Historian's Corner



Charlene Cole
Sandy Creek/Lacona Historian
Historian's Corner
July 8, 2014

Photo: Wheeler’s Drug Store

Dr. Frederick Austen was a very well know doctor in our community for many years. When he died Aug. 2, 1928 at his home he had been a practicing physician in Lacona for half a century and was the community’s oldest doctor, having located in Lacona in 1878 when he was 29 years old.

Dr. Austen was the attending doctor when Pauline Tanner was born and she remembered, “He was our family doctor for many years and I can recall going to see him in the small office building which in his later years he built in front of his home. I remember that instead of using a stethoscope to check my heart and lungs as doctors do today, he laid his grizzled gray head directly on my chest and took a good listen. He had the reputation of always being able to pull his pneumonia patients through the crisis in those days before antibiotics and penicillin and he himself was known as quite a rugged character.”

Dr. Fred Austen was born in Oswego in the year of 1849. He attended Brooklyn College and was graduated from Rush Medical College in 1873. He first practiced medicine in Mannsville and one little incident that occurred during his practice there is worth telling, whether or not it happened that way. The bridge in Mannsville was being replaced by a new one and only the girders were in place. The doctor, on horseback, was returning from a call very late at night. Having faith the horse knew the way home, Dr. Austen dozed. The horse knew the way, but rather than going down the bank to a narrow place in the creek where everyone crossed, the horse walked across the narrow girders. There was about an inch of snow on the ground, and the tracks of the horse could still be seen the next morning.


When he left Mannsville he went to Binghamton for a short time and then in 1878 he came to Lacona. Dr. Austen’s first office was in the Powers Block which was later Bortles Hardware, now Lorice Apartments. Later Dr. Austen operated a drug store, which he sold to Newton G. Wheeler.

He was considered one of the very best pneumonia doctors in Northern New York. When the flu claimed the lives of so many people, Dr. Austen prepared a special formula and delivered some to each of his patients. He spent a great deal of time doing research work and his remedies passed on with him. Dr. Austen practiced until two month before his death, which came at the age of 79 in the year 1928.


Charlene Cole
Sandy Creek/Lacona Historian
1992 Harwood Drive
Sandy Creek, NY 13145
315-387-5456 x7
office hours: Friday 9am to 2pm
www.sandycreeknyhistory.com