DOVER-FOXCROFT – Leaning comfortably against a counter on a recent day, Dr. Harold Sherman greeted a woman who tugged a reluctant large black dog behind her into his small examination room.

“What’s happening?” Sherman, 77, asked as the woman closed the door behind her dog.

When the woman explained her dog Nova was having trouble with her left ear, Sherman glanced at his “right-hand” assistant Susan Page of Dexter and said, “Let’s get her on the table.”

Sherman then grabbed the dog’s right ear to peer inside and quickly discovered that Nova wanted none of it. Bucking, the rowdy dog whacked his head against Sherman’s, and the dog’s toenail sliced Sherman’s arm, drawing blood.

“See how much fun we have?” Sherman remarked to this reporter, before two assistants held the dog down and muzzled her while Sherman gave the animal a mild sedative.

The abuse is all in a day’s work for the senior citizen who has not only been scratched, but also bitten, snarled at and pooped on. Despite these pitfalls, Sherman said he thoroughly enjoys his job.

Other than being sidelined by a heart attack for a few months in 2001, Sherman has been steadily caring for animals throughout the state for more than 52 years.

During a recent interview, Sherman said he first contemplated becoming a veterinarian during his high school years but such a career was discouraged then.

After graduation, Sherman enrolled in prelaw at the University of Maine. He said he realized his mistake his first day on campus. Before he had attended a class, Sherman said, he shifted his major to veterinary science, a move he has never regretted.

After his stint at the University of Maine, Sherman continued his education at what is now known as the Ontario Veterinary College in Guelph, Ontario.

With his college diploma in hand, the Island Falls native settled in Dover-Foxcroft in 1957 where on April Fool’s Day he purchased the practice of Dr. Lewis Denton. For years, Sherman held office hours at his business, Sherman’s Veterinary Service, as well as traveled throughout the state to care for farm animals.

In the summer of 1973, Sherman was joined at his Route 7 practice by Dr. Dennis Ruksznis.

Ruksznis recalled those early years with Sherman as extremely busy. The pair would split the workload.

“As long as you did the work, he was a hands-off type boss,” Ruksznis said. “One thing about Harold is he’s really fair.”

And, he added, nothing much rattled him, including the abuse he gave Sherman’s vehicle.

Ruksznis recalled he had to have Sherman’s station wagon towed repeatedly from the rough roads where he made his rounds. That included one trip when Ruksznis buried the vehicle up to its axle in mud and the exhaust system unhooked. Ruksznis chuckled as he recalled getting the vehicle towed from the mud, then sneaking the car with the loud muffler back into Sherman’s garage. When Sherman fired it up in the morning, he was greeted with a loud rumble, he recalled. “I never remember him yelling at me.”

In 2001, Ruksznis switched roles with Sherman when he, Dr. Ron Miles and Dr. Jeffrey Kelly purchased the practice and renamed it Foxcroft Veterinary Service.

Sherman worked long and hard at his business during his career, according to Ruksznis. When he wasn’t working in the clinic, Sherman was on call for farmers who needed his assistance, he said.

“If people called and said they had a sick animal, he came,” Ruksznis said.

One of those sick animals, a horse, exposed Sherman to rabies in 1959. Sherman said he treated the ill horse but it still died. When he went to remove the animal’s head for testing to determine its cause of death, Sherman nicked his finger with the scalpel. Twenty-one days later, he learned the horse had died from rabies, a relatively unknown disease in the state at the time. It was suspected the horse had been bitten by a migratory bat that had the disease. Sherman said he was exposed to rabies a couple of times in later years and again took the necessary treatment.

There have been lighter moments in Sherman’s career, as well. The active Dover-Foxcroft Kiwanian recalled taking what he thought was a chocolate-covered cherry from a box of candy and chewing on it only to learn that one of his co-workers had dipped a cow’s teat in chocolate and placed it in the box. “It was very rubbery,” he said with a loud laugh. It didn’t bother him much, he said, since he had eaten worse substances while tending to animals.

Page, his assistant of six years, recalled the day Sherman became host to a multitude of fleas. She said someone brought a deceased dog in a paper bag to Sherman for incineration. When Sherman opened the bag to check on the carcass, fleas that covered the dog found a new home in Sherman’s then full beard.

“Since then, I’ve been a bit more cautious about opening bags with dogs in them,” Sherman joked.

Despite his age, Sherman has no plans to hang up his maroon work apron. He works 25 hours a week for the Dover-Foxcroft practice and half a day a week at Dr. Barbara Farren’s practice in Hampden.

“I like what I’m doing so I do it,” Sherman said.