YELLOW SPRINGS — Dr. Hosket saw it all.

He was there for each delivery, there for every loss, there for emergency stitches or diagnosis or surgery.

And farmers and families counted on that.

Dr. Charles Scott Hosket, DVM, died unexpectedly April 19.

Friends describe the late Hosket as a dedicated country vet, an advocate for animal rescue, and a great storyteller. Because all of the veterinarian’s clients — those farmers and families — quickly became his friends.

“For most of my farming career he has been our farm’s veterinarian,” Craig Corry, who has a beef cattle herd in Xenia, said. “When you know somebody that long — you have more than just a client-patient relationship. He was much more than a veterinarian, he was a close friend and an advisor.”

Hosket started his own practice, Hosket Veterinary Service, in his hometown of Yellow Springs in 1985, taking care of families and their pets not just in the village but in the surrounding communities as well. But for farmers like Corry, he was an invaluable part of farming operations.

“He made frequent visits to the farm. It was seasonal — several times a year — and for emergency visits,” Corry said.

One Cedarville family names Hosket their go-to vet for the last 30 years.

“With Lindsey and I involved in 4-H, we both had livestock animals,” Justin Hudgell said. “At any time if we needed Dr. Hosket, all we had to do was call and he would go out of his way to come over and check our animals.”

Hudgell recalled a few months ago when his dog Storm was very sick. It was a Saturday, the vet’s office wasn’t open, but Hosket answered his cell phone and met him shortly after. Storm was better within a week.

Justin’s mother, Cheryl Hudgell, said there was many-a-time she would call Hosket to their house in the middle of the night to help deliver calves and hogs — “always with a smile on his face.”

“He has been in our life through the good moments of all our animals but he was also there for some of the sorrow,” she said, naming the time they had to put down her husband’s K-9, Bronson, the K-9 for the Greene County Sheriff’s Department.

“He sat with our family, knowing it was one of the hardest days not only for us, but for him,” she said.

The older Hudgell continued, “One time our horse got his leg caught in the fence and needed to have stitches. He gave the horse a sedative and told me to hold the halter. He was stitching his leg and the horse was wobbling all over. I kept telling him that he was making me nervous that the horse was going to fall on him. He would just laugh and look up every so often at me holding that horse and laugh at me being so nervous.”

Katie Rose Wright of Yellow Springs met Hosket when she was 14. He was the vet for her horse, and most recently, her ally at Yellow Springs Pet Net.

Wright recalls the time her horse cut its leg and he came out to the stable on a Saturday.

“He was so dedicated to being a larger animal vet. If an animal was in need on a farm, he was there. He was passionate about being a country vet,” she said. “He gave dogs and cats the same care, but he knew how important it was that large animals also had a vet. He was always able to treat an animal with the littlest possible intervention but able to get them healthy quickly.”

Wright said while he worked long hours traveling as a large animal vet, he was also dedicated to animal rescue. Wright and Jen Boyer volunteer at the non-profit that fosters and re-homes stray pets in the village.

“He reduced his costs so that we were able to properly care for our animals. If we picked up a stray, we could bring them in right away, get micro-chipped, checked out, spayed and neutered. He was just always there,” Wright said.

Boyer said Hosket not only excelled in modern medicine — graduating with a degree in veterinary medicine from The Ohio State University — but he was also talented in homeopathic medicine.

“Last summer, our dog experienced a severe allergic reaction one evening. We had been to an emergency vet, tried numerous medications, spent hundreds of dollars, and I decided to stop by Dr. Hosket. He said, ‘Are you willing to try something out of the ordinary?’ Then he dusted off a huge green book off his bookshelf and went through it,” Boyer said.

Her dog quickly healed with Hosket’s intervention.

Hosket helped four-legged creatures — large and small. For years.

And he was there for their humans.

So today, they remember him — in homes and on farms, across villages and towns — as kind and generous and calm. As simply enjoyable and humorous. As loving and caring, passionately loyal. And as the best storyteller around.

“He loved to talk about why he got into being a vet, the pride that it gave him today,” Wright said. “He’d talk to me about his sons Michael and Nathan, how proud he was of them — how they were loving and caring to animals.”

In lieu of flowers, the family asks that contributions be made in Hosket’s memory to a local animal rescue or shelter.