My Genealogy Hound

WILLIAM B. SCALES, M. D., enjoys a large and lucrative practice as a physician and surgeon in Sedalia, though he has been located here only five years. From 1873 to 1890 be practiced in Boonville, Ind., and while there was honored with the position of County Health Officer for several years, and served as State Medical Examiner for the Ancient Order of United Workmen some six years. He is now local examiner for the same order, and is associated with the Central District Medical, the Pettis County Medical and the State Medical Societies. Of the two first-mentioned organizations, he has been Treasurer, and when connected with the Warrick County (Ind.) Medical Society, which he helped to organize, he was President on several occasions. The Doctor’s grandfather, William Scales, was born in Rockingham County, N. C., and with his wife and one child moved to Indiana at an early period, there clearing and improving a farm. He was Captain of an Indiana company during the War of 1812, held nearly all of the county offices in Warrick County, including those of Judge and Sheriff, and was a prominent and successful Democratic politician. At the time of his death, when he was in his seventy-fifth year, he was residing in Boonville, Ind., where he had made his home for many years. Religiously he was a Baptist, and held the office of Deacon in the congregation. His wife, formerly a Miss Skelton, of North Carolina, lived to a good old age. The Scales family were banished from Scotland on account of their liberal ideas, and settled in North Carolina. Our subject is a second cousin of ex-Governor Scales of that state, and possesses the sterling characteristics which are inherent qualities of all bearing the name.

Thomas Scales, the Doctor’s father, was born in Rockingham County, N. C., and was reared on a farm in Warrick County, Ind. For about thirty-two years he followed agricultural pursuits, and then engaged in a mercantile business at Selvin. He was elected to the position of County Recorder, and died while serving in that office, in 1876, aged seventy-five years. Throughout the state he was known as a prominent Democratic politician. His wife, formerly Sarah Bogan, was born in Lexington, Ky. Her father, Levi Bogan, a native of Virginia, moved to Lexington, Ky., and subsequently became an extensive land-owner and farmer in Warrick County, Ind., where he passed the remainder of his days. Mr. and Mrs. Scales were members of the Baptist Church.

Dr. W. B. Scales was born in Warrick County, Ind., October 9, 1841, and is the youngest of four children, three of whom are living. From the time he was nine years of age, he was reared in Selvin and Boonville, and when in his seventeenth year he commenced teaching school in his home district, and followed that profession for six years altogether, a part of the time being Principal of the high school at Lynnville, Ind. In the fall of 1863 he enlisted in the Ninety-first Indiana Infantry, being assigned to Company B, and was mustered in at Evansville, Ind. He was placed in the Army of the Tennessee, and ten days later was detailed and commissioned Quartermaster’s Sergeant. As he was taken sick and discharged from service on that account, he returned home and became a clerk in a drug-store, and later read medicine with Dr. Hoagland for three years. In 1868 he entered the Ohio Medical College at Cincinnati, and after taking one course of lectures, practiced for a short time in Gibson County, Ind. Then, settling in Boonville, he made that place his field of work for the succeeding seventeen years. In the mean time he returned to the Ohio Medical College, in 1877, and was duly graduated the following year with the degree of Doctor of Medicine. In 1890 he moved to Sedalia, opened an office at No. 418 Ohio Street, and has since been very successful in his practice here.

In 1868 the Doctor was married in his native county to Emma Badger, who was born in Perry County, Ind., and who is the daughter of Wesley Badger, a farmer. The Doctor and wife have two children, Herbert L. and Daisy B. The son graduated from the high school at Boonville, and received the degree of Bachelor of Arts from DePauw University. On determining to follow his father’s example, he entered the Louisville Medical College, graduating in the Class of ‘92, and is now engaged in practice with his father. Daisy B., also a graduate of the Boonville (Ind.) High School, is an accomplished young lady and is still at home with her parents. They are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and move in the best social circles of Sedalia. In his political affiliations the Doctor is an uncompromising Democrat.