HORACE GREELEY WOOTTEN, M. D. For three successive generations the Wootten family has given to the south one of her most capable physicians. The first was Dr. Gilbert Wootten, the second was George Wootten and the third is Dr. Horace Greeley Wootten of this review, who makes his home in Annona, Texas, near which he was born and where he has passed his entire life thus far. All three of these men have been particularly devoted to their profession and have done excellent work in the cause of humanity as physicians. The first of these men of whom we have any absolute record is Dr. Gilbert Wootten who was born about 1815 in Georgia. He was educated in that state and early in his medical career he came to Clarksville, Texas, at a time when that town was practically in its infancy. He continued in medical practice there until declining age compelled him to relinquish his hold upon his work, and he died in Texarkana, Texas, in 1894. In earlier life he married his cousin, Miss Sallie Wootten, and they reared a family of eight children. Of the eight children of Dr. Gilbert and Sallie Wootten, Dr. George was one. He was entering upon his 'teens when he came to Texas and the greater part of his early education came to him from the old Clarksville college. While still a boy he began to view with considerable favor the profession of his father as one in which he might find success, and he was still in his 'teens when he decided to adopt his father 's profession for himself. Accordingly he studied medicine in New Orleans, and was graduated in 1857 from Tulane in that city when he was just past his twentieth birthday. For some years thereafter he continued in practice with his father, and was a figure in the medical schools of Red River county in a prominent way both before and after the war. It was in 1878 that he came to Annona,Texas and here the frailty of his physical condition compelled him to withdraw from all active participation in his work and other interests, and in June, 1893, he died after an illness that had lasted more than a dozen years. As a young man, in 1862, he had enlisted in the Confederate Army, and as a surgeon was attached to Colonel Gould's regiment. He remained in the field until just before the collapse of the cause of the Confederacy and he returned to civil life only when
it became apparent that the secession was doomed to
destruction. For some little time after the war he took
an active interest in politics as an adherent of the Republican
party, concerning himself with national and
other issues, but his physical infirmities made it impossible
for him to keep up his work in any public interest
and he finally retired from all active intercourse with
public life and his profession. Dr. George Wootten was
always a religious man, and a firm believer in the promises
of the Bible, and might often be found preaching in
the pulpit of the Christian church, when a vacancy made
his services in that respect desirable.
Dr. Wootten married Miss Winnie M. Childress, who
was a daughter of Levi Childress, who came to Texas
from Georgia in early life and was one of Red River,Texas
county's earliest judges. They became the parents of
six children, of whom brief mention is here made as
follows: May, the oldest, married Thos. Lovett a resident
of Annona; Flita, the wife of Dr. W. E. Hardman,
is also a resident of this city; Dr. Horace G. Wootten
of this notice is the third one of the six; Bonnie, married A. H.
Brown; Alma is the wife of J. W. Mann; and D. C.
Wootten, the last of the six, resides in Annona,Texas as do
the others. Mrs. Wootten, after her widowhood became
postmistress of the town of Annona TEXAS in 1894, succeeding
Mrs. Abbie Dickson in that office. She has proved her
suitable and efficient incumbence of the office and has
been retained continuously through the express wish of
the people.
Dr. Horace G. Wootten came to somewhat mature
years upon the farm, and his education was acquired in
the public schools. He began preparation for a professional
career in 1900 at Memphis, Tennessee, in the
Hospital Medical College and there spent two years in
study. He later entered the medical college at Dallas
and graduated from that institution in 1904, after which
he entered upon active practice in Stanley, Red River
county, and it was not until 1905 that he established himself
at his old home in Annona, where he took up the
practice of his profession, and has since carried on the
work which his father laid down some ten years previous.
Dr. Wootten has been a profound student of his profession.
He has not contented himself with his college experiences,
but has taken a number of post-graduate
courses at some of the best clinics in the country. He
has identified himself with whatever movements that
have been started toward a closer union of the profession,
and the local and State Medical Societies have included
him on the rolls.
On October 17, 1909, Dr. Wootten married Miss Ruka
Bishop of Annona Texas. Mrs. Wootten is the daughter of Ira
Bishop, a farmer of this community and former employe
of the Texas & Pacific Railway Company. Ira Bishop
married Miss Mattie Hill, and they have four children,
Mrs. Wootten being the oldest. The others are Mrs.
Earl Lawson of Box Elder, Texas, Miss Sibyl Bishop and
Miss Bessie Bishop. Dr. and Mrs. Wootten have one son,
Horace Greeley, Jr.
The doctor has identified himself with the Masonic
Fraternity. He has held a number of offices thus far,
and is making continuous progress in the various degrees
of the fraternity. He is a member of the Methodist
church, and is devoted to the work of that denomination
in its many branches.