Ira W. Clark, M. D., superintendent of the State Home for Feeble Minded, located at Winfield, Kan., is a native of Indiana, born near Washington, Daviess county, June 28, 1854. He is the son of Robert M. Clark, also born in Indiana and spent his business career as a farmer in Daviess county of that state, where he actively participated in the work of the Republican party. Robert M. Clark married a Miss Delilah Bray, a daughter of John H. Bray, a native of North Carolina, who settled in Indiana in a very early day. Mr. Bray was a farmer and a prominent and well known citizen of Daviess county. Robert M. Clark died in 1880, but is survived by his wife, who now resides with her son, Dr. Clark. John W. Clark, the paternal grandfather of Dr. Clark, was a native of Ohio, but became an early settler in Indiana, where he was engaged in farming and stock raising. He and his wife reared a family of six children and three of their sons served as loyal defenders of the Union throughout the Civil war. John W. Clark died about 1865.

Dr. Ira W. Clark was reared in Daviess county, Indiana, and received his early education in the public schools of that county. After his school days he worked on a farm until twenty-one years of age, then taught three terms of school, after which he became a student, first at Miami Medical College, Cincinnati, Ohio, and later at the Eclectic Medical College of Cincinnati, graduating in the latter school in 1880. He began the practice of medicine at Plainville, Ind., and continued there until 1885, when he came to Kansas and located in Edna, Labette county. There he built up a very extensive practice, which included a large patronage among the farmers of the surrounding country, and was thus successfully engaged until 1905, when he was appointed by Governor Hoch and the Kansas State Board of Control as superintendent of the Home for the Feeble Minded at Winfield. He at once assumed the duties of his new position and has since remained as the directing head of that institution. The home has some 1,500 inmates and 100 employees. More detailed mention of this institution will be found in the historical volumes of this work. Dr. Clark has prospered financially during his twenty-five years or more of residence in Kansas and he has acquired valuable real estate and commercial interests. Besides owning a fine farm of 300 acres in Labette county he also has banking interests at Longton and at Elk City, Kan.

In 1883 Dr. Clark married Miss Clara Trocter, a daughter of George F. Trocter, a native of Indiana and an early settler in Daviess county. Mr. Trocter removed to Kansas in 1885 and located in Labette county, where he engaged in farming. He is still living and resides in Edna. Dr. and Mrs. Clark have two children: Roscoe T., who is engaged in farming and resides at Edna, and Oma, who graduated at Southwestern College at Winfield with the class of 1911 and is now at home with her parents.

Dr. Clark was one of the most widely known and respected citizens of Labette county at the time he was placed at the head of the home at Winfield, and since that time has become quite well known throughout the state. He is a Republican in politics but has never been an active worker in political affairs. Fraternally he affiliates with the time-honored Masonic order. In the line of his profession and of his particular kind of work Dr. Clark is associated with several organizations, which have for their purpose the advancement of the medical profession. He is a member of the Cowley County Medical Society, the American Association for the Study of the Feeble Minded, and attends all the annual conventions of the latter organization He is also a member of the National Conference of Charities and Corrections.