The lights have been left on at the West Side Baptist Church so a student can practice piano, while on the other side of Block Island, Dr. Bennett (right) has just turned over the busy town practice to Dr. Brassard.

It's been said that everyone hates doctors, but they love their own. Nowhere is this more evident than in the town of New Shoreham, otherwise known as Block Island. The town depends on its only physician for much more than can be said or seen. But now Dr. John Bennett is leaving and turning his practice over to Dr. Pete Brassard. Before Dr. Bennett leaves, he treats one more patient.

"In a small town like this, you'd never think I would encounter a blood disorder that occurs in one of every ten thousand, but here it is." His last official patient has hemachromatosis, a disorder that requires a specified amount of blood to be "let off" every five weeks or so.

Dr. Bennett has grown fond of this patient, someone for whom he has saved his empty wine bottles.

"The medical procedure is a phlebotomy" says Dr. Bennett, "done under sterile conditions. But since the blood is thrown out, I collect it in an empty wine bottle -- no sense charging the patient for a fancy container that's discarded."

The Island Clinic is in a house owned by the town, which allows its doctor to live there rent free. This year, a new medical center will be built; Dr. Brassard looks forward to this prospect.

John Bennett has left for Missouri to go back to where he grew up. Pete Brassard has come home to practice medicine in his native Rhode Island, where he'll make house calls and set aside an empty wine bottle every five weeks or so.