Collection Information
Historical Sketch
Scope and Content Note
Folder Listing
Cataloging Information
Processed
by
Charles Latham
17 November 1994
Updated 15 June 2004
Manuscript and Visual Collections Department
William Henry Smith Memorial Library
Indiana Historical Society
Indianapolis, IN
VOLUME OF COLLECTION: 7 folders
COLLECTION DATES: 1849-1901
PROVENANCE: Miss Dorothy Helmer, Indianapolis IN, August 1983 and 5 August 1994
RESTRICTIONS: None
REPRODUCTION RIGHTS: Permission to reproduce or publish material in this collection must be obtained in writing from the Indiana Historical Society
ALTERNATE FORMATS: None
OTHER FINDING AIDS: None
RELATED HOLDINGS: None
ACCESSION NUMBERS: 1983.0184, 1994.0893
This collection contains material on the Garr family of Kokomo, Indiana, in the latter half of the nineteenth century.
John Wesley Garr (1817-1866) came to Indiana from Virginia in 1846. He settled first in Johnson County and then in 1851 in Howard County. He received a medical degree from the University of Louisville in 1849, writing a paper on intermittent fever. He farmed and had a medical practice. He married Anna Clore, and both had family connections in Kentucky.
The son of this couple, James O. Garr (1850-1930), was educated in local schools and at Howard College and High School. In 1873-1875 he studied medicine: first with Drs. William Scott and E. A. Armstrong in Kokomo; then attending medical lectures in Indianapolis; and finally graduating from the Medical College of Ohio. In 1875 he married Edna Overton, and they had four children.
Though based in Kokomo, James Garr and his family moved about quite a bit. In 1878-1879 they were in Great Bend, Kansas; in 1901 they were about to return from a stay in Houston, Virginia.
Sources: Materials in collection
Biographical and Genealogical History of Cass, Miami, Howard, and Tipton
Counties (1898), Vol. 1 pp. 69-71
This collection, filling seven folders, contains correspondence, school papers, and printed material from the period 1849-1901. It is arranged chronologically.
Folder 1 contains John Wesley Garr's 1849 paper on intermittent fever, a record of his graduation from medical school, and a tax bill for his father, Benjamin Garr. Folder 2 contains letters from Mary Diane Garr in Kentucky to her parents in Kokomo in 1862 when she was helping nurse her grandfather.
Folders 3-4 document the school days of James O. Garr. In Folder 3 are school papers from 1867-1871, and in Folder 4 letters from the same period to his cousin Newton B. Smith of Nineveh.
In Folder 5 are family letters between Kokomo and Great Bend, Kansas, from the period of James Garr's sojourn at the latter place.
Folder 6 contains two letters pertaining to James Garr's return to Kokomo from Virginia in 1901, and Folder 7 contains copies of portraits of John Wesley Garr and James O. Garr.
FOLDER
1 John Wesley Garr medical records
1849
Benjamin Garr tax bill 1864
2 Mary D. Garr to family 1862
3 James O. Garr school papers 1867-1871
4 James O. Garr to Newton B. Smith 1868-1874
5 Letters to and from Great Bend, Kansas 1878-1879
6 James O. Garr 1901
7 Portraits-- John Wesley Garr, James O. Garr
For additional information on this collection, including a list of subject headings that may lead you to related materials:
1. Go to the Indiana Historical Society's online catalog: http://opac.indianahistory.org/
2. Click on the "Basic Search" icon.
3. Select "Call Number" from the "Search In:" box.
4. Search for the collection by its basic call number (in this case, SC 1884).
5. When you find the collection, go to the "Full Record" screen for a list of headings that can be searched for related materials.