Fort Dodge resident Tom Schmoker wanted to honor his late wife’s vision for UnityPoint Health — Trinity Regional Medical Center. The end result of that wish is a gift that will benefit the community for years to come.

Norma Schmoker served on the hospital’s board, and she envisioned the facility as a place where a wide range of medical services would be provided.

”She always felt that health care should be at the home level,” Tom Schmoker recently said.

Treating cancer is obviously one of those services that a local hospital ought to provide for its patients close to home. To ensure that happens at UnityPoint Health – Trinity Regional Medical Center, Tom Schmoker donated $2 million to help pay off the hospital’s new linear accelerator.

The Trinity Foundation is in the midst of a capital campaign called Radiating Hope to pay for the machine. The campaign goal is to raise $3.5 million.

Tom Schmoker just covered most of that amount.

In recognition of the gift, the hospital leadership has named the cancer treatment area the Norma Schmoker Cancer Center. Interestingly, it is not the first facility the hospital has which bears her name. There is also the Norma Schmoker Women’s Center.

With the cancer center, Tom Schmoker and his family have given the Fort Dodge region an incredible gift of health care. Generations of patients will be treated successfully thanks to this generosity.

A $2 million gift from an individual or a family is just about breath-taking. And no doubt there are probably other things Tom Schmoker could have done with that money. But he chose to give it away so that people he will never meet will get proper cancer care.

Merely saying thank you seems inadequate, but we will do it anyway. Thank you, Mr. Schmoker.