Ludson Worsham

by Edmund Starling, 1886

 

LUDSON WORSHAM., Physician, is the second living son of E. W. and Miriam J. Worsham, and was born in Henderson County on the nineteenth day of December, 1854. At an early age Ludson Worsham manifested a fondness for books. He was educated in various private schools, and by private tutors, finally graduallly with high honors from the "Henderson High School." He studied medicine, for which he exhibited a great fondness, and graduated in the year 1879, at the Medical University, New York City. He accompanied his father during the month of August, 1873, to San Francisco, California, and became a citizen of the "Golden City". He remained in San Francisco several years, and then visited New York for the purpose of completing his medical education, which he did as before stated in 1879. Having graduated, he returned to San Francisco and immediately engaged in the practice of his profession in that city until 1882. His ability was so marked, his strength of character so well settled, commercial eyes were soon directed toward him, and in a short while he was induced by the "Alaska Commercial Company" to accept the position of Medical Purveyor for that district, Unalaska, a town situated upon the east coast of Unalaska Island, the largest and most extreme eastern of the Aleutian Islands, was designated headquarters. He accepted the position, and during his stay at that place, traveled among the Aleutian Islands off the Coast of Alaska. In 1884, much to the regret of the Alaska Commercial Company, Dr. Worsham tendered his resignation. For nearly two years he had performed his duties nobly and faithfully, his gentle kindness in sickness and in health, had won him warm friends; therefore, it is not to be wondered, that the Alaska Company reluctantly accepted his resignation, but, there was a jewel in his far off native home, dearer to his noble love than all the glittering wealth above or underneath the earth of Alaska. Love knows no limit; for six and one-half long years his heart had been tangled in a golden smile; and, why not, beauty hath made our greatest manhood weak; other Doctors than he have gone tilting with a lance of light, in lists of argument, and yet have knelt and sighed most plethoric sighs; stern hearts close barred against a wanton world, have had their gates burst open by a kiss. There was one, who might have topped all men, who bartered joyously for one single smile, an empired planet with its load of crowns, and thought himself rich. With such sweet arguments staring him in the face, he yet "loved and languished after the most orthodox model." Hope, "Heaven's own gift to struggling mortals," cheered him upward and onward, and soon he was enroute to Henderson. In coming, the Doctor visited Petropaulovsk, in the southern part of Western Siberia, and, after a long, tedious and disagreeable voyage, landed safe at his native town.

     A few months subsequent to his arrival, an event occurred which explains what we have been hinting at. On the seventeenth day of December, 1884,, Dr. Ludso Worsham and Miss Mary L. Hodge, an affectionate and self-denying wife and mother, and a model christian, were joined together in the holy estate of matrimony at Henderson, Rev. Dr. D. O. Davies, of the First Presbyterian Church, officiating. Dr. Worsham, immediately after his marriage, formed a medical partnership with his wife's father, Dr. Joseph Anthony Hodge, and for several months practiced his chosen profession in Henderson, but as time rolled on, he believed Evansville to be a better vineyard for the medical laborer, so on the tenth day of August, 1885, he remove to that city, and is yet domiciled there, doing, as the writer learns, a lucrative practice. Dr. Hodge, the father of Mrs. Worsham, is well known to the profession throughout Kentucky. He was at one time President of the Kentucky State Board of Health, and as a physician is recognized and acknowledged one of the best in the State. Dr. and Mrs. Worsham have had born unto them two children, both boys, each of whom being most appropriately named. The eldest is named for his maternal grandfather, Anthony Hodge, the youngest for his paternal grandfather, Elijah William.

     Dr. Worsham was raised in the Baptist Church faith, but at this writing has not confessed the faith handed down, by attaching himself to any church, through membership. Mrs. Worsham is a devoted Presbyterian, sincere in all she does or says. Dr. Worsham is a charter member of St. George Lodge, Knights of Pythias at Evansville.

Home Bios