Wade H. Vann, M. D.
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.