Louis Burgin McBrayer was born on December 27, 1868, in Buncombe County, North Carolina. McBrayer was a physician and medical administrator who served as superintendent of the North Carolina Sanatorium for the Treatment of Tuberculosis as well as the chief of the state's Bureau of Tuberculosis from 1914 to 1924. He died near Southern Pines, North Carolina, on April 1, 1938.