl; I’m a country girl.” Eventually, they narrowed the possibilities down to two choices: Key West, Florida, and — 3,056 miles away — Astoria, Oregon. Key West was remote, at the end of a long island chain, and they judged that it might be diffi cult to PHOTO BY DWIGHT CASWELL Bill Armington is an accomplished pianist and is on the board of the As- toria Music Festival. PHOTO BY DWIGHT CASWELL Deborah and Bill Armington moved to Astoria in 2007, looking for a new community to call home after Hurricane Katrina left its mark on New Orleans. become a part of the community. Astoria was not quite so remote, and the arts community was vi- brant and growing. More impor- tantly, Bill says, “People accepted us.” Deborah echoes the sentiment, “We were thrilled that people wanted us to be a part of things.” Upon arrival in 2007, the couple immediately began volunteering. Deborah became a Court Appointed Special Advo- cate volunteer to help ensure that abused and neglected children have a better start in life. She now serves on the boards of Clatsop CASA and Astoria Visual Arts, and, although she is no longer on the Columbia Memorial Hospital Foundation Board, she is active in fundraising for the hospital’s new cancer center. An accomplished pianist, Bill had been on the advisory board of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Foundation. In Astoria, he joined the Liberty Theater Board of Di- and emergency medicine, and to rectors and was president for two the new cancer center, which will years. He now serves on the board break ground in August of this of the Astoria Music Festival. The year. “It’s really exciting for me Armingtons often play host to to be a part of this,” he says, “as artists and musicians and, he says, a doctor and as someone who has “It’s fun to see what’s happening to had a part in bringing this about.” music here. The music festival has “We love it here in Astoria,” some of the best classical music says Bill, “and we love exploring on the West Coast, and there is the the world.” When not working growing indie scene with Blind or volunteering, the Armingtons Pilot.” travel. Thanks to Bill’s greatest the internet, Bill can read scans from ‘WE LOVE contribution to almost anywhere in the community, IT HERE IN the world. though, has been as ASTORIA, Deborah, a doctor. “My goal AND WE LOVE “We Says love adventure in coming here,” he EXPLORING travel, and we love says, “was to make THE WORLD.’ to hike.” That might available in a rural mean hiking in setting all the medi- the Alps, kayak- cal care available in ing in Patagonia, or traveling in a large city.” He was immediately South Africa with their two adult aware of, he says, “how hard it children. On his 60th birthday, was for patients with serious con- ditions like cancer to get care with- Bill went swimming in 28-degree out major inconvenience.” Patients water at the North Pole. Perhaps the greatest discovery needing chemotherapy or radiation the Armingtons have made has little might have to make daily trips to to do with travel. “When the bottom Portland. “I was able to be a part fell out and our world turned upside of reaching out to OHSU (Oregon down,” says Bill, “we could contin- Health & Science University) to ue with our lives.” bring services to the coast.” In a small town on the Oregon Bill points to expanded options Coast. in general surgery, orthopedics