Unlike some folks, Dr. Lloyd Eslinger of Macungie never said he got paid peanuts.

Cakes, yes. Potatoes, yes. But not peanuts.

The retired family physician, an Allentown native who had a medical practice in Northampton for 37 years, served a lot of farm families, he recalls.

And when these patients could not pay $3 for an office visit or $4 for a house call, Eslinger accepted food products from their farms instead.

As a sole practitioner working out of the basement of his Northampton split-level house, Eslinger, now 88, says he put in long hours back in the day.

"At one phase I was seeing about 90 patients a day," he rememberes.

Apparently the disabled World War II veteran, shot in the left shoulder and arm while serving in the Marines in Okinawa, could handle the heavy workload.

Displaying his first appointment book, Eslinger pointed out the neatly-written entries for each day.

"I kept records by hand, not on a computer," he says.

Mornings were devoted to house calls. Afternoons and evenings were reserved for office visits.

In between, he and his wife Doris, a nurse, raised six children, three of whom now work in medical professions.

For the last nine years of his career, his wife helped in the doctor's office, along with a nurse he had hired after several years of working alone.

Eslinger, who received his medical degree from the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, after graduating from Muhlenberg College, enjoys talking about the days when medicine was simpler.

He still remembers having to deliver babies in women's homes in Philadelphia as part of his medical training.

"Two medical students would go together. We'd carry a maternity pack. On one occasion we delivered triplets in the home," he says, chuckling at the memory.

In addition to his private practice, Eslinger served as the school doctor for Allen Township for about 20 years and was the team physician for Northampton Little League football, baseball and basketball.

"My doctor's office was close to the field," he says. This made it easy for injured young athletes to be brought to his doorstep.

Eslinger vividly remembers a particular coach and his young charge, a football player who had dislocated a shoulder.

"The coach fainted in my office, so I had to treat both of them," the doctor says, laughing.

Besides his original appointment books, Eslinger still has his old black bag, which carried medical essentials when he made house calls.

Sometimes he ventured a distance from Northampton to see patients in their homes, traveling to Slatington and Trexlertown, for example.

He had to take along whatever instruments and medicines he thought could be needed on site.

Since retirement in 1990, Eslinger continues to run into patients he treated decades ago.

Even in Florida during a vacation with his wife, Eslinger was approached excitedly by a man who remembered his longtime physician.

The doctor, too, fondly recalls his patients and their many kind gestures.

"One would bake donuts for me. Another would often bring me eggs. These were gifts, not payment for services," Eslinger points out.

He says he retired because "the government is making it hard for the solo practitioner. There are so many restrictions."

Eslinger says medicine is not as personal as it used to be 50 and 60 years ago when he was in practice.

"Today doctors spend more time looking at their computers than at their patients," he says.

These days he enjoys following horse racing on TV.

"I used to go to the races, but I gave up driving because of macular degeneration. I had a race horse, too, for a while, but it never won," he says.

The doctor also enjoys reminiscing.

One look at the well-worn black bag or the handwritten appointment book from the early 1950s is enough to trigger his many memories.

And stories. And smiles.