Surnames: PUTNAM

----Source: HUMBIRD ENTERPRISE (Humbird, Clark County, Wis.) 04/30/1910

Putnam, William C. (1872 - 23 Apr 1910)

One of the saddest death that has ever occurred in this community (Humbird, Clark County, Wis.) was that of Dr. Wm. C. Putnam, who was found dead in his office at about eleven o'clock Saturday morning. He had sleeping apartments in the rear of his office and had retired before ten o'clock the night preceding. During the night he was heard by James Wilson, who occupies the second floor of the house. When morning came, and several patients knocked at the office door and received no reply, Mr. Wilson thought there must be some trouble. He looked through the window at the side of the curtain and could see the light burning. Accordingly he summoned E. Washburn, B. J. Stallard and Will Hahn, and they entered the doctor's room by the side door using a skeleton key. Dr. Putnam was lying on the bed entirely dressed, excepting his coat, and only a quilt pulled over him. The district attorney was notified and by his orders Dr. Moore came from Merrillan and made an examination of the body. Dr. Moore gave his opinion that death was due to natural causes. After the examination was made the body was prepared for burial, N. J. Putnam, a brother of the deceased, arrived here Monday from Seymour to accompany the remains home.

A short funeral service was held at 11:00 o'clock Tuesday morning at the office of the deceased, which was attended by quite a number of friends. Floral offerings and expressions of sympathy tendered his brother, gave evidence of the respect in which he was held. The remains were taken to Seymour Tuesday, where further services were held and where the interment took place.

All Monday and Tuesday morning friends from the village and surrounding country called for a last look upon the face of the dead. Old and young alike paused to shed a tear at his bier and mourn his untimely death. He was a newcomer among us, having practiced only since last July, but his pleasant manners, sympathy and ability had won his place in the hearts of all. Perhaps we were all too negligent about speaking well of his better self, and too prone to upbraid him for his short comings.

He lived a lonely life. Family troubles had left their impression upon him, and at times he was afflicted with a sort of melancholia, from which it was almost impossible to arouse him. At these times he sought to put away his troubles and it was this that brought on the heart affection that caused his death. He felt a lack of that comradeship, which is so much needed to bring out the best in human life. His fondest memory was of the home he once had, and the following poem written by him and printed in the October number of the Framers Life, shows the impression these thought made upon him. It is entitled "Dreaming":

That rippled and murmured low,

And pressed it liquid lips to the beach

Of pebbles, white as snow.

But the shadows fell o'er a weary world,

And lay on the water's breast'

While the wavelets crept from the silent shore

And sank in perfect rest.

And the tenderest song, and sweetest far,

The song of a wandering bird

Came trembling down from a maple grove,

The saddest I ever heard.

'Twas a glorious night; just a single cloud,

That seemed to have gone astray

From the rolling host that had fled afar

On the wings of a vanished day.

Not in perfect rest, not in deep repose,

Though couched on its native pillow,

For it rose and fell o'er a mystic swell,

Like a boat o'er a broken billow.

In dreams I revisit the beautiful lake

And the rings through my trouble brain,

An I hear -- as in sprit I stand on the shore,

And the shadows fall o'er the hill --

The low, plaintive notes of the wandering bird,

And the call of the Whippoorwill.

The deceased served in the Spanish-American war in the hospital corps, and for a number of years had been a wanderer. Four years ago he worked as a farm hand for the Beede brothers, and last summer while there they induced him to located in Humbird. He was a graduate of the Louisville Medical College, receiving his diploma seventeen years ago.

Dr. Putnam was stricken in the prim of his life, being just past 38 years of age. He was the youngest of a family of five, two brothers and two sisters, with the aged mother being left to mourn.

His was a sad taking away. Without a friend near for a parting hand clasp, without a relative at the bedside to close his eyes in death, he passed from this world out into the unknown.