LeRoy Long Biography

              LeRoy Lone; Sept. 21, 1967 ARCHIVES
LeRoy Long was born on January 1, 1869, in Lincoln County,
1,  His father was a Confederate Army veteran and
4orth Carolina
farmer.  Despite inadequate schooling LeRoy was studious and at
the age of twenty spent a year reading anatomy with the inspiring
local physician, Robert A. McLean, who remained his sponsor, ad»
viser and friend throughout his life.  Long attended the two-year
course at Louisville Medical College, and graduated with first place
honors in 1893.  After a brief practice in North Carolina and a year
as a junior lecturer and clinical assistant to Dean Kelly at the
Louisville Medical College, where he worked in the bacteriological
laboratory in his spare time, he suffered a prolonged illness with
pneumonia.  Therefore, in 1895 his friends in Louisville welcomed,
and he accepted, an opportunity to serve for three months as locum
tenens to an alumnus, Dr. J.S. Fulton, in Atoka, Indian Territory.
His ability and industry were recognized there and he lost his heart
to a young teacher, Martha Downing, a Choctaw citizen.  On Fulton's
re-turn to Atoka, Long moved a few miles south down the MK&T Railroad
to Caddo, where his growing practice allowed him to marry in April,
1896.  Their sons, LeRoy Downing and Wendell McLean, were born during
his years in a busy country practice, but he continued studiouw reading
as well as active participation in the programs and offices of the
Indian Territory Medical Association (Credentials Committee, Judicial
Council, Secretary 1897-1900 and President 1900-1901).  His Presidential Addresses in December 1900 and June 1901 stressed high standards of professional ethics, better and more uniform laws to regulate
practice through the entire territory, the establishment of district
sub-societies to organize the profession more closely with the IT
the implementation of methods to care for the insane and feeble-minded,
the introduction of modern m ethods of dealing with the problem of