A Horse and Buggy Doctor

By Jim Potter

Recently, while at the Wichita Postcard Club’s annual show, I purchased a photo postcard of the residence of Dr. J. S. Graves. He lived in Inman, Kansas, from 1888 until his death in 1915.

I noticed the photo was taken by Marion Bailey (1869-1944), an exceptional photographer residing in Hutchinson, Kansas, working at his trade from 1905 to 1915.

The postcard was sent on July 29, 1908, by Anna Epp, 12, who was visiting Inman, to her sister Louisa Epp, 17, at home in Newton, Kansas. Anna and her brother Jacob had been visiting Inman for a week.

Dr. John Stevens Graves was born and raised in Missouri, and graduated from the Iowa College of Physicians and Surgeons, Keokuk, Iowa, in the spring of 1885. After beginning his practice in Williamstown, Missouri, the same year, he moved to McPherson, Kansas, in 1886, and then down the road to Aiken in early 1887, where he became well known as one of the early pioneer physicians, keeping busy visiting patients by horse and buggy within a ten mile radius of Aiken (renamed Inman in 1889).

John S. Graves (1861-1915) and Miss Emma Belle Brooks (1863-1953), of Illinois, married October 24, 1888. Their four children were: Leona Saunders (1891-1943), Brooks Wallace (1893-1987), Charles Wright (1895-1960), and Dwight Reno (1897-1970).

Despite having a doctor’s office in Inman, above his drug store, Dr. John S. Graves was known for traveling the countryside outside of town in his horse and buggy to care for his patients at their homes.

On June 10, 1887, Dr. Graves was favorably described in the McPherson Freeman newspaper: “The Dr. is a young man of good character, responsible in every way, and is deserving the large practice which he has already built up. The Doctor’s success has been as good in his new location as it was in this city, and we understand has brought out a number of difficult cases.”

Over the years, as a pioneer doctor, John S. Graves traveled many a muddy road under harsh conditions. Like another horse and buggy doctor, Arthur Hertzler (1870-1946), Halstead, Kansas, Dr. Graves answered calls day and night, working himself to exhaustion, especially while nursing patients over several days. Even when Brooks Graves, a son of Dr. Graves, drove the buggy on the country circuit, the weather was often unpredictable with extreme temperatures. The most cooperative buggy horse could still be surprised by attacking dogs, or later, by horseless carriages.

John S. Graves was born at Lewistown, Missouri, October 31, 1861. At age 53, he died from complications after surgery for gall stones and several ulcers, and was buried July 12, 1915, at the Inman North Cemetery.

In writing Dr. Graves’ obituary, the Inman Review (July 16, 1915, 1) said, in part: “The harvest of human life goes on. The latest addition to the countless millions of the victims of the mysterious reaper, is none other than our fellow citizen, Dr. J. S. Graves. He was hardly past the period of his prime but was still active and influential in his profession, in business and in the civil and social affairs of our town and county. He was the pioneer physician of Inman. Hundreds of people today within a score of miles of his office owe their lives to his skill and honesty in treating their various maladies. His life is as a prominent thread woven into the fabric of the local history. His judgment as a city councilman had much to do with the shaping of the present and the future success career of Inman.”

The Inman Museum, 101 N. Main, Inman, Kansas, is open on Sundays 1:30 – 4 p.m. and by appointment at 620-585-2122.