A standard history of Oklahoma; an authentic narrative of its development from the date of the first European exploration down to the present time, including accounts of the Indian tribes, both civilized and wild, of the cattle range, of the land openings and the achievements of the most recent period, Vol. III, Part 1

Author: Thoburn, Joseph B. (Joseph Bradfield), 1866-1941
Publication date: 1916
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 660

USA > Oklahoma > A standard history of Oklahoma; an authentic narrative of its development from the date of the first European exploration down to the present time, including accounts of the Indian tribes, both civilized and wild, of the cattle range, of the land openings and the achievements of the most recent period, Vol. III > Part 1

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Gc 976.6 T35s v.3 15352:

GENEALOGY COLLECTION

ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 02302 5361

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A Standard History

OKLAHOMA

An Authentic Narrative of its Development from the Date of the First European Exploration down to the Present Time, includ- ing Accounts of the Indian Tribes, both Civilized and Wild, of the. Cattle Range, of the Land Openings and the Achievements of the most Recent Period

JOSEPH B. THOBURN

Assisted by a Board of Advisory Editors

V.3

VOLUME III

Gc 976.6 T35N V.3

ILLUSTRATED

THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY CHICAGO AND NEW YORK

1916

1535237

Solun Flores

HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA

JOHN NEWTON FLORER. One of the greatest of the pioneer characters of old Indian Territory was the late Colonel Florer, whose extensive interests and operations made him a familiar personality throughout the territory, and particularly among the Osage tribe. Much of his life was spent on the frontier and in close contact with men and conditions he gained that hardy self-reliance, that resourcefulness, and courage in face of adversity, which eventually brought him to almost a pre-eminent station among the men of wealth and influence in his section. The best sketch and estimate of his career are found in the words of an article penned a short time after his death and by one who had long been familiar with his activities and character.

Born in the City of Cincinnati, Ohio, April 19, 1844, Col. John Newton Florer had many vicissitudes and experiences in the course of his lifetime, and died at Bartelsville, Indian Territory, January 9, 1907. His mother was a New Englander, and his father and his ancestry were Virginians. Colonel Florer in a marked degree combined in his character the heritage of both the New England and cavalier types. As a boy he gained only the rudiments of an education, and was some- what weakly in physique, and received his first important influence toward molding and hardening his plastic life when he volunteered at the age of seventeen as a soldier in the Civil war. The restive desire to be something and to do something beyond the lot of the ordinary man controlled him through life, and immediately after the war he went out to Kansas, and beginning as a clerk soon had charge of the business at the City of Lawrence. While living there in July, 1869, he married Miss Anna Finney, a sister of the first wife of Col. John K. Rankin, a very prominent man in business and politics in Kansas at that time.

In 1871 Colonel Florer established the Landrath House and hotel at Humboldt, Kansas, and for several years was its owner and proprietor. About that time the Osage tribe of Indians was moved from Kansas to the Indian Territory. Forming a partnership with Robert Dunlap under the name Florer & Dunlap, Colonel Florer went with the tribe and began business as a licensed trader at the point now marked by the City of Pawhuska. The old red store in which he and his partner did business was long considered the oldest building on the reservation, and was destroyed only a short time before Colonel Florer's death.

The writer of the sketch already referred to furnishes some interesting data on the life of the old Indian trader and particularly of Colonel Florer's relations in that capacity. The following is a quotation: "The business of a licensed trader in the early days was a very different undertaking than it is now. Indians made long trips or hunts, two or three hundred miles distant, for the buffalo that roamed the great Pan- handle district. They would be gone during a whole

winter at a time. Colonel Florer would accompany them on these trips, packing his supplies across the prairie, trading with the Indians to such an extent that at times he would bring back as much as ten thousand buffalo hides He became thoroughly conversant with the Osage language, and the customs, habits and characteristics of the Indians. He was their friend and adviser in pros- perity, sickness or death. He was the one to whom the Indians went when they were in trouble and in whom they placed the greatest faith and confidence down to the last days of his life. He was true to the individual Indian and he was true to the tribe. He was familiarly known and called by the Indian name of 'Johnnie Shin- kah.' His life and service have become a part of the history of the tribe. So much so was this that in the bill for the allotment of the Osage Reservation it was provided that Colonel Florer should have the forty acres used by him as a home at Grayhorse. This is the only recognition of this character to a white man contained in the bill. It was done on the petition of and by the unanimous consent of the Osage Indians them- selves. Through all this association and life with the Indians, and notwithstanding his environment, Colonel Florer grew and broadened into a true American, with his heart and soul in his family, his relations and his friends, and he never forgot his beautiful home for a moment, but adorned it with all that the best culture and taste could suggest. His life is a strong proof of how the typical American has a tendency to be the same and do the best under all circumstances, and to rise above his conditions or surroundings. Colonel Florer extended his realm of friends and acquaintances into almost every part of the United States, and wherever he went was not only welcome but he brought with him that generous spirit, kindly disposition and courtly manner which won for him very many friends, and his friendships were always intensified when the life of this man and his rugged honesty of purpose was understood and appreciated.

"The writer of these lines can testify with exact knowledge when it is said that Col. John N. Florer was the greatest friend of the Osage tribe of Indians. He was instrumental in procuring the attention of the out- side world to the possibilities of the reservation in the production of oil and gas prior to 1896. Of course there were no indications as subsequently developed thereon, but Colonel Florer always had said that oil and gas existed there in paying quantities. Even after the lease was granted it was found to be a losing venture. The prospecting was done and the wells were drilled in localities yielding but a small return, so that after seven or eight years of the life of the lease no great discoveries had been made and the proposition was bank- rupt. It was Colonel Florer's presence in the business world, the many trips that he took, and the many men that he interviewed, the intensity of his arguments and

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his well known character for integrity and probity that at last started the wheels moving again."

In 1882 Colonel Florer sold his mercantile interests, and his restless spirit sent him into the eattle business on a large scale. He fenced the first great pasture in the Osage reservations, consisting of 300,000 acres. For the next three winters in succession he experienced the worst of adverse fortune, and his possessions were prac- tically swept off the plains. With indomitable energy and restless ambition he started over again to build up what he had lost. In 1885 he returned to the business of licensed trader in partnership with H. P. Branham of Mississippi, a nephew of Secretary of the Interior Lamar. They built the first store at Grayhorse in the Osage reservation. Later he continued in the trading business with Dan McTaggart, a well known legislator of Kansas, and this firm was followed by the firm of John N. Florer & Company, in which A. C. Fitch of Independence, Kansas, was interested, and also John L. Bird, up to 1902. Subsequently Colonel Florer was in business by himself until joined by his brother-in-law, T. M. Finney.

Colonel Florer had a very happy marriage and was always devoted to his home. Two children were born: Walter Osage Florer, who was the first white child born in the Osage reservation, and who died in 1905, being survived by one daughter, Annie Florer. The other child of Colonel Florer is Mrs. John L. Bird, mentioned on other pages.

Colonel Florer was affiliated with Masonry in the lodge at Lawrence, Kansas, with the Chapter and Commandery at Independence, Kansas, with the Scottish Rite Con- sistory at Wichita, and with Ararat Temple of the Mystie Shrine at Kansas City. Colonel Florer belonged to the old school that believed in the principle that humanity had something to live for outside of selfish interests. There was no selfishness in him, and his desire for busi- ness success was only an ambition to do something to better the world. His time was given not only to his friends but to mere acquaintances of the most lowly character. In his charity and work he knew no caste. In speaking of his character an able lawyer said: "Uncle John, as we have familiarly known Mr. Florer for many years, can truly be described as one of nature's grandest noblemen, and a man whose acquaintance was a splendid fortune to possess. Philanthropic and generous to a fault. he lived throughout his life, and especially the last few years, for the good he might render to others, rather than for consideration of self. It is unfortunate that this world is without more men of the high minded, exalted and benevolent disposition of our beloved 'Uncle John.' When the world moves on years hereafter, his name and memory will still be bright and unforgotten, because of the splendid deeds of his generosity and unfaltering citizenship."

JOHN L. BIRD. Now one of the best known bankers of Osage County, John L. Bird first became identified with the Osage country as a trader more than thirty years ago, and in point of continuous residence is one of the oldest citizens of Osage County. As a business man he has supplied enterprise, hope and enthusiasm to many substantial institutions, and his work and influence deserve such estimate as can be given at this time of his life, which finds him still in the high tide of his activities and only a little past middle age.

The fine integrity and success which have marked his individual career must be ascribed in part to his excellent heritage. Mr. Bird was born at Rockport, Missouri, November 22, 1864. His parents were Dr. J. Y. and Sarah (Stivers) Bird. It is only proper that some coll- siderable space be devoted to the career of his father, who for many years was one of the best known and most

loved practitioners of medicine and a citizen in Atchison County, Missouri. Second in a family of twelve children, and a son of Jacob Bird, Dr. J. Y. Bird was born in Virginia, May 31, 1818, and when still a child the family moved to Hardin County, Kentucky, where Doctor Bird grew up among pioneer conditions and received the advantages of subscription schools. He began the study of medicine in 1840, his preceptor being one of the physicians of his home locality in Kentucky, and in 1842 he removed to Andrew County, Missouri, and completed his reading under a physician of Savannah. In 1846 he began to practice at Oregon in Holt County, Mis- souri, and in 1847 removed to Atchison County, locating at Linden, then the county seat. In the meantime Doctor Bird had enrolled his name among the volunteers for the war with Mexico, and later, during the years 1850-51, he was in the far West in the California gold fields. Doctor Bird removed to Rockport in 1856, and ten years later bought a fine farm a mile south of that eity, and that was his home until his death on December 4, 1886. He was a progressive farmer and managed his estate in addition to looking after the interests of a large private practice. He was a lover of mankind, rich and poor alike receiving his earnest attention, and at his death it is said his books showed several thousand dollars of uncollected accounts, testifying to his zeal for service and not for material reward. In his practice he dis- played a generous amount of common sense and good judgment, seldom made a mistake in diagnosis, and without pretension to abnormal skill on his own part, though as a matter of fact he was one of the best equipped physicians of his time in Northwest Missouri, he particularly despised all quackery in the profession. It is recalled as a characteristic of the man that when the state law for registration of physicians went into effect Doctor Bird affixed to his personal signature the words "chimney corner physician." He possessed few of the negative virtues, but was always positive in action and opinion, earnest and conscientious in performance of duty, generous to a fault, and charitable to all.

He also stood high in the estimate of his community. From 1855 to 1860 and again from 1883 to 1885 he served as treasurer of Atchison County. He was a member of the Masonic fraternity, and was buried with the honors of that order. While doing so much for his community, and so justly meriting the love and admiration of a host of people, Doctor Bird was above all devoted to his family and home. On October 29, 1849, he married Mrs. Sarah (Stivers) Baird. She was born in Adams County, Ohio, and by her first marriage had a daughter named Emelissi. who died at the age of twenty-seven. Mrs. Doctor Bird died in February, 1915, at the old home in Rockport. She was born in March, 1823. Doctor Bird and wife by their marriage had six children, four sons and two daughters: Albertine, the wife of Judge M. B. Nicholson of Council Grove, Kansas; Dr. R. E .; Josephine, who died in 1880, was married in 1879 to S. L. Morehead, a newspaper man; E. O., now living at Rockport, Missouri; George, of Rockport; and John L., who is the youngest. The oldest son, Dr. R. E. Bird, was an Indian trader among the Osages in the early days, had previously, from 1881 to 1884, practiced as government physician among the Kaw Indians, and gave up his practice to trade with the Osages. It was owing to his presence among this tribe that his younger brother, John L. Bird, came to Indian Territory. Dr. R. E. Bird was a trader at Pawhuska from 1884 to 1898, and has since lived retired at Rockport.

John L. Bird, since he was eighteen years of age, has lived in the Osage country of Indian Territory and Okla- homa. His early years were spent on his father's farm near Rockport, Missouri, and while there he gained

John & Bring

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a common school education. In May, 1883, he found a position as clerk in the trader's store among the Kaw Indians, and left that position January 1, 1885, to come to Pawhuska. Pawhuska at that time had in the way of business improvements only the government agency and two small stores. In the past thirty years Mr. Bird has witnessed practically every improvement and change in this city and surrounding country. His own work and business enterprises have entered into much of this change and he is justly spoken of as one of the leading citizens. In the spring of 1888 Mr. Bird went to Grayhorse and opened a store for his brother and partner and was manager of that establishment until 1895. He then engaged in business with his father-in-law, John N. Florer, under the firm name of Florer & Bird, general merchants. They were in business together for twelve years, and up to 1906 also operated a large cattle ranch. In 1906 Mr. Bird established the Fairfax National Bank at Fairfax, of which he became president. 'At the coming of statehood, in 1907, Mr. Bird was elected the first sheriff of Osage County, and held that office for a little more than two years, until 1909, when he resigned. He still retained while sheriff the vice presidency of the bank at Fairfax, and on leaving office he bought with other associates the City National Bank of Pawhuska. He has since been vice president of this institution, and has given most of his time to its management. He is also vice president of the Fairfax National Bank.

In politics Mr. Bird is a democrat, and is particularly interested in all civic movements affecting his home county. In Masonry he is affiliated with the Lodge and with the Scottish Rite degree, and also with the Mystic Shrine, and belongs to the Benevolent and Pro- tective Order of Elks. During the early years of his residence in the Osage country Mr. Bird found his principal diversion in hunting and fishing. Business among the Indians was conducted on somewhat leisurely principles, and in the afternoon, as there were seldom any customers at the store, he shut up his shop and either went out with his rod or his gun. There were no game laws to interfere, and he has killed almost every variety of the larger and smaller game in and around Pawhuska. He has shot wild turkeys on land now covered with the buildings and streets of Pawhuska. Mr. Bird has a fluent command of the Osage language, speaking it better even than some members of the tribe, and also has a knowledge of the tongues of the Kaws, Poncas and Omahas sufficient for business purposes. Since he was eighteen years of age he has been dealing with the Osages, and many of his customers at the bank are still members of this tribe. He thus has an experience which enables him to speak with authority concerning many features of Indian business honesty. He has freely extended credit to the Indians, and on that account has never lost a single dollar. Mr. Bird says that the Indians always pay if they can, though their wants arc many, in fact they are much like children, and the white man has to use judgment in not allowing his Indian customers to take more than they can probably pay for, although they never fail to recognize their obliga- tions of debt.

In 1891 Mr. Bird married Miss Maude Florer. She was born at Lawrence, Kansas, in 1870, and has lived in the Osage country since 1872. Her father was the late Col. John N. Florer, whose life and career are sketched on other pages. Mr. and Mrs. Bird are the parents of two children: Jack F. is now a student at the State University in the third year of his commercial and science course. The younger son, Robert Emmett, is still attending school at Pawhuska.

PHIL D. BREWER was born and raised in Sebastian County, Arkansas, near Fort Smith, where his father, John O. Brewer, was born. His mother, Sarah Louisa Council, was born in Alabama, and died at Fort Smith, Arkansas, March 23, 1915, at the age of seventy-nine years. His grandfather, William Lewis Brewer, a Meth- odist minister, located in that state in a very early day, when it was yet a territory, and settled in southern Arkansas, now Pike County. The family is of Scotch origin, and originally settled in North Carolina, from whence the members drifted west through Kentucky and Tennessee, being a part of the early pioneers who settled those regions. About the time of the Louisiana Purchase the father of William Lewis Brewer settled on the Missouri River, near the present city of Boon- ville, Missouri, from which place they, with several other families, migrated, principally by boats, to Arkansas, where they settled on a small stream, then unnamed, and called it the Little Missouri.

Phil D. Brewer, having been born during the Civil war, had in his early youth very limited opportunities for an education. But what few opportunities he had, however, which consisted of country summer schools and one year in DePauw University, he employed to the fullest extent, and this want of and defect in his early training has been largely overcome by many years of careful and diligent study. He taught a country school when nineteen years of age, and when about twenty-four studied law under the instruction of Hon. John S. Little, then a lawyer of repute and later a member of Congress and governor of Arkansas. In 1890 he was elected from Sebastian County as a member of the Arkansas Legis- lature. In 1894 he married Annie L. Garner, nee May- field, and the next year settled in Indian Territory, now Eastern Oklahoma, at Cameron. In 1897 he moved to McAlester, where he practiced law until 1909, when he was appointed by Governor Haskell judge of the Su- perior Court. In 1910 he was elected to a four-year term in this office, but resigned in August, 1911, to accept a judgeship as a member of the Supreme Court Commis- sion, the appointment being made by the Supreme Court. This commission was an auxiliary to the Supreme Court, designed to assist the court with its over-burdened docket. He has continued to serve ever since on this commission, through different appointments, and is at present (1915) presiding judge of Division No. 1. His opinions are scattered through Volumes 30 to 45 of the Oklahoma Reports, and Volumes 117 to 155 of the Pacific Reporter.

The lodge activities of Judge Brewer have been con- fined to Masonry. He has been Worshipful Master of Amity Lodge, F. & A. M., at Hackett, Arkansas; of South McAlester Lodge, No. 96, at McAlester, Okla- homa. He became a member of the Masonic Grand Lodge at Wynnewood in 1898; has attended every an- nual communication since, save two; was Grand Orator, Grand Senior Warden, Deputy Grand Master and Grand Master of the Grand Lodge, A. F. & A. M., of Indian Territory, to which last position he was elected at Tishomingo in 1903. He is now, with all other past Grand Masters, a life member of the Grand Lodge, A. F. & A. M., of Oklahoma. He regards the honor of having been elected Grand Master of Masons his greatest distinction.

CHARLES L. DAUGHERTY, Among the well known and honored citizens given to Oklahoma by the Lone Star State is the present efficient and valued incumbent of the office of State Commissioner of Labor. Mr. Daugherty has wielded large influence in connection with the cause of organized labor, has given close study to the condi- tions and influences that compass the productive factors

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in the great domain of industry, has been prominent in connection with newspaper enterprise, and his broad experience as a practical printer, as an editor and pub- lisher and as an exponent of the cause of labor has admirably qualified him for the responsible and im- portant office which he now holds.

Mr. Daugherty was born in Denton County, Texas, on the 13th day of July, 1873, and is a son of Christopher C. and Nancy J. (Lovejoy) Daugherty, the former of whom was born in Texas County, Missouri, on the 22d of October, 1832, and the latter of whom was born in the State of Texas, where her father was an honored and prominent pioneer, as will be noted in detail in a later paragraph.

Christopher C. Daugherty was reared and educated in his native state and there continued to reside until 1851, when he settled in Denton County, Texas, and became one of the pioneer merchants in that section of the state. He assisted in the organization of the county, served as its sheriff in the early days and later as tax assessor, and was otherwise prominent and influential in civic affairs of a local order. At the time of the Civil war he gave valiant service as a soldier of the Confederacy in a Texas regiment commanded by Colonel Morse and assigned to the command of General Cabell. In addition to his mercantile interests he became a successful farmer and stock grower in Denton County, where he continued to reside until his death, on the 9th of February, 1912, and where his wife died May 23, 1913.

Mrs. Nancy J. (Lovejoy) Daugherty was a daughter of Rev. John L. Lovejoy, who was a pioneer minister of the Methodist Church in Texas, his earnest labors as a preacher of the gospel having covered a period of many years, though he was not formally licensed as a clergy- man until he was seventy-three years of age. In 1835, the year prior to the organization of the Republic of Texas, he there established his home, upon his removal from Arkansas. He was a native of North Carolina and as a young man served as a Government Indian scout on the western frontier. From his native state Mr. Lovejoy went to Mississippi, whence he later removed to Arkansas, and in Texas he established his home at Blossom Prairie, Lamar County, where he became a merchant and farmer, to him having come the distinction of having sold the first merchandise in what is now the thriving Town of Mckinney, Texas. He later moved to Denton, where he again embarked in the mercantile business. In 1838 Mr. Lovejoy organized the first Metho- dist Church in Northern Texas and effected the erection of its pioneer edifice at Clarksville. He attained to venerable age and was one of the well known and revered pioneer citizens of Denton, Texas, at the time of his death, in 1885, his age at the time having been eighty-five years. He was a member of the Lovejoy family that was prominent in the banking and mercantile business in the Lone Star State in the early days.

At Denton, Texas, the present Commissioner of Labor of the State of Oklahoma acquired his early education in the public schools, and there also he served an appren- ticeship to the printer's trade, in the office of a local newspaper. In 1890 he found employment at his trade in the City of Fort Worth, and as a journeyman printer he gained wide and varied experience, having thereafter been employed at his trade at Paris, San Antonio, Vic- toria and Brownsville, Texas, as well as in the Republic of Mexico and in Central America. In 1896 Mr. Daugherty came to Oklahoma Territory and located at Ardmore, Carter County, but in the following year he became associated with others in establishing and pub- lishing the Muskogee Morning Times, in the City of Muskogee, where he remained until February, 1899, when he returned to Denton, Texas. From July of that year

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Author: Thoburn, Joseph B. (Joseph Bradfield), 1866-1941 Publication date: 1916 Publisher: Chicago, New York, The American Historical Society Number of Pages: 660

Author: Thoburn, Joseph B. (Joseph Bradfield), 1866-1941
Publication date: 1916
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 660