LOREN C. PAYNE, M. D.

A life devoted to the alleviation of human ills is the record of the well- known physician and surgeon whose name introduces this sketch,, a gentleman whose professional career has made his name a household word in hundreds of homes and who is endeared to the many patients whose sufferings have yielded to his skill.

. Dr. Loren C. Payne was born in Salem, Washtenaw county, Michigan, February 17, 1848, and is a son of Barton and Maria (Cronkheit) Payne, natives of Ontario, New York. These parents moved from the latter state to Michigan as early as l838 -and settled at River Rouge, near the city of Detroit, where they lived until returning to New York, four years later. Subsequently they again came to Michigan and for some years Barton Payne operated a flouring mill at Farmington, Oakland county, but, owing to failing health, he afterwards discontinued that line of work and engaged in lumbering in the county of Shiawassee, where he was accidentally killed at the age fifty-two.

Loren C. Payne spent his childhood and youth at the various places mentioned above and was fifteen years old at the time of his father's death. Meanwhile he received such educational discipline as the common schools afforded and after the death of his father he began working on a farm for six dollars per month, with the promise of an increase of wages as he grew older. The money thus earned went to the support of his mother, whose mainstay he continued to be until her second marriage, a few years later. When4seventeen years old, he was employed in a woolen mill at Pontiac where in due time he learned the trade of weaving, receiving for his services the sum of fifteen dollars per week, the wages of a skillful workman. While

thus engaged he conceived a strong desire for the medical profession and as soon as the opportunity admitted he began preparing for the same at Ovid, in the office of Doctor Leorard, a successful physician of that town, under whose instructions he continued until entering the Bennett Medical College, Chicago, where he mad t rapid progress in his studies and researches. On leaving that institution in 1875, he opened an office at Eagle, Clinton county, where he remained six years, during which time he built up an extensive practice and achieved honorable repute in his profession.

At the expiration of the period indicated Doctor Payne located at Westphalia, in the same county, where he spent the ensuing two years and in the spring of 1883 transferred his office to Beal City, a -new town just being started in Isabella county, which at that time consisted of about forty families, the majority from Westphalia, for which reason he decided, to move with them. When he first saw Beal City the place presented anything but a cheerful outlook as a field for practice, and he almost decided not to remain, but, taking counsel of his better judgment, also from the opinions of a number of his friends and former patrons, he finally opened his office and it was not long until his practice taxed him to the limits of his bodily powers. During his sojourn of nine years at that place his patronage, which grew rapidly from the beginning, took a very wide range and in a region fifteen miles in every direction from the town he was the principal practitioner and his services were in constant demand. For several years he rode almost day and night and was out of the saddle only long enough to feed his horse and catch a few minutes' sleep, then away to see other patients clamorous for his help or to answer calls in localities remote from his place of residence.

At the end of nine years Doctor Payne moved to Caldwell, or Two Rivers, a town ten miles west of Mt. Pleasant, but after spending two years there he sought a more favorable field for the exercise of his talents in the latter city, where he located at the expiration of the time indicated and where during the nine years ensuing he enjoyed an extensive practice which was successful financially and, professionally. The Doctor bought a beautiful home. in Mt. Pleasant which he still owns and was well situated to enjoy the fruits of his professional labors, but in 1909 he was induced to make another change, perceiving, as he thought and as time fully demonstrated, a fine opening at Weidman, then in the palmy days of its lumbering interests and giving promise of future growth and prosperity.

'Since moving to Weidman the Doctor has full sustained his reputation y as a safe and skillful physician and surgeon, and his practice, which it, one of the largest in the county, is still increasing, and the place he occupies in his chosen calling is second to that of few if any of his professional brethren in the central part of the state. I-le is still a student, keeps in touch with modern professional thought and abreast of the times on all matters relating to the healing art, being a member of the Isabella County Medical Society and various other organizations which have for their object the advancement of medical science. Fraternally, he is a Mason of high degree, with which order he has been identified for thirty years, belonging to Wacousta Lodge at Mt. Pleasant, Mt. Pleasant Chapter, Royal Arch Masons, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and Knights of the Maccabees at the same place, in all of which he is an active worker and influential in carrying out the principles upon which the societies are founded.

Doctor Payne, in the year 1871, contracted a matrimonial alliance with Frances Lyons, of Oakland, county, Michigan, the union resulting in the birth of one child, a daughter, Minnie, who married Bert Leadman and who still lives with her parents. Doctor and Mrs. Payne hold to the Methodist creed and are active workers in the church at Weidman. Socially they are highly esteemed not only in their own community but in the various places where from time to time they have resided.

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