 |
 R. SAMUEL D. GARDNER, who for
many years has been farmer and physician
combined, and in each department more
than ordinarily successful, first opened his
eyes to the light near Bowling Green, Warren Co.,
Ky., on the 27th of March, 1822. He is the second child of Asa B. and Amelia (Bowles) Gardner,
natives of Virginia. His paternal grandparents
were Thomas and Sarah (Ford) Gardner, also natives of the Old Dominion. The parents of his
mother died when he was a child. The Gardner
family, as well as the Fords, were of Scotch-Irish
ancestry, and located in Kentucky during an early
period in its history. Asa B. Gardner occupied a
farm in Warren County, and was engaged mostly
in raising tobacco. The mother died in 1843, and
the father, after his second marriage, lived to a
good old age, passing away in 1877. The subject of this history pursued his early studies in a log school-house in his native county, and began teaching when eighteen years of age. This, however, he followed only a short time, but afterward clerked in a dry-goods store. When twenty-six years of age he began the study of medicine under the instruction of Dr. John Austin, of Morgantown, with whom he remained three years, and subsequently entered the office of Dr. Withers at Dripping Springs, about seven miles from the Mammoth Cave. Here he commenced practice, and a year later, in 1853, came to Illinois. He located first in Paradise Township, where he taught school and practiced medicine, and also made the acquaintance of Mrs. Margaret Clarke, to whom he was married in July, 1855. This lady is the widow of Willis H. Clarke, and the daughter of Dr. John and Sydney (Hanson) Apperson, natives of Virginia. They lived for two years following in Paradise Township, near the limits of the town, where the Doctor had secured possession of a snug home, and where he taught school when the community was healthy, and practiced medicine in the sick season. In 1857 Dr. Gardner, desirous of changing his location, purchased 144 acres of improved land in Mattoon Township while it was inhabited principally by wolves and other wild animals. This purchase was brought about on the occasion of a hunting expedition, which led him into that section and which has remained his residence until the present. During the progress of the Mexican War, Dr. Gardner was anxious to distinguish himself as a Federal soldier, but on account of the loss of an eye occasioned by the bursting of his gun in a deer hunt during his visit to his home in 1845, he was of course rejected. He has now almost entirely given up his practice, and confines himself to superintending the labors of his farm, where he raises roadster horses, of Lexington and Eclipse blood. Dr. Gardner, upon first beginning to exercise the right of suffrage, voted with the old-line Whigs, but upon the abandonment of that party cast his lot with the Democrats. In former years he was connected with the Baptist Church, but there being no church of that denomination in this locality, is not identified with any religious denomination. Mrs. Gardner belongs to the Methodist Episcopal Church. They became the parents of five children, three now living, namely, John Asa, Harry and Margaret. The Doctor has been a man of note in his community, and one interested in the moral and intellectual welfare of its people. He has served as Road Commissioner and School Director, and while in his native State was Circuit Clerk and Deputy County Clerk. |
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