There is no calling, however humble, in which enterprise and industry,
coupled with a well directed purpose, will not be productive of some
measure of success, and in the medical profession the qualities mentioned
are especially essential. Under certain circumstances a physician lacking
them may seek out an existence, but he who would be eminently successful
must possess a definite aim and must persevere in the pursuit of his purpose,
besides having the other necessary qualities of head and heart to render him
popular with the public. These the subject of this sketch seems to possess,
since he is recognized as one of the honored and influential citizens of
Jefferson county, Illinois, where he has long maintained his home, enjoying
a wide practice in his chosen field of endeavor and commanding the respect
and esteem of the most equivocal order. Doctor Arendale is a splendid
illustration of what a man may develop into if he has the grit, industry
and perseverance, although surrounded in early life by many obstacles and
discouraging environment.
Dr. D. H. Arendale, a well known physician of Mount Vernon, Illinois,
was born May 28, 1857, in Marion county, Tennessee, one-half mile from
the Alabama state line. His early schooling was quite primitive, having
been obtained in the log schoolhouses of those days, in which split logs
were used for seats and other similar furnishings. His first effort to
gain a livelihood was in carrying produce on horseback, often a distance
of twelve miles, seeking a market for various kinds of farm products, and
he always succeeded in getting good prices. He was always at work what
time he was not in school, having left the log school-house when seventeen
years old and desiring to become a doctor he entered Burritte College in
Tennessee in 1874 and was accredited with being the most industrious pupil
in that school. At a meeting of the faculty a few days before the close
of the term it was agreed that Mr. Arendale was the best student in the
school. In 1875 and 1876 he attended Doran's Cove high school, where he
studied so assiduously that he seriously impaired his nervous system, having
never completely recovered from the effects of the over-work he did there.
While here he mastered most of the higher branches of mathematics, such
as geometry and trigonometry, and at the close of the school was designated
by the president of Pikeville College as a suitable pupil to demonstrate
mathematical work, which he did to the entire satisfaction of all. In 1877
he was tendered a professorship in the William and Emma Austin College
at Stevenson, Alabama, and he also taught in the free schools of Alabama
and Tennessee. giving entire satisfaction to both patron and pupil. When
only eighteen years old he applied to the trustees of a country school,
who informed him that it had always required a bearded man to teach their
school, but our subject asked to be "tried out" which was done and he taught
the school to the end of the term in a most gratifying manner, having among
his pupils one boy who weighed over two hundred pounds whom he taught his
letters. This was the Island Creek, south of Bridgeport, Alabama.
In 1880 our subject raised a cotton crop, working early arid late in
order to get enough money together to defray expenses in a medical college.
His close application to farm work in Jackson county, Alabama, further
demonstrated his determination to succeed, and, useless to say that his
subsequent studying of medicine resulted in the acquisition of a carefully
trained mind in this line.
He was a private student under Doctor Westmoreland at Atlanta, Georgia,
where he received most of his medical training and while there he was
complimented by the professor of anatomy in the state medical school upon
his profound information in minute anatomy. Doctor Arendale took a course
of medicine at Nashville, Tennessee. This was after he had tried to practice
medicine at Elk Prairie, Jefferson county, Illinois, where he came in October,
1882. On the day after his arrival while passing the Quinn school-house just
as the school closed for the day, noticing a very beautiful young girl
among the pupils our subject inquired of Francis Cox, who was driving him,
who the young lady was. Upon being told that she was Miss Louie Bodine,
he replied, "That's my wife." In less than two months they were engaged
an4 were married in the following month of June, the young couple spending
their honey-moon that summer at the subject's old home in Tennessee, and
his bride accompanied him to Nashville, when school opened the following
fall, where she assisted him with his school work and did her part in
economizing.
Toward the close of the term their money ran out and they had a hard time
to live, having to borrow money of the instructors in the college to defray
part of their expenses back to Illinois, having settled in Elk Prairie
among their relations. Doctor Arendal fitted up an old building in which
they started housekeeping. Although almost poverty stricken and in poor
health, resulting in too close application to study, our subject was too
self-reliant to ask for help and for the first two years of his married
life he never knew one day where he would get something to eat for the
following day, maintaining his office in his residence an old stable. In
1 886 he was appointed postmaster at Elk Prairie and conditions took a
better aspect. This was during Cleveland's administration. Doctor Arendale
purchased an acre of ground and erected a three room house on it, using
the front room as post-office
and also keeping a few articles to sell, his stock of goods having been
obtained by giving a fifty-dollar note with his mother-in-law for security.
His stock consisted of very small quantities of such materials as were
used by his neighbors, such as coal oil, which he first purchased in quantities
of one gallon at a time, his first stock of tobacco consisting of one dollar
and fifty-five cents' worth, and his stock of dry-goods was a half bolt
of light shirting, five cent calico. But prosperity came and he soon afterwards
purchased such articles in lots of one hundred dollars' worth and his practice
having grown in the meantime, he was enabled in the course of two years
by his practice, the profits in the store and his salary as postmaster
to accumulate the sum of two thousand dollars.
Prosperity has attended the efforts of our subject since those days
and he observed the larger opportunities that were to be found at the county
seat, Mount Vernon, where he moved.
Since locating in Mount Vernon he has practically retired from the active
practice of his profession and has devoted his time and attention to real
estate and the management of the Palace Hotel, the latter being one of
the leading and most successful in the city, recently rebuilt and refurnished.
Through hard work, economy and self-denial the doctor and his wife have
accumulated a competency, owning valuable property in Mount Vernon in addition
to profitable investments in California.
SOURCE: Walls History of Jefferson County, Il By
John A. Wall 1909 pgs 346-349
submitted by: Misty Flannigan Dec 1997
