In Memory

Jeffrey Hubelbank

Jeffrey Hubelbank

Jeffrey B. Hubelbank

Born 13 June 1944, Connecticut

Died 3 April 1973, Los Angeles, California

California Death Index



 
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01/31/12 10:17 PM #1    

Sandra Malek

Family Kept Strong Hope

Man Loses Life Struggle After Ten Years in Coma

For 10 1/2 years, Jeffrey Hubelbank fought for his life in a semicomatose condition resulting from head injuries caused when a car in which he rode was struck by a train in Canoga Park.

The battle came to an end Tuesday, when he died at his Woodland Hills home. He was 28.

His mother Ethel was with him when death came.

Mr. Hubelbank did not wage his fight alone. His family, countless friends, nurses and doctors from all across the country fought with him.

And his parents, though grieving, want their story to bring hope to others who are waging similar battles.

The Hubelbanks kept such hope for 10 1/2 years even when Jeffrey appeared twice to be near death. Both times, doctors managed to pull him through.

"We never would say, 'If he recovered. . .'" his father Simon recounted. "We would always say, 'When he recovered. . .'"

"He was able to show recognition at times," Mrs. Hubelbank said. "He could eat by mouth."

Following the accident, which occurred on Roscoe Blvd. just east of Canoga Ave., Jeffrey was taken to Northridge Hospital, where he stayed for 10 months. Then his parents took him home.

"The doctors hoped that the familiar surroundings might make him become aware," Mrs Hubelbank said. "He seemed to show some awareness at times--in other words, there was always hope."

With help from friends, the family began a medically prescribed program known as "patterning" in which they would lay Jeffrey on his stomach atop a table and move his arms and legs in a crawling motion.

In recent years, the family was able to purchase a machine to do this work.

In the meantime, the family sought help from a number of local hospitals and the Institute for Achievement of Human Potential in Philadelphia, a clinic to help brain-damaged children.

It was while Jeffrey was at IAHP that one of the close calls came.

About a week after his parents had returned home, Dr. Eugene Spitz, who was working on Jeffrey's case, "phoned and said he was dying," Mrs. Hubelbank said.

There was an airline strike on at the time--about seven years ago-- "but somehow we managed to get back there."

Getting Jeffrey home though, was going to be another problem. With the strike on, his parents had to find a way.

An appeal to the Philadelphia Inquirer to air their plight produced miraculous results, Simon recalled.

From the Inquirer, the story found its way to the wire services, then to Los Angeles area newspapers where it was read sympathetically by Larry Smith, then general manager of the Lear Jet Corp.

Smith arranged to have a jet dispatched to Philadelphia to bring Jeffrey and his parents home, Simon said.

Spitz' involvement in the case did not end there, the parents noted.

Over the past few years, they said, they were taking Jeffrey twice a year to Help for Brain-Injured Children, an institute in LaHabra, where Spitz would go to visit several children.

"In fact," remarked Mrs. Hubelbank, "we had just got a card that another visit was coming up next month."

The second close call came last December, when Jeffrey's breathing stopped and "he had no blood pressure," she said.

With the aid of a special breathing device that "did his breathing for him," doctors again were able to pull him through.

The family also built a special backyard pool for him, with the water kept at 95 degrees, Simon said.

Jeffrey was graduated in 1962 from William H. Taft High School in Woodland Hills. At the time of the accident, he was a freshman at San Fernando Valley State College (now California State University), Northridge.

He wanted to be a dentist, his parents said.

"Even in his first year in college," his mother related, "he befreinded a fine young man who was practicing in Woodland Hills."

"He (the dentist) allowed Jeffrey to go in on weekends and help him in his laboratory, and he would have sponsored Jeffrey through dental school."

Jeffrey also worked as assistant manager at a Canoga Park movie theater, his parents said. He was on the tennis teams in high school and college.

Also surviving Jeffrey is his sister Sherri of the family home at 22355 Tiara St.

Funeral arrangements were indefinite, pending official determination by the Los Angeles County coroner's office of the cause of death.

Arrangements are being handled by Mt. Sinai Memorial Park at Forest Lawn, Hollywood Hills.

The Valley News, Thursday, April 5, 1973. By Richard Knee


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