Francis Everitt Townsend (1867-1960), American physician, author, and political organizer, crusaded for pensions for the elderly.

Francis Townsend was born into a poor farm family near Fairbury, II., on Jan. 13, 1867. The family moved to Nebraska, where Francis attended Franklin Academy. He went to California expecting to get rich in the land boom, only to end up nearly penniless. After a few years at farming and odd jobs in Kansas and Colorado, Townsend entered Omaha Medical College, graduating in 1907. He set up practice in South Dakota, where he remained until he entered the Army Medical Corps in World War I. He married a nurse, Minnie Bogue.

After the war the Townsends lived in Long Beach, Calif. But Townsend's medical practice was far from prosperous. He finally secured appointment as assistant city health director but, with the Great Depression, lost the job. At retirement age himself, Townsend grew increasingly indignant...