Oh, how we’d rush to the television set when the theme song to “M-A-S-H” came on.

It was the early 1970s, and I was in high school. My mother enjoyed watching “M-A-S-H,” a CBS comedy-drama series about an American mobile army surgical hospital (thus the M-A-S-H name) during the Korean War. Mom was a registered nurse and related to the series’ characters, particularly Benjamin “Hawkeye” Pierce, a surgeon with a keen sense of humor played by Alan Alda.

Pierce was from Crabapple Cove, a fictional Maine town, another reason we felt an affinity for the show, which was based on Maine author Hiester Richard Hornberger Jr.’s 1968 book “M-A-S-H: A Novel About Three Army Doctors.” The book, for which Hornberger used the pen name Richard Hooker, as well as the 1970 “M-A-S-H” film starring Donald Sutherland and Elliott Gould and the television series are based on Hornberger’s experience as a U.S. Army surgeon in a M-A-S-H unit in South Korea.

Some may not realize that Hornberger, who grew up in New Jersey but spent summers in Maine, had a connection to our very own city of Waterville.

After the war, he moved to Maine, where his family roots go back several generations. He worked two years at the Veterans Administration Hospital at Togus in Augusta and then as a thoracic surgeon at Thayer Hospital on North Street in Waterville. He shared an office with our good friend, Anthony “Tony” Betts, a physician and medical examiner who had a delightful sense of humor. Betts, who died in 2007, was the best man at our wedding and spoke fondly of Hornberger. Betts is the inspiration for the character Tony Holcombe in one of Hornberger’s sequel novels, “M-A-S-H Goes to Maine.”

Hornberger retired from his Waterville practice in 1988 and moved to Bremen. In 1997, he died at Maine Medical Center in Portland at the age of 73, according to his obituary. It says he repeatedly disclaimed any similarity between himself and the character Hawkeye Pierce.

My husband Phil and I still watch reruns of “M-A-S-H,” which ran from 1972-83. We never tire of the often hilarious, sometimes touching stories.

So, when I learned that Spectrum Generations’ Muskie Center in Waterville was going to host a talk last Monday about the show and its creator’s connection to Waterville, I was intrigued and decided to attend.

Joe Schmalzel, new president of the Waterville Historical Society and his son, Joshua, a society volunteer and member of the Waterville Historic Preservation Commission, gave the presentation, citing their longtime love of history and of all things “M-A-S-H.”

“We as a family watch it frequently,” the elder Schmalzel told an audience of about 25. “We’re dedicated fans, and it was very interesting to us that our place of abode, Waterville, has a connection to ‘M-A-S-H.'”

A member of the Waterville Board of Education and former adjunct professor at both Thomas and Unity colleges, Joe Schmalzel described the setting for the show following World War II when the Korean War began in 1950. He said a million soldiers and 2 million to 3 million civilians died.

Learning from previous wars that the sooner a soldier with a traumatic injury can get to a surgeon the higher the chance of survival, mobile army surgical units were set up in tents, with multiple surgeons, nurses (who also were officers) and medical support staff, Joe Schmalzel explained. Hornberger worked in such a unit, where helicopters would bring the wounded in from the front lines.

Joshua Schmalzel spoke about Hornberger’s background — he was born in Trenton, New Jersey, in 1924, attended school in that state and graduated from Bowdoin College before attending medical school at Cornell University. He was drafted into the army in 1951. Hornberger and a fellow officer named his tent in the M-A-S-H unit “The Swamp.”

Hornberger bought a house in Waterville in 1958 and published the novel in 1968, after which Ring Lardner Jr. wrote the screenplay based on the book.

The Schmalzels received enthusiastic applause for their presentation, which I’m not able to adequately summarize here for lack of space. Nor can I do just service to the stories retired Waterville radiologist Stephen Eccher shared about his friendship with Hornberger, with whom he worked at Thayer. Eccher said he recalled Hornberger was furious that he didn’t profit from the “M-A-S-H” movie.

“He said he sold the movie rights for a couple of hundred bucks,” Eccher said. “He got nothing for the TV series — one of the most successful TV series ever.”

Eccher said Hornberger’s sense of humor and turns of phrase were remarkable.

“I was just impressed with the genius of his writing,” he said.

He recalled the days at Thayer when medical professionals were trying to figure out the best ways to keep patients safely in their beds, as they often would fall out of them at night. Staff put bed rails up, added padding and even talked about using restraints. Eccher said that during a meeting one day, Hornberger, sitting in the back of the room, piped up with a zany idea.

“He said, ‘We could electrify the side rails,'” and everyone said, ‘What?'”

Hornberger drove like a maniac and was forced to take a defensive driving course twice because of it, according to Eccher.

“He had speeding tickets out the ears,” he said.

Eccher’s wife Cindy, a retired nurse, brought her copy of  “M-A-S-H goes to Maine” to Monday’s event. She recommended people read the book, especially the sixth chapter which she said reveals the true heart of Hornberger.

“It’ll make you cry,” she said. “It won’t make you laugh, it’ll make you cry — but the rest of the book will make you laugh.”

Amy Calder has been a Morning Sentinel reporter 37 years. Her columns appear here Sundays. She is the author of the book, “Comfort is an Old Barn,” a collection of her curated columns, published in 2023 by Islandport Press. She may be reached at [email protected]. For previous Reporting Aside columns, go to centralmaine.com.