Dr. R.Y. Lacy House

Original Owner: Dr. R.Y. Lacy

320 Quitman Street

Built: 1909

Dr. Robert Yeager Lacey was born in Palestine, Texas in 1875. He attended the University of Texas, the University of Texas Medical School in Galveston, and Jefferson Medical College which was the medical branch of Princeton University. Dr. Lacy and his bride, Florence Wren Harman, moved to Pittsburg in 1902. As a young doctor he was called to pronounce the death at the last public hanging in Camp County; this was 1903. The next morning he was awakened by Sheriff Jim Stafford banging on the door, "I've had reports that the family fed the deceased milk and biscuits and revived him. We've go to check it out." He accompanied the Sheriff to the home, took the lid off the coffin and again pronounced the man dead. Dr. Lacy was a no-nonsense, dignified expert, but this was tempered with a quick sense of humor and an inexhaustible fund of good stories. He was a meticulous, kindly gentleman who always wore a flower in the lapel of his well-cut suit, usually a red carnation, but he favored blue cornflowers in the summer. Dr. Lacy, along with three other doctors, founded Pittsburg's Medical and Surgical Hospital in 1940; this later became ETMC Pittsburg. Dr. and Mrs. Lacy had two children; William and Eugenia. Mrs. Lacy died ion 1921, and R. Lacy later married Mrs. Minnie Hood Fleming, widow of Dr. Fleming of Mt. Pleasant. Dr. Lacy served the community for more than half a century. He was a devoted member of the Presbyterian Church, on the board of directors of two banks, and a member of the Pittsburg School Board.