Oliver O. Hockett, one of the younger members of the medical fraternity of Douglas County, and one of the leading men in the social, professional and educational life of Newman, was born in Paris, Edgar County, Illinois, March 2, 1866. He was graduated from the high school of Paris in 1882 and subsequently entered the state university at Champaign, where he remained for three years. He then took up the study of medicine with Dr. M. P. Smith, with whom he remained until he entered Chicago Hahnemann College, from which well known institution he was graduated in the class of 1880, and the following year he spent in the Hahnemann hospital. In March, 1890, he came to Newman and opened out in the general practice of medicine, and has succeeded far beyond his expectations. He is skilled and successful, and although having been in Newman but a few years, he enjoys one of the most extensive and lucrative practices in the County. He is a member of the Hahnemann Medical Society, contributes to the medical journals and keeps himself thoroughly in touch with the advancements being made in his profession. As a diagnostician in his profession, as well as in his judgment of human nature, he would pass muster in any community.
Dr. Hockett is a son of Mahlon and Mary (Kimble) Hockett, natives of Vermilion and Edgar counties respectively. His father was a well-to-do carriage manufacturer, who has recently retired. During the war of the Rebellion he was first lieutenant of the First Missouri Volunteers. His grandfather Kimble walked from Ohio to Edgar County, and died in 1877 worth ninety thousand dollars. In 1895 our subject married Miss Luella Gillespie, and has by this marriage one child, named J. Maxwell. Dr. Hockett has a suite of rooms in the Swag-Bert building, which is his office, elegantly fitted up, and where lie takes care of a large and growing practice, built up by close application to his work. While in medical college special honors were conferred upon him, and on his entering the great school of active life his thorough education and medical training did him great service in beginning his practice. He is thoroughly equipped with the finest out-fits for use in his specialties that can be had. Socially he belongs to the Knights of Pythias, and in 1881 was a member of Company H, Eighth Regiment, Illinois State Militia, retiring in 1887.