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DR. THOMAS JEFFERSON DODSON
Vol. 5, p. 1823

One of the pioneer physicians and surgeons of Mangum, Oklahoma,
having come here in 1900. He has been in constant practice here since
that time, and has a high standing in the community and among his
professional brethren. He is a native son of the state, born in
Coriell County, Texas, on September 23, 1862, and his parents were
William P. and Rachel G. (GREEN) Dodson.

William P. Dodson was born in Kentucky in 1824, and died in Paint
Rock, Texas, in 1898. From his native state he came to Coriell
County, Texas, in 1849, one of the pioneers of that time, and in 1879
he settled in Concho County, Texas, where he passed the remainder of
his life. He was a rancher and stock raiser, and was successful and
prosperous. During the Civil War he served the South as a frontier
guard in Texas. Mr. Dodson was a Methodist and was long a steward in
the church. He was a Mason, and was past senior warden of his lodge.
His politics were those of a democrat. His wife was a woman of
Missouri birth and parentage, born in 1824, and she died in Paint
Rock in 1907. They were the parents of a family of nine children.
Adeline, the first born, married George JACKSON, and lives on their
farm in New Mexico; Mary Jane is deceased; she married C. A. LEWIS,
and he is now, a resident of San Angelo, Texas; Jesse P. is a
carpenter and builder in Oklahoma; J. F. is a stock farmer at Paint
Rock, the old home of the family; Sarah married J. C. OLIVER, a
Baptist minister of Abilene, Texas; Casana died at the age of ten
years; the seventh born child was Thomas Jefferson, subject of this
review; Sophronia married Edward DOZIER and they live at Paint Rock;
he is a stock farmer and has served as county sheriff; Lucy married
James DAVIS and they live in Paint Rock, where Mr. Davis is a farmer.

Dr. Thomas Jefferson Dodson was born and reared on his father's
ranch in Coriell County, and in 1879, when he was seventeen years
old, the family moved from that place to Paint Rock, Concho County.
From then until 1887 he lived at home and in that year be entered
Centenary College, Lampasas, Texas, and there completed a three years
course of study. In 1891 be was graduated from the medical department
of the University of Tennessee at Nashville, with the degree M. D. In
1891 Doctor Dodson began the practice of his profession at Bartlett,
Texas, continuing until 1898, and then he engaged in practice in
Sonora, where be remained until October. 1900. It was then that he
came to Mangum, since which time he has been engaged in a general
medical and surgical practice, barring one year, 1904, which he spent
in the Chicago Post Graduate School in further preparation for his
work.

Doctor Dodson has his offices in the Elliott Building. He is
president of the Grier [Greer] County Medical Society and is a member
of the State and American Medical associations.

The doctor has always been ready and willing to give public service
when it was required of him and he has been health physician of Grier
[Greer] County on the democratic ticket. While practicing in Sonora
he served as a member of the local school board, and he is a trustee
of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Mangum.

Doctor Dodson is a Mason, and those Masonic bodies with which he is
connected are as follows: Mangum of Lodge No. 61, Ancient Free and
Accepted Masons, of which he is past master; Mangum Chapter No. 35,
Royal Arch Masons, in which he served for nine years as high priest;
Hobart Commandery, Knights Templar; Mangum Chapter, Order of the
Eastern Star, of which he is past patron; India Temple, Ancient
Arabic Order of Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, Oklahoma City. He is
also a member of the local lodge of the Knights of Pythias and of the
Modern Woodmen of America.

Doctor Dodson was married on October 15, 1890, in Sonora, Texas, to
Miss Della POOL of Bartlett, Texas. She died in 1894, leaving two
daughters. Daphne, the eldest, is a graduate of the Mangum High
School, and also studied music at Baylor University in Belton, Texas,
and at Epworth University in Oklahoma City. She is now engaged in
teaching music in Mangum. The second child, Fay, died at the age of
eleven years. In 1895 Doctor Dodson married Miss Elizabeth SMITH, of
Bartlett, Texas, a daughter of Benjamin R. Smith, who was a well-
known farmer there, and who died in 1904. There are two daughters of
this marriage: Thelma, a graduate of the Mangum High School in 1915,
and Naomi, now a senior in that school.

Typed for OKGenWeb by Jack Wood July 21, 1999.

SOURCE: Thoburn, Joseph B., A Standard History of Oklahoma, An
Authentic Narrative of its Development, 5 v. (Chicago, New York: The
American Historical Society, 1916)