Wade H. Vann, M. D.
In the perspective of the history of the United States Oklahoma is
one of the youngest, even as it
is one of the most vital, of our national commonwealth, and
notwithstanding its lack of maturity it has produced young men who
have achieved distinctive success and prestige in what are commonly
designated as the higher professions. The truth of this statement is
verified in the case of Doctor Vann, who claims this state as the
place of his nativity, though he was born in a section that was at
that time still a part of Indian Territory, and is thus a
representative of one of the pioneer families of the state. He is now
one of the prominent physicians and surgeons of Caddo County, where
he is engaged in the successful practice of his profession in the
vigorous little City of Cement.
Doctor Vann was born
in what is now Muskogee County, Oklahoma, and the date of his
nativity was December 1, 1877. He is a son of Herman Johnson Vann and
Elizabeth (Davis) Vann, the former of whom was born near Maysville,
Benton County, Arkansas, in the year 1852, and the latter of whom was
born in Texas. Herman J. Vann received his early education in the
public schools of Arkansas and as a youth he came to the Red River
country of Indian Territory, where he lived in the home of his uncle,
Joseph Thompson, during the period of the Civil war. He was a man of
strong mind and sterling character, and in the early days was a
successful teacher in the school maintained in the little village of
Briartown, Muskogee County, where he continued his pedagogic labors
three years. After his marriage he settled in Muskogee County, where
he became the owner of a large and well improved ranch and where he
devoted the remainder of his life to successful operations as a
farmer and stock raiser. He was one of the well known and highly
honored citizens of the county, was progressive and liberal as a
citizen, was a staunch supporter of the cause of the Democratic
party, and was affiliated with the Masonic fraternity and the
independent Order of Odd Fellows. He died in the City of Muskogee, in
1912, and his widow still resides on the fine homestead farm in that
county. Of the children Doctor Vann is the eldest; Clem resides upon
his ranch in Muskogee County; Joseph is a resident of the City of
Galveston, Texas; William is a prosperous farmer in Muskogee County;
Sophia remains with her widowed mother:
Lola is the wife of Robert F. Herbert, who is living retired at
Cement, Comanche County; Nora remains with her mother; and Daisy
resides on a farm in Muskogee County.
The ancestral
history of Doctor Vann is one of specially interesting order, and he
takes just pride in claiming descent from staunch Cherokee Indian
stock on both the paternal and maternal sides, he himself having
one-eighth Cherokee blood. The doctor’s great-grandfather. Joseph
Vann, was born in the State of Georgia, and not only became the owner
of a large number of slaves and other property, but for a long period
in the early days he owned and operated two steamboats on the
Mississippi and Arkansas rivers. He was familiarly known as “Rich
Joe Vann,” and he met his death in the explosion of the boilers
of one of his steamboats, near Dardanelle, Yell County, Arkansas,
prior to the early ’50s. His father married among the Cherokee
Indians, when they were still on their native quarters, in the
Southern States, and William Vann, grandfather of the doctor, was
born in Georgia, in 1831, he having come with the Cherokee Indians to
their assigned place and allotment in Indian Territory when they
removed from the South at the behest of the Government, and he became
the owner of a large landed estate in Indian Territory. He was
murdered at a point between the two present Oklahoma cities of
Webbers Falls and Tahlequah, Oklahoma,
in 1852, about the time of the birth of his son, Herman J., father of
Doctor Vann.
Doctor Vann acquired
his early educational discipline in the public schools of Muskogee
County, and supplemented this by a four years’ course in the Cherokee
National Male Seminary, at Tahlequah. Thereafter he was for one year
a student at Worcester Academy, at Vinita, Craig County, and thus
admirably fortified for educational work of a more technical order,
he followed the course of his ambition and entered the medical
department of Vanderbilt University, at Nashville, Tennessee, in
which institution he completed the prescribed curriculum and was
graduated as a member of the class of 1903. After thus receiving his
well earned degree of Doctor of Medicine, Doctor Vann returned to
Oklahoma and initiated the practice of his profession in Muskogee
County, where he remained thus engaged until Christmas day of the
year 1913, when he removed to the thriving industrial town of Cement,
Caddo County, where he has since continued in active and specially
successful general practice as a physician and surgeon, with well
appointed and eligibly located offices and with an attractive
residence property of which he is the owner. He has not permitted
himself to lose touch with the advances made in medical and surgical
science, and is a close student of the best standard and periodical
literature pertaining thereto,’ besides which, in 1905, he completed
in his alma mater, Vanderbilt University, an effective post-graduate
course in which he specialized in microscopy and bacteriology. The
doctor is local surgeon for the Frisco Railroad and is identified
with the Caddo County Medical Society, the Oklahoma State Medical
Society and the American Medical Association.
Doctor Vann accords
staunch allegiance to the democratic party, is past grand of the
Cement Lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and is
affiliated also with Forum Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons.
At Claremore, Rogers
County, Oklahoma, on the 31st of December, 1904, was solemnized
the marriage of Doctor Vann to Miss Mary Belle Starr, who was born
and reared at that place and who is a daughter of the late Watt
Starr, a representative agriculturist of Rogers County at the time of
his death. Doctor and Mrs. Vann have three children: Lillian, Vera,
and Herman Johnson, the only son having been named in honor of his
paternal grandfather.