Sitting at the table of their ranch-style rural Fremont home, Jim Dake went into another room to grab a stack of papers.
When he returned in his wheelchair with a proud grin, he started to read from a Nebraska Unicameral Judiciary Committee transcript.
“I’m here today as an example of what stem cell science offers,” Dake read from the March 2007 testimony.
Diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1993 -- 13 months after being sworn in as an attorney -- he continued to work, then from an office in Schuyler. But the disease progressed, and in 1998 he was informed by staff at the University of Nebraska Medical Center that he was a candidate for an experimental autologous stem cell transplant being conducted there.
“The hope of the experiment was to halt the progression of my MS by destroying then rebuilding my immune system through the use of stem cells that were harvested through me,” he continued to read his testimony against proposed LB700 that would prohibit human cloning.
But there was a problem with the bill as it was introduced, he said. It was “so cobbled together” that it failed to give specific definitions so that it could prove nearly impossible to enforce.
A North Bend native, Dake, 44, said he enjoys political involvement.
With a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Dake graduated from the UNL law school in 1992. But he didn’t go straight to law school after he received his bachelor’s degree in 1986.
In between he worked for former State Sen. Chris Abboud of Omaha and for the marketing department of the UNL food processing center, which promotes food products made in Nebraska.
After law school, he worked for a law firm in Columbus, but in just more than a year later his life changed.
“My mother-in-law noticed that I was walking funny,” he said. “Liz and I had just bought a house. I was helping move something into another house. I went to run to the car to get a tool, but I couldn’t run. I just thought I screwed up something in my back.
“The last week of September (1993) I was sitting at my desk at the law firm and I felt like someone wrapped a belt around my chest, not like a heart attack, just feeling constrained like that.”
In October, he went with Liz to a conference in Kearney. At the time, Liz was teaching English as a Second Language classes.
“We got a phone call from the doctor, who said they needed to schedule a second MRI to find out what the spots on his spine were,” she said. “That’s how she left it. That was the message she left us. So, we scheduled a second MRI. Spots on his spine? That didn’t sound good. Jim started making out his will in his mind.”
Later that month, he was diagnosed with MS, and he was excited that it wasn’t something worse.
“That set the tone for the rest of my experience with multiple sclerosis,” he said.
He was able to continue practicing law until January 1999 with the last two years in Fremont.
Just before his law practice career ended, he got a break.
“UNMC received a grant to do five stem cell transplant procedures,” he said. “The idea was that no one knows exactly what caused my MS. One idea is that my own immune system was attacking the fibers of the cells in my nervous system. I thought this was an opportunity to step away from it and make a clean break.”
The experience of the transplant procedure made an impact on his, partly because of the other patients in the Lied Transplant Center, where the procedure took place.
“It really gave me whole different outlook,” he said. “There were people there with liver transplants, breast cancer and a number of high mortality situations. I have MS. It will slow me down but it’s not generally terminal. It made me appreciate my own situation.”
Since the procedure he has had no more MS attacks.
The past few years, his work in politics has increased.
“When I was in Columbus I helped some friends with their campaigns,” he said. “But in 2001 or 2002 I called Richard Register about getting involved in Dodge County politics. He soon became an alternate for the Nebraska Democratic Central Committee, and in 2004 he became co-chairman of the Dodge County Democratic Party.”
Something else happened in 2004 that really piqued his interest in politics.
“I had gone to the Nebraska State Democratic Convention and elected as a state central committee member,” he said. “They were looking for people to go to the national convention in Boston. My name was put into the hat for consideration. I was elected to be a national delegate. The convention was incredible.
“But the most incredible thing was the keynote speaker,” he continued. “Everybody was carrying around these signs ” Obama2004.com. He was running for the U.S. Senate seat. He was the keynote speaker and tore the place up. I turned to the guy I was sitting next to and said that I think we just saw the first African-American president of the United States. He was every bit of what everyone has seen this last year. It certainly made us feel like we were in a historic moment.”
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