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JOSEPH J. HARDY, M. D.
Vol. 3, p. 1006-1007
Book has photo

The high awards attainable in position and character through a life
of industry and faithful adherence to an honorable ambition are most
forcibly illustrated in the life of Dr. Joseph J. HARDY, of Poteau.
Whether one considers the obstacles which poverty and obscurity
placed in his path to oppose his entrance upon a learned profession,
his patience and persistence in overcoming them, the worthy motive
which impelled him, or the skill which he has brought to a difficult
calling, he will be impressed that Doctor Hardy's career is one which
reflects much credit upon him and which should encourage other young
men starting life under difficulties.

Doctor Hardy was born February 26, 1861, in Jefferson County,
Arkansas, and is a son of George W. and Mary E. (WAKEFIELD) Hardy.
His father was born in Giles County, Tennessee, and came of the
numerous southern Hardy family that from Virginia scattered to
several states of the South. He was married in Tennessee to Mary E.
Wakefield, who was born in Illinois and soon after his union removed
to Jefferson County, Arkansas, where he was residing, engaged in
farming, when the war between the states came on. Casting his
sympathies with the South, George W. Hardy enlisted in an Arkansas
regiment and served with gallantry until he met a soldier's death on
the battlefield of Cane Hill, Arkansas, in 1863. His widow, with her
daughter and son, left Arkansas in 1866 and returned to Giles County,
Tennessee, and there Joseph J. Hardy grew to manhood and gained a
fair common school education.

With the sterling qualities of the Scotch-Irish on his father's
side, and Scotch on his mother's, Doctor Hardy determined to make a
place for himself in life, and at the age of twenty-one years left
Tennessee for California, confident of making his fortune in the
West. He remained in the Golden State and in Arizona from that year
until 1893, being engaged principally as a prospector and miner in
the gold fields, but all the time nursed a well-defined ambition to
one day return from the West and apply himself to the profession of
medicine, when he had accumulated sufficient means to pay the
expenses of a medical education. This ambition was eventually
realized, for in 1896 he was graduated with the degree of Doctor of
Medicine from the Louisville Medical College, Louisville, Kentucky,
and immediately thereafter he located at Wister, Oklahoma. He has
since practiced within the border of what is now Le Flore County,
Oklahoma, residing at several places, but since 1909 has been
permanently located at Poteau. He has won an excellent reputation as
a skilled, careful and sympathetic practitioner, and enjoys the
emoluments which attend such a position. Doctor Hardy has been an
assiduous student, having taken postgraduate courses at Chicago, New
York and St. Louis, and his attainments have been recognized by his
professional brethren in bestowing upon him the presidency of the
Central District Medical Society. He holds membership also in the Le
Flore County Medical Society, the Oklahoma Medical Society and the
American Medical Association. Doctor Hardy has rendered acceptable
service to his community as county superintendent of health of Le
Flore County. He is a democrat in politics, and is fraternally
affiliated with the Royal Arch Masons and the Knights of Pythias. In
church faith he is a Methodist. Aside from his profession, Doctor
Hardy is interested in farming, being the owner of 500 acres of well
cultivated and valuable land in Le Flore County. His success in his
profession has been entirely self gained, and his standing as a
citizen rests upon the support he has given to civic affairs and on
this adherence to high principles.

Doctor Hardy was married in 1908 to Miss Grace E. HODGENS, who was
born near Greenwood, Arkansas, and to this union there have been born
two children: Lucile E. and Willa Grace.

Typed for OKGenWeb by: Dorothy Marie Tenaza, Dec. 13, 1998.