‘I figure I’m good for another 40 years’

When Duane Hookom walked into Champps with his brother in March, he was surprised to see that none of the buddies they were meeting were sitting at their usual table.

As they searched the room, Hookom’s brother casually walked him toward the back of the restaurant. There he found more than 50 people in the restaurant’s party room.

It was his 70th birthday.

“My wife had planned all of this, and I had no idea at all,” he said, still sounding a bit overwhelmed eight months later. “I mean, the whole spread of appetizers and city councilmen and the mayor and friends from college and high school and relatives I hadn’t seen and neighbors and just all walks of life, you know, were there.”

A 70th birthday is noteworthy, to be sure. For Hookom, even more so.

“It was extra special, because, you know, I came so close to not having a 70th and so that was really amazing,” he said.

Cardiac arrest

On June 8, 2023, Hookom was at Nesbitt Park in Eden Prairie attending a ceremony for new playground equipment, a splash pad and a cricket exhibition as part of his role as a member of the city Parks, Recreation and Natural Resources Commission.

As he got in his van to head home to attend a birthday party for his wife, Laura, he suffered a cardiac arrest – one known as the “widow maker” – a term that refers to a heart attack caused by a severe blockage in the left main coronary artery.

It’s usually fatal.

Molly Menton, a mom of twin boys who happened to be at the park, saw Hookom’s van rolling down the park’s driveway and jumped in the passenger side and pressed on the brake pedal until help arrived.

She was also at Hookom’s birthday party. And she brought her parents.

Hookom underwent a quadruple bypass on June 13 and was home on Father’s Day. (Read Eden Prairie Local News’ July 19, 2023, story here.)

I met Hookom for the first time when he sat down next to me in early October, the first night of the Eden Prairie Police Department’s Citizen’s Academy. As we introduced ourselves, officers entering the room would shout greetings to Hookom, accompanied by “How are you doing?”

I soon learned why. Some of the officers were at Nesbitt Park that day in 2023. Hookom estimates there were nine EMTs, police officers and firefighters. Three of them took turns performing CPR on him.

They had watched Hookom at the edge of death and seen him come back and were glad to see him again as a healthy man.

Seventeen months after his heart attack, Hookom and I sat in the quiet, open space at FRGMNT Coffee in the Southwest Crossing building to talk about his progress. He had worked for Nestle on the fourth floor of the building for 15 years and retired in 2021.

The day before our meeting, he had visited his doctor. “I actually just had an echocardiogram yesterday,” he said. “It was the biannual checkup, and everything was really very good, so I’m good for another six months.” He said this with a laugh, but his face told me it was an important moment.

“I’m just feeling lucky,” he said. “And I still have time here with family and grandkids and friends and everything else that, you know, could have been gone.”

The academy

Hookom felt it was important to tell the story of the academy and the importance of Eden Prairie’s first responders and those that patrol its streets and keeps its citizens safe. He is a perfect example of the kind of work first responders do, he said.

The EPPD’s Citizens Academy is held every fall and is limited to about 15 participants, who attend six presentations on consecutive Tuesdays, during which participants are able to see up close how the department operates.

Hookom had attended the City Government Academy, a six-week program that spotlights a different department each week and allows participants to tour facilities, meet city staff and learn about municipal government. He heard about the police academy and signed up.

Academy participants visit the 911 call center and the department’s training facilities in Edina, watch a demonstration by the unmanned aerial systems (drones) team and learn about the department’s DWI enforcement efforts, crime scene technicians, negotiators and investigators, SWAT team members and K-9 officers.

“I think that what impressed me most was the passion,” Hookom said. “The passion that every one of them has toward their job and performing their duty to keep Eden Prairie safe. Every one of them was enthusiastic.”

Cycling and a setback

Getting back on his bike was Hookom’s primary motivation during his recovery.

Before his heart attack, he was a committed cyclist who rode with a group at the Eden Prairie Senior Center and with Utepils Cycling Friends, a group of cyclists connected with the Utepils brewery in Minneapolis.

Hookom gets emotional as he tells the story of his rehab. “Last summer, one of the things I really did a lot of initially was (riding a) stationary bike,” he said, choking back tears. “(My goal) was to get back out and do my first real life bike ride. It’s not that I ride a lot, but that’s my main source of exercise.

“And, you know, some of it is ‘me’ time, some of it’s with a group. It’s something I have done with my son, and so to get back out and bike again was a big thing for me.”

On Oct. 22, 2023, four months after his heart attack, Hookom rode 18 miles with Utepils. 

He was back in the swing of things this spring, when his previously injured right knee finally gave out on him. Just after Memorial Day, Hookom had knee replacement surgery. Injuries from his days as a rugby player in college finally caught up with him. He suspects his knee was aggravated when he was pulled from his van on the day of his heart attack.

But he’s not complaining. After another summer of rehab, he’s back on the bike trails.

Thankful 

As another Thanksgiving and holiday season approaches, Hookom is grateful. 

“I’m just thankful and lucky as heck that the situation was what it was,” he said. He’s thankful for Molly Menton, who prevented his van from running into visitors at Nesbitt Park. “Otherwise, I might have hurt some people.”

He’s also thankful there were several EMTs just 50 feet away from him when he went into cardiac arrest. “I can’t think that I would have been in a better situation if I had been in a hospital, to be honest with you,” he said.

And he’s thankful for his recent echocardiogram that shows he is doing well. 

“I’m good for another six months,” he said. “But since I had the quadruple bypass, I think, you know, there’s no warranty on that, but I figure I’m good for another 40 years.”