Schuyler County Missouri Biographies

An AHGP Project

Schuyler County Missouri

Dr. O. W. Avery

Dr. O. W. Avery, physician and surgeon, is a native of Prospect, Ohio, and was born in 1839. He is a son of Aaron F. and Elizabeth (Hoskins) Avery. The father was of English descent and born in Jersey City, in 1811. When a young man he went to Ohio where he was married, and about 1864 removed to Agency City, and in 1873 came to Queen City, Mo., where he engaged in the mercantile business and died in 1885. He was made captain of a company to enter the Mexican War, but while in camp at Columbus, peace was declared. The mother was born in Ohio in 1813, and died in Iowa in 1870. Both were members of the Christian Church.

Our subject was reared at home and received a common-school education during his younger days. In 1858 he entered the American Eclectic Institute at Cincinnati, Ohio, from which he graduated in the medical course in 1861. He immediately began to practice at Essex, Ohio, and the next spring went to Montezuma, Ia., where he was married in 1862 to Miss Sarah, daughter of Samuel and Catherine Willey, formerly of Ohio, where Mrs. Avery was born. In 1862 he entered the United States Contract Surgery Service for a year, and then settled in Springfield, Ia., remaining until 1867, when he came to Schuyler County, and located at Queen City, where he soon established an extensive and lucrative practice and now ranks among the foremost of his fraternity. Since 1875 he has conducted a drug store in connection with his profession, and is one of the active business men, as well as a leading physician of the county. He is one of the oldest settlers of Queen City, and is the only resident of the city at the present time who resided there at the time of his location at the place. He is a Democrat and cast his first presidential vote for Douglas in 1860. He is a member of the Masonic fraternity, a Knight of Pythias, and belongs to the G. A. R.

Source: History of Adair, Sullivan, Putnam and Schuyler Counties, Missouri, Volume 2, Chicago: The Goodspeed Publishing Co., 1888

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