St Landry County Louisiana Archives Obituaries.....Young, Sr., Dr. Zachary Taylor October 5, 1905 ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Mary K. Creamer marykcreamer@yahoo.com May 15, 2015, 5:39 pm The Opelousas Courier (Opelousas, La.) 1852-1910, October 21, 1905, Image 4 God Willed It So. On the afternoon of October 5th, in Ville Platte, his home, Dr. Z. T. Young departed from this life at the age of 56 years and six months. He was born March 28, 1849, at Plaquemine Ridge, in St. Landry Parish, and was the 4th child of Madison Young and Mary Ann Richard, both deceased, the latter preceded her doctor son by fifteen months. Dr. Young's early schooling was obtained in St. Landry's renowned old institution, The Franklin College, located at Opelousas. He then entered the medical department of the University of Louisiana at New Orleans, now Tulane University, graduating with distinction from that institution in the spring of 1872. He first began his professional career on Bayou Boeuf, soon afterwards removing to Ville Plate, then a little village far out in the primitive encompassed by broad prairies and the gradual prairie swells that gave it its characteristic name. As a medical practitioner he soon won the faith and confidence of his people, and in time came to enjoy a most lucrative and ideal country practice. At the age of 30 he married Miss Valentine P. Archinard of Alexandria, La., who died some years afterwards, leaving the Doctor with a single offspring, Z. T., Jr., who lives to-day and who in on the eve of his majority and a promising career of success and usefulness. Dr. Young mingled in politics at various periods in his life. He was a legislator in the house of representatives once, caroner (sic) of St. Landry parish, later deputy coroner; candidate for sheriff; and again candidate for the coroners office. His private life was a strange admixture of sunshine and cloud, success and disappointment, but through it all he was gonerous - a beau idol of generosity. Of the Cardinal virtues charity is first, and he was charitable to a fault. His home was the sheltering refuge of the wanderer and belated. His hospitality extended to the wealthy prospector and belated stranger as well as the night overtaken laymen, among the latter of whom he found his truest friends and staunchest supporters. His home was the happy meeting place of grand-mother, children and grand- children, and delightful memories still cling around that sacred gathering place - memories akin to an affectionate worship. Dr. Young was, in the strict sense of the word, a self-made man. His struggle for an education against the unfortunate circumstances that combined to crush out every vestige of ambition, was wonderful, superhuman. Among the thousands of Southern planters whose lands had been desolated and homes dismantled by the ravagings of war, was that of Madison Young, father of our subject. When Dr. Young received his hard earned medical degree from the old University of Louisiana, a mere strippling, beardless boy, he turned to face the exigencies of real life with a widowed mother, a widowed sister and a helpless little brother and sister dependant upon him for a support. Notwithstanding these encumbrances and his humble beginning he was accounted at his death one of the independently rich men of St. Landry. He was not only a student of medicine but a student of the civil and social conditions of men. His profession often brought him into the humble homes of poverty and distress - the homes of those who truly live the simple life. These experiences gave to his public as well as private life a philanthrophic tendency marking him for the slings and arrows of unrighteous polical enemies. "Did I know him in life? Yes, as brother knows brother. I knew him and loved him, t'was all I could give." I knew him best as a child knows a father, and happy was I when i could be with him in his quiet hours of retrospection and learn of those things and conditions of which his wide experience and close observation had made him so accurately familiar. He leaves behind him three brothers and two sisters, all heads of families, beside many other relatives in St. Landry parish and elsewhere. His remains were interred in the Catholic cemetery at Church Point by those of his sister and mother who had only shortly preceeden him, to use Iris his own favorite quotations, "to that undiscovered country, from whose bourn no traveler returns." With generous heart he freely gave To the poorly clad, unshod - Around his faults let charity cling, While we cover him with the sod. ONE WHO KNEW HIM. Additional Comments: NOTE: Dr. Zachary Taylor, Sr. is buried at Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Cemetery #01 located in Church Point, Acadia Parish, LA. www.findagrave.com memorial # 5942401 File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/la/stlandry/obits/y/youngsr5896gob.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/lafiles/ File size: 5.2 Kb