Nathaniel Moreland Brian, M. D. One of the busiest physicians and surgeons in Grant Parish is
Doctor Brian, whose home is at Montgomery and whose practice extends over a large section of
the country. He is a comparatively young man, physically equal to the heavy demands made
upon his strength and energy and has a reputation for skill and ability that would gain him
prominence in his profession in the larger cities.

He was born at the Hargis postoffice, near Montgomery in Grant Parish, January 12, 1889, son of
Rev. Ilie M. and Kate Eulalie (Traylor) Brian. His father, a native of South Carolina, was a child
when his parents, Mr. and Mrs. William Brian, moved with their family to East Feliciana Parish,
Louisiana. Iley M. Brian finished his education in the Louisiana State University and entering
the Confederate Army was in active service until the Battle of Shiloh, where he was wounded in
the right thigh and was a prisoner of war six months. After that wound, be walked with a slight
limp the rest of his life. He taught school after the war and at the age of twenty-six became a
minister of the Baptist Church and thereafter did missionary work, organized congregations and
built churches in many parts of Louisiana, including Boyce, Pollock, Montgomery, and
Winnfield. After a long life of earnest labor and devotion to the church and humanity, he died
October 27, 1923, at the age of seventy-eight. His last church work was done at Verda in Grant
Parish. He was a Mason and was active in public affairs, serving three terms on the Grant Parish
police jury, being president during the last term. His wife died in November, 1919, at the age of
sixty-eight. She was a college graduate, had been a teacher and was active in church affairs.
Rev. Iley Brian had a brother, Morgan Brian, who served as district attorney at Winnfield;
another brother, Dr. F. N. Brian of Alexandria; and a sister who first married Robert Milling of
Shreveport and later became Mrs. E. W. Tiddlie. Rev. Iley Brian and his wife's children were:
S. M., a physician for the Tremont & Gulf Railroad at Winnfield; E. A. Brian, postmaster at St.
Maurice in Winn Parish ; Homera, wife of C. C. McQuilty, a railroad man living in Arkansas;
Nena, wife of O. D. Hastings of Montgomery; Eagar, wife of C. R. Rhinehart, of Alexandria;
Odette, wife of R. L. Barker of Houston, Texas; D. A. Brian, now with the Standard Oil
Company of Houston, Texas.

Nathaniel Moreland Brian, was educated in several different schools, attending the Boyce High
School and the Louisiana Industrial Institute at Ruston. For two years he was a teacher, and also
worked as manager of the grocery department of the Balls Lumber Company store at Pollock.
Largely with money earned and saved, he entered the Memphis Hospital Medical College at
Memphis, was graduated in 1911 and subsequently in 1914 took postgraduate work in the
polyclinic at New Orleans. Doctor Brian did his first work as an industrial citizen for the Dixie
Lumber Company. He was then at Clarence, in Natchitoches Parish, practiced at St. Maurice
and from there moved to Montgomery. The good work he did in these different communities
has made his service in demand by his old patients so that even yet he looks after practice at
Clarence. He is chairman of the local School Board and a member of the Health Board and held
similar positions at St. Maurice.

Doctor Brian married sisters, Claudia and Eunice Gardner, daughters of W. D. Gardner. By his
first marriage, he had two children, Nathaniel M., Jr., and Mabel Estelle. The two children of
his second marriage are Iley and Francis. Doctor Brian is a Baptist, is a member of Phoenix
Lodge No. 38, Free and Accepted Masons at Natchitoches, belongs to the Independent Order of
Odd Fellows, and the Louisiana State Medical Society and is former president of the Red River
and Natchitoches Medical Society.

NOTE: The sketch is accompanied by a black and white photograph/drawing of the subject.

A History of Louisiana, (vol. 2), pp. 312-313, by Henry E. Chambers. Published by The
American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, 1925.