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The end of an era is looming in Wallace. After 47 years, Dr. Dan Robinson, commonly known simply as “Dr. Dan,” will retire and close his practice, bringing an end to the three-generations long stint of the Robinson family practicing medicine in the town.
Dr. Dan’s grandfather, Dr. John D. Robinson, Sr., opened his medical practice in downtown Wallace in 1954, followed years later by his son, Dr. John D. Robinson, Jr., who opened an optometry practice. Dr. Dan decided at an early age that he wanted to be an optometrist, just like his dad.
He made the decision in seventh grade, Dr. Dan said. “We had to do a term paper and I thought it’d be easy to write about optometry, because I thought my dad would send me all this information,” he explained. “My mother and father divorced when I was 10, so I was living in Durham. He sent me information, but I had to do the work on my own. By the time I went to college, my schoolwork was all the optometry prerequisites. I graduated from the University of North Carolina in Wilmington with a degree in chemistry. Then I got two degrees from the University of Alabama in Birmingham. One is in visiological optics and the other is a doctorate in optometry. I was pretty dead set on what I was going to do, and I’ve never regretted it.”
He opened his practice on Main Street in Wallace in 1976, and will close it on December 22, 2023. He said he made the decision with the help of his two employees, Linda Kraulik, who has been with the practice for 40 years, and Rhonda DeVane, who’s been there 32 years.
“They’ve been dedicated employees,” Dr. Dan said. “You can’t go to many practices that have receptionists or technicians or whatever that have worked 32 or 40 years. That’s been wonderful here, patients come in and they know who these girls are, and the girls know them. But that makes a difference. I look at that like community. They’re really family to me. I’ve spent a lot more hours with them than I have with my wife, by a long measure.”
Dr. Dan and his staff made the decision to close the practice together, he said, adding that he was going to retire in two years anyway, but his staff’s health concerns have necessitated an acceleration in those plans. “It’s the best time, in my mind,” he said.
“It’s been a very rewarding profession, and we’ve had so many families that have been loyal patients,” Dr. Dan added. “We’re seeing third, and sometimes fourth generations.”
Kraulik said she will miss the patients, many of whom she’s gotten to know very well over the past 40-plus years. “We are more like family than coworkers,” added DeVane.
The staff is required to maintain the practice for 90 days after its closure, to rectify any outstanding insurance claims and provide records to patients. However, Dr. Dan is hopeful that he’ll be able to find a qualified practitioner to take over the practice in that time. “I’m trying to find somebody suitable to come in and take over a well-established practice,” he said. “The community needs it.”
He understands that his loyal patients feel concern about finding a new eye doctor once his practice is closed. “People have come in and said, ‘Oh, Dr. Dan, you can’t retire!’,” he said. “And it makes you feel good because you know they care. And [they ask,] ’who am I going to see?’ A lot of these practices are full with their patients. I tell them, give me some time to see if I can get somebody, but we’ll get you seen. We’ve got good practitioners around us, in Kenansville and Burgaw.”
Dr. Dan’s patients are so loyal that even after a satellite practice in Warsaw closed in 2016, many of those patients followed him back to the Wallace office.
Dr. Dan Robinson also gets referrals for eye injuries, in addition to regular eye exams. “I don’t know who’s going to be able to do that once we close,” he admitted. “But I can’t practice without a sufficient office staff. And hopefully, we’ll get a new practitioner or a group to come in and take over. They may not be in this building but they’d have access to our patient base.”
One thing is for certain: Dr. Dan and his wife, Tanya, will remain in the Wallace community. Though he moved to Durham with his mother in the fourth grade, he returned to Wallace after college and has stayed there ever since. There was never any question that his optometric practice would be right here at home.
“When I was an undergraduate in UNCW, I came home almost every weekend,” he said. “I love the people of Wallace. … I can’t imagine wanting to live in a city anymore, especially when you try to drive around Wilmington or Raleigh, or even Durham.”
Not only has Dr. Dan been a mainstay in the medical community of Wallace, he’s also been very active in his community, like his father and grandfather before him. He was a part of the Wallace Jaycees when it was in existence, as well as the Wallace 100 Committee, and served on the Duplin Board of Health for 15 years. He is also a member and past president of the Rotary Club in Wallace. He’s active in his church, Wallace Presbyterian, and is a member of the Gideons International and a qualified church speaker.
“When you get involved, you become part of the fabric of the community,” he said. “When I look at what my grandfather did, my dad’s service… one of the credos in the Jaycees creed was that service to humanity is the best work of life. Rotary, you know, has a saying, he profits most who serves best.”
Of the many accomplishments and awards that line his office walls, including photos of his grandfather with Eleanor Roosevelt and an invitation to John F. Kennedy’s inauguration, Dr. Dan is perhaps most proud of receiving the award that bears his late father’s name. “Because of his service to the Board of Examiners of Optometry, my dad was recognized by people all over the U.S.,” he explained. His father was instrumental in passing a nationwide law in 1977, which established that optometrists could prescribe medications and treatments. “So, they established this award in my dad’s honor, the Clinical Excellence Award. And I was a clinical examiner for many years. So our people that come out of school and want to be optometrists, have to take a board exam, so they established this on June 7, 2002. And after years of serving as a clinical examiner, I actually was given the award that’s named for my dad in 2008. So that was a pretty proud moment.”
With just a little more than three weeks left to care for his patents’ eyes, Dr. Dan reflects on his many years in Wallace, and his father and grandfather’s legacies, and realizing he now has one, too. So, what will he do now? Maybe finally find time to play golf, he joked.
“But you know, when you close a practice down, you’re closing a chapter in your life, and it’s like I’m going into uncharted waters,” he said. “I’m going to miss seeing patients in my office, and I hope I’ll recognize them out in public places. It’s been a good 47 years, and I can’t regret a moment.”
