One of the leading members of the Southern Illinois medical profession,
who has held many positions of trust and has discharged the duties that
have been delegated to him in a manner calculated to win and maintain
the confidence and esteem of his entire community, is T. Lee Agnew, A.
B., M. D., president of the Union County Medical Society, whose field of
practice since 1900 has been the city of Anna. Dr. Agnew was born at
Makanda, Jackson county, Illinois, in 1871, and is a son of Dr. Frank M.
and Harriet E. (Elmore) Agnew. Dr. Agnew’s father, who is the oldest
practicing physician in Jackson county, was born in Ohio, in 1840, and
his mother in Tennessee in 1846, and both are now living in the town of
Makanda, whence they came as young people.
T. Lee Agnew attended
the public schools of Jackson county, after leaving which he attended
Ewing College for three years in Franklin county. In 1888 he went to
Jackson, Tennessee, and entered the Southwestern Baptist University,
from which he was graduated in 1892 with the degree of A. B., having
been a member of the Alpha Theta Chapter of the Kappa Sigma fraternity.
While at Ewing College he was phytogian, and at Jackson was a member of
the Appolonian Literary Society, winning the gold medal for oratory.
Although greatly interested in his studies, Dr. Agnew did not neglect
his physical needs, and was one of the best shortstops and pitchers that
the Jackson baseball team ever had. In 1892 he entered Marion Sims
College of Medicine, at St. Louis, which is now connected with the St.
Louis University, and he was graduated therefrom in 1895 with the degree
of M. D., having taken a special course in internal medicines. During
the next five years he was engaged in practice with his father at
Makanda, and he then came to Anna, which he has since made his home, and
where he has built up an extensive practice. Dr. Agnew is a member of
the A. F. & A. M. and the Modern Woodmen, of which he is medical
examiner, as he is also of the Aetna Life Insurance Company, the Bankers
Life Assurance Company of Des Moines, Iowa; the Northwestern Life
Assurance Company, the Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company, the
Travelers Life Insurance Company and the Penn Mutual Life Insurance
Company. He is president of the Union County Medical Society, of which
he was secretary for four years and one of the reorganizers after it had
been dissolved, and is connected with the state and national bodies. As
a member of the board of health, Dr. Agnew successfully handled several
smallpox epidemics, and his labors here in every way have been conducive
to the public welfare. His politics are those of the Democratic party,
but he has not found time from his professional duties to enter the
public field as an active participant, although he is deeply interested
in all that pertains to the progress and development of his section.
January 18, 1899, Dr. Agnew was married to Miss Edna E. Ellington,
who was born in Jackson, Tennessee, at which place he met her as a
schoolmate. They are consistent members of the First Baptist Church, in
which he has been a deacon for some years, and he was for a long period
associated with Sunday school work, acting as teacher, secretary and
superintendent. A man of scholarly tastes and able to throw light on
almost any subject connected with his profession, yet drawing from a
fund of rich experience and ripened knowledge, Dr. Agnew is also a man
of rare sympathy, great kindness of heart and magnetic personality.
Possessing a fine presence, a cheerful manner and an invigorating voice,
he is destined for great things in the happy future that stretches
before him, as a reward for his years of faithful, painstaking
preparation for the noblest work in which a man can engage.
Extracted from 1912 A History of Southern Illinois, by George W. Smith, volume 2, page 780.