SERVING HENDRICKS COUNTY SINCE 1847
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Danville Merchant Chatter
The Republican
Danville
Danville’s “Doc” Will Be Long Remembered
Locker Room Sporting Goods It’s harvest time in Hendricks County. Give the farmers room when needed and if you have to go around them, make sure you have room! That 2 minutes you think you might save is not worth someone’s life, including your own! Be Safe! _____ Seize the Night Designs will be closed for Covered Bridge from October 7-18th. Come check out all the festival exclusive boutique items! Make sure to bring cash and directions (most credit card machines don’t work out there - no cell service!) I’m set up on the lawn of the 1878 House in Bridgeton (across from the food court near the mill) every day from 9-5! ______
Dr. Paul Leondis treated Daisy as Karen Hardman held the cautious beagle.
Most small towns have a “Doc” - someone who’s tended to several generations of townsfolk. Danville’s “Doc” was such a character, but he tended to the four-legged community. A student at the University of Illinois College of Veterinary Medicine, Leondis came to Danville in 1955 as a intern for Doctors Keller and Sudoff, whose practice included offices in Danville and Stilesville. He made $50 a week. Leondis and his wife, Mary, rented an apartment for $90 a month. At the end of the summer, he had saved $250.
Smokey Fireside Creations is bringing back their Fall online art classes! Interested in watercolors, mixed media, acrylics, or art journaling? Sign up for classes today! All classes will be hosted via Zoom. More information can be found on our website at: http://www.smokeyfiresidecreations.com _____
The following year, Dr. Sudhoff left and Dr. Keller decided to take the Stilesville office, leaving the Danville practice to Dr. Leondis. Knowing he would need more money to establish his own office, he went to a local bank to ask for a loan. “I sat at a big table with seven bankers,” he recalled. “They turned down the loan.” Walking back to his office, he met Dr. Keller, who suggested he go talk to Fred Shelton at the State Bank. “I walked in the door, and Fred walked over and said, ‘Hi, Paul. What can I do for you?’ I told him I needed $750 to start my business,” Dr. Leondis remembered. He said Shelton arranged the loan while they stood in the doorway. The She Shed - NEW Leondis never forgot that day. It marked the beginning HOURS: Now open of his relationship with the people of Danville. “It was a Wednesday - Saturday. beautiful, lovely little town,” he declared, “the people were Come see all the great new so friendly, wonderful people to come and live among.” fall arrivals! _____ The Leondis family moved from the house on S. Jefferson St., then to a large home at the corner of Washing Speakeasy Books and ton and Columbia in 1964. They raised a family of seven More Now open Wedneschildren, one boy and six girls. With seven children, the day - Saturday. Leondis home had its share. NEW HALLOWEEN BOOK SECTION! _____
Ruff House Adventures will soon be offering full grooming services, along with boarding and board and train packages to expand our training options. Call us at 317-8500835 or make a reservation on our app: https://ruffhouseadventures.gingrapp. com/customer Please check out our partnership with Pet Wants food. The food is fresh, nutritious and delicious, and we provide free delivery. Www.petwants.com/indywest _____ Forget-Me-Nots Shop Local, Shop Small, Shop American Made and Handcrafted. I know, Shop Us! Original handcrafted and locally made just for you. _____ Gallery On The Square Did you know that we have great gifts and home decor at great prices by our local artists? You can even get your greeting cards from us!
“Mrs. Keller called us to come out to her house and get a kitten,” he said. “That kitten ended up have eight kittens. I told the kids they would have to give the kittens new homes. When I got home that evening, the children were crying, ‘Daddy wants to give kitty’s children away!’ We kept all the kittens.” Dr. Leondis quit his large animal practice about 1977. “I used to enjoy going to the farms,” he said. “The families were so friendly, they’d offer you coffee and pie.” The little concrete block clinic on North Washington street was enlarged soon after he started his own practice. “We expanded the front,” he explained, “and added the kennels.” A parade of animals visited the building over the years. Leondis recalled a man who brought in an injured fawn. “One time Ezra Eads brought one of his ponies clip-clopping in to have its eye worked on,” he remembered. Most days Doc Leondis could be seen walking the few blocks from his home to the office. “I’m like an old mule,” he once said. “If they put up a wall, I’d probably just stand there waiting for it to go away.” Doc retired in 2013. His last day at the office was March 30. Within a few minutes of his arrival, patients and owners sat in the small waiting room their turn. They came for shots, to pick up medicine, and some came to say “Thanks, Doc!” one more time. Studies report the average length of a veterinarian’s career is 24 years. Doc Leondis doubled that. “It’s good to work,” Leondis said in an inteview for The Republican in 2006. “This is a wonderful place to raise a family. That’s all anybody really does..” Paul Leondis, D.V.M., passed away September 17, 2021, at the age of 93, a respected member of the community that had been so good to him.
New Corner Taking Shape
Then new building at the northwest corner of Main and Jefferson is quickly taking shape. It will house Fast Track Phylical Therapy, with additional retail and rental space available.
Thursday, October 7, 2021
Tri Kappa Poinsettia Sale
Brighten the coming holidays with poinsettias from the Alpha Associate Chapter of Danville Tri Kappa. Sales are underway with this year’s ordering deadline Friday, Oct. 22. All poinsettia sales are in advance and support local philanthropy. Poinsettias are available in two sizes and in an array of colors: 6.5-inch pots (with 7 or more blooms) are available in red, white, pink, marble, ice crystals (new color), and shimmer surprise; and 8-inch pots (with 15 or more blooms) are available in red, white, pink, marble and shimmer surprise. Prices are $9 for 6.5-inch pots and $16 for 8-inch pots. These extra nice poinsettias, grown by Heartland Growers, can be ordered from any Alpha Associate Chapter member. Or call Brenda Koch at 317-679-6772 or Jaci Gibbs at 317-341-4413. Order deadline is October 22. Poinsettias will be available for pickup on Tuesday, Nov. 23, at the Phi Delta Kappa house (802 Phi Delta Kappa Dr., Danville) – just in time for a Thanksgiving thankyou gift or holiday decorations for churches, businesses or your own home. The Alpha Associate Chapter of Danville Tri Kappa greatly appreciates the community’s support for its annual fundraising project. ______________________________________________
Letters To The Editor [The following letter was sent to the Danville Plan Commission by Gregory W. Black, on behalf of two property owners in the project area, in regard to approval of the petition of DR Horton for approval of Miles Farm, Residential Subdivision at property commonly known as Northwest corner of the intersection of US 36 and Mackey Road. ] Approval should be postponed a decade or more to permit the bypass study & bypass construction to be completed. Otherwise Danville traffic will ensnare us into economic oblivion & physical danger. (Please note the plan says a Bypass Corridor Feasibility Study is a state prerequisite to any bypass built by The Indiana Department of Transportation.) Our approximate 2015 comprehensive plan urges that the study precede further subdivision approval. In recommending a study as to whether to build a bypass, for all its dithering the plan urges the study be done posthaste. To my knowledge the study has yet to begin. A chief purpose of the study is to detect whether the burgeoning traffic on 36 is intended predominately to terminate beyond or within Danville. If within, the study speculates, congestion may be alleviated by building “connector” roads using local roads other than U.S. 36 to provide escape routes for the offending local traffic. If without, a bypass is suggested though the study equivocates even on that point. (The study says a bypass may go too far south, letting passers by view the landfill so often they get a negative view of us. If north the bypass will be so far away drivers may simply avoid it, figuring a slow ride on 36 is better than a long ride up north.) A) Either way something must be done. When nothing changes nothing changes. The plan says a bypass study will require 5-8 years to fund & plan before beginning. So we are at least seven years away from knowing more than we know now. All the while seeing more traffic & reading about Council permitting more subdivisions swelling our population. B) Respectfully, a bypass obviously is essential. All you must do to grasp the traffic besieging us primarily is transient- entering from out of town to leave town on the other side - is stand alongside 36 west of Clear Creek in the morning & watch cars come from the west. C) “Connector roads” won’t work but let us assume those will. Then, please build those before permitting Miles Farms so we are not inundated with traffic! Common sense. Please deny the petition. Sincerely, Gregory W. Black ______________________________________________
Genealogy Nuts To Meet
The next Genealogy Nuts meeting is Monday, October 11, at 1 p.m. Our guest speaker is Vicki Casteel, Director of Patron and Outreach at the Indiana State Archives and Record Administration. Casteel will give us an overview of the Indiana State Archives collections. Learn about collections genealogists love, as well as collections one might not think of as family history treasures. The discussion will include the newly updated Digital Index, and how to access records, particularly during the Covid 19 pandemic. Vicki Casteel has been an archivist with the Indiana State Archives since 1997. She holds a Masters in Archives and Records Administration from San Jose State University School of Information. Casteel is the Director of Patron and Outreach Services and manages the many database projects that become part of the Indiana Digital Index (formerly known as the Digital Archives.) Areas of research interests include the Dillinger Gang, Camp Morton Civil War Prison, Eugenics, and Native American Land and Court Records. She is also a genealogist and DNA enthusiast. Currently, the Genealogy Nuts are holding hybrid meetings – both in person and virtual. If you wish to join us in person, registration is required as the program is limited to 12. Sign up on the DPL website at www.dplindiana.org. Go to the DPL events calendar link and click on Genealogy Nuts - In Person. Currently, we are allowing 30 people to join us in person. Those wishing to attend via Zoom, please visit the DPL events calendar and click on Genealogy Nuts – Zoom. The link to Zoom invitation is on the events calendar. The Indiana Room sends out programming news and other genealogy and history information through their email list If you would like to be added to our email list, please contact Cindy at crutledge@dplindiana.org or call the Indiana Room at 317.745.2604. ___________
Thank You
I would like to thank all my friends and family for helping celebrate my 80th birthday. I received 98 cards in the mail! Maria Kiger
