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White Deer Land Museum

116 S. Cuyler

Pampa, TX 79065

Dr. Brunow makes calls, has first car, catches crook, shoots eagle

Many area citizens---past and present---were ushered into the world by Dr. Vittorio E. von Brunow, Pampa's first resident doctor.  Perhaps (?) he delivered Wilma Chapman, daughter of John E. and Ellen Chapman on May 13, 1904. Wilma was the first white girl born in Pampa.

Dr. Brunow attended Perry LeFors and four of his daughters when they were fatally ill with typhoid fever in the fall of 1909.

Mary (Mrs. Jud) Wilson often went with Dr. Brunow to help people who were ill. The big hill north of Pampa (on the Perryton highway where the Bob Macks now live) was known as the Wilson Hill and it was steep and muddy when it rained.

Roy Wilson, son of Jud and Mary Wilson, married Julia "Dollie" Brunow, daughter of Dr. Brunow. Roy J. and Julia D. Wilson lived in the first Brunow house when it was moved to 825 West Kingsmill in 1926.

In the winters between 1913 and 1918, when Dr. Brunow was called out, H.H."Shorty" Heiskell would drive him, day or night, to take care of the sick.

Dr. Brunow often called Maggie (Mrs. W.D.) Martin to go with him, especially during the flu epidemic of 1918, or for the birth of a baby.

About 1925, when Florence Jones was teaching at Laketon, she found a fire in the stove one morning when she arrived at the schoolhouse. Dr. Brunow now had delivered a baby in the area and had stopped to build a fire and warm himself.

When Dr. Brunow first came to this area, he drove a beautiful fast team of brown horses. After a few years he purchased the first car in Pampa.  The car was a red, one-cylinder Velie with a steering bar instead of a steering wheel. Dr. Brunow tore over the rough wagon paths and frightened most horses within hearing or seeing range.

He got tired of having to fight roads full of chug holes, so he borrowed a road grader and evened the streets and some of the country roads.

The doctor could not pronounce the letter "V." One day Beryl Wynne (Mrs. DeLea Vicars) asked what he did when the car would not run. He replied, "I just put some 'waseline' on the 'walwes' and then the 'Wealie' runs."

On one occasion, Dr. Walter Purviance accompanied Dr. Brunow on his calls. The Velie stopped and would not start again. Dr. Purviance remarked that the car needed doctoring, too.

During the early days here (ca 1915-1917), a handsome young man named Thompson was hired at the Shoe Nail Ranch near Pampa. With his charming manner and easygoing ways, he quickly became a popular figure.

One day while Thompson was helping Wiley Vincent load hay, he was approached by a man who brandished a pistol and commanded Thompson to throw up his hands. Cleverly Thompson whirled and jumped on his attacker, who was a U.S. Marshal. Thompson grabbed the Marshal's gun, fastened handcuffs on him and was ready to make a hasty retreat.

Unexpectedly, Dr. Brunow, who had accompanied the Marshal, slipped up behind Thompson, grabbed his throat and held him until he could be restrained.

Dr. Brunow had recognized Thompson from a postcard which pictured two desparadoes. Thompson had written to an uncle telling about a bunch of horses he had located. Thompson was out locating horses for a desparado gang in Oklahoma and was working near Pampa only to locate horses.

Dr. Brunow, who liked to hunt and fish, had many birds and animals stuffed and mounted. Once each year a taxidermist came from Amarillo to clean these stuffed birds and animals and oil their eyes. A bald eagle, which  Dr. Brunow shot on the Canadian River before it was illegal to do so, is mounted on the wall and seems to look down on the office of the White Deer Land Museum.