1906 – 1995
Married: Gwendolyn Moss, 1931
Children: Gay Chamberlain, Sam Grady McFarland, and Jerry Allen McFarland
9 Grandchildren and 1 Great-Grandchild
Sam Bradshaw McFarland was born in 1906 in the Palmer House on the McFarland Family Farm on Coles Ferry Pike. The Palmer House was the second home the McFarland Family built and, in 1912, Sam’s father Dr. Jerry McFarland built the current house across from Friendship Christian School. In addition to his medical practice, Dr. Jerry was a farmer and Sam and his brother James helped raise cattle, hogs and chickens on the family farm. Sam was a teenager working in the hayfield when he saw a farmer seriously injured when he fell off a haystack onto a pitchfork. It was then that he decided he wanted to follow in his father and grandfather’s (Dr. Billy McFarland) footsteps and become a doctor. Sam graduated Lebanon High School and attended David Lipscomb for his pre-med degree. He met, courted and married fellow Lipscomb student Gwendolyn Moss of Tuscumbia, Alabama. Sam obtained his medical degree at University of Tennessee at Memphis and came home to Lebanon to open his practice. Thereafter, he was affectionately known by his patients, friends and even family as "Dr. Sam".
Dr. Sam was kept busy throughout the 1940s with his practice and growing family. He and "Ms. Gwendolyn" had three children, Gay (Chamberlain), Sam Grady, and Jerry Allen McFarland. He also decided to take over operation of the McFarland Farm and concentrate primarily on Guernsey dairy cattle. His goal was to produce the richest milk with the highest buttery fat content at the largest volume possible. He traveled the United States purchasing the highest quality Guernsey and even bought cattle in Oregon and Washington State and had them flown to Nashville on an Eastern Airlines flight! The cattle from Robin Roost Farms gained a reputation as having the best appearance for showing purposes and for producing rich milk in high quantity. At the time, Robin Roost Farms boasted of having the most modern milking parlor in the Middle Tennessee area. Several of Dr. Sam’s cows won state awards such as First Place in the National Junior Guernsey Show in 1953 and the Gold Star Sire Award. Robin Roost Ruby was heralded as the best dame ever sired at the farm and she won awards across the State of Tennessee, the Southeast Championship, and showed at the National Championship. In the 1960s, the market for high fat milk hardened and that, coupled with the fact that factories moving to Lebanon had siphoned off most of his farm help, prodded Dr. Sam into changing Robin Roost farms from a dairy farm into a beef cattle farm. He raised Angus for several years before turning the farm over to his son, Jerry, who still raises Charolais beef cattle.
