A history of the state of Oklahoma, Volume I, Part 82

Author: Hill, L. B. (Luther B.)
Publication date: 1908
Publisher: Chicago : Lewis Pubishing Company
Number of Pages: 645

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After teaching school at various places in his home county he conceived the idea of studying medicine and immediately be- gan preparation for his life work under the well known physicians and surgeons, Drs. Kennerly and Dorr, of Batesville, Arkan- sas. He graduated from the Memphis Hos- pital Medical College with the class of 1900, and won a year in the City Hospital as interne. Returning to Sulphur Rock he located for practice, but the call to the west was too strong, so he relocated at Asher,

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Oklahoma, in 1902, where he has a large and lucrative practice.

Dr. Byrum has always taken considerable interest in politics. Coming as he did of southern blood, the Democratic party is his home. He served two terms as chairman of his county central committee, looking in person after many of the details of the campaign when the new state was admitted, the majority of his party in Pottawatomie county at this time being larger by several hundred than ever before. He served as a delegate to the Congressional and State con- ventions in 1907 and 1908.

Dr. Byrum inherited a high regard for the Masonic fraternity and became a mem- ber at twenty-two years of age, serving as master both in Arkansas and Oklahoma. He is an active member of the County and State Medical societies and for two years was superintendent of public health for Pot- tawatomie county and president of the Oklahoma State Health Association in 1908.

He was married at Sulphur Rock. Jan- uary 29, 1903, to Miss Leah Knox, daugh- ter of Captain T. C. Knox, an old Missis- sippi family and a relative of President James Knox Polk. The only child of this union is a son, James Knox Byrum.

B. S. SHAW, whose beautiful country home is situated within Bales township, Pottawatomie county, Oklahoma, is by birth a Yankee, born near Boston, Massachu- setts, in 1862, during the great Civil war period, son of Bartlett Shaw, who was born in New Hampshire and served as a gallant soldier in that conflict which took so many of America's best men to the field of battle, between 1861 and 1865. He was a mem- ber of the First Massachusetts Cavalry. He married Sarah E. Geleucia, born in Swampscott, Massachusetts, of an old New England family. The parents of Mr. Shaw removed from their home in Massachu- setts to Jefferson county, Kansas, where the father died, aged sixty years. He was a Re- publican in politics and a member of the Universalist church. As a citizen and father there was no better within any com- munity. His good wife now resides on the old home place in Jefferson county. Kansas.

They were the parents of two sons and one daughter.

B. S. Shaw received his education in the common schools in Swampscott, Massachu- setts, and grew to manhood on a farm in Kansas, where he was taught the useful- ness of industry and frugality. His farm is known as the "Opal Farm," and contains one hundred and sixty acres of well tilled land. His cottage farm-house is a model of neatness, well furnished and cost him fourteen hundred dollars. He also has good tenant houses on his farm, which place is situated four miles northeast of the thriving town of McLoud. He is numbered among the pioneers who made the famous "run," at the time of the opening of the Kickapoo reservation, May 22, 1893, when he secured this valuable quarter section of land from the government, and thus commenced to lay the Shaw foundation for his present charming home, where he and his family are surrounded with all the comforts of life. Mr. Shaw was happily united in marriage in 1899 to Mary McCoy, a native of Texas. where she was reared and educated. She is the daughter of Charles McCoy, of Mc- Loud. The issue by this marriage is one daughter-Opal Belle, a bright girl of eight summers now.

W. S. CLARK, M. D. Although young in years, Dr. W. S. Clark has the honor of being one of the pioneer physicians and surgeons of Pottawatomie county. He came to Oklahoma at the opening of the territory to settlement in 1891 and has since made his home here, prominently identified with the medical profession.

Dr. Clark was born in Alabama, near Eufaula, in 1870, a son of Daniel and Lucy (Thompson) Clark. The father was born in 1844 and died at the age of fifty-three years, a member of the Christian church, and to him and his wife were born twelve children, seven sons and five daughters. On their home farm in Texas the Doctor grew to a sturdy and vigorous manhood and re- ceived his literary training in its public schools. He first began the study of medi- cine under Dr. Walker, at that time a prom- inent and well known physician of Shaw- nee, and later he continued his medical re-

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search in the College of Physicians and Surgeons of St. Louis, graduating at the completion of his course there. At the time of his arrival in Oklahoma he secured a choice claim two miles south of McComb of one hundred and sixty acres, upon which he proved, and he has since been identified with the business and professional interests of that city.

Dr. Clark was married in the Chickasaw Nation to Sarah Elizabeth Cloer, and their children are Oma A., Tandy Overton, Dooley V., Harley Briggs and William Suter. Dr. Clark is a prominent worker in Democratic ranks, and was a delegate to the first convention of his party held in Oklahoma. He is a member of the State and County and the South Pottawatomie Medical Societies and has also membership relations with the Masonic fraternity and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, Lodge No. 207, in which he has held all the offices. He is a stanch advocate of education, religion and reform, and is one of the upbuilders of Pottawatomie county.

DR. M. A. WARHURST is the secretary and treasurer of the Southern Pottawa- tomie County Medical Association and one of the best known medical practitioners of the county. He was born in Chariton coun- ty, Missouri, near Salisbury, September 21, 1864, and is a member of a family illus- trious both in England and the United States. His great-grandfather was a na- tive of England and was a valiant soldier under King James while in this country. Dr. Warhurst is a member of the same family as the Hon. John Morgan, of Ala- bama, and of Robert E. Lee. He is a son of Francis Marion and Virginia (Harris) Warhurst, the former of whom was born in Missouri. The mother is yet living on the old home farm in that state, now sev- enty years of age, but her husband died at the age of forty-two. He served as a sol- dier in the Missouri State Militia and was for many years a school teacher. He was a member of the Baptist church, as is also his wife. Their family numbered eight chil- dren, three sons and five daughters, and one of the sons, Charles, is a resident of Marce-

line, Missouri, while Robert is a resident of Howard county, that state.

The first son, M. A. Warhurst, is a grad- uate of Pritchett Institute of Missouri, with the class of 1885, and during ten years fol- lowing his graduation he was at Lerado, Reno county, Kansas. Going from there to Arkansas, he was located near Fort Smith until his removal to Oklahoma in 1903. But previous to coming to this state . he graduated from the Chicago Medical College with the class of 1899, and is now a member of the Medical Society of Okla- homa and of the American Medical Asso- ciation of the United States, as well as be- ing the secretary and treasurer of the Southern Pottawatomie County Medical Association. He is also the examining physician for the Modern Woodmen of America and for the Woodmen of the World. He owns a splendid farm of eighty acres in Pottawatomie county, the land being fertile and well improved and the place also contains excellent buildings and an orchard.

Dr. Warhurst married in Missouri Miss Lydia Noll, but she died in 1899, and in 1901 he married his present wife, Kate Pinkston, who was born in Savannah, Ten- nessee, a daughter of William H. and Eliza- beth (Robertson) Pinkston. Dr. and Mrs. Warhurst have two sons, Hubert Olin and Herschel Eldon. Dr. Warhurst gives his political support to the Democratic party. and he is a member of the Odd Fellows fra- ternity, Remus Lodge No. 145, and of the Methodist Episcopal church. Mrs. War- hurst is a member of the Free Will Baptist church.

LINA P. HELM, of Earlsboro township, is one of the best known men of his com- munity, public spirited, and an active work- er in the cause of temperance, education and the church. He was born in Fauquier county, Virginia, March 3, 1854, of Scotch ancestry and a son of Richard and Ellen (Smith) Helm, both of whom were also born in the Old Dominion state. They moved to Carroll county, Missouri, in 1859, near Dewitt, where the mother died in De- cember, 1864, and the father at the age of

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fifty-three. They were members of the Methodist Episcopal church and in their family were twelve children, six sons and six daughters.

It was in 1893 that Lina Helm joined the tide of emigration to Oklahoma, and choos- ing Pottawatomie county as the place of his abode he purchased a farm in Section 28 and has since been active in its improve- ment and cultivation. At the same time he has taken an active interest in the public life of the community, serving with credit and honor as a member of the school board. The cause of education and religion find in him an especially good friend, working faithfully and earnestly in their upbuilding, and in the Methodist church, of which he is a member, he is a trustee and the super- intendent of the Sunday-school.

In 1876 Mr. Helm was united in mar- riage to Julia Stanley, who was born on the 16th of February, 1860, a daughter of Bartlett and Nancy (Mahoney) Stanley, who were born in Kentucky. The mother died at the early age of thirty-five years, the mother of but one child, who grew to ma- turity, Mrs. Helm, and the father has now reached the advanced age of seventy-eight years and is a resident of Missouri. He served in the Confederate army during the Civil war, under the command of General Sterling Price, and was wounded in battle. He is both a farmer and a Democrat. Four sons and four daughters have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Helm-Edna Dyer, Violet Gibson, Douglass, Charlie, Myrtle (Van- landingham), Forest, Stanley and Lottie. Mr. Helm votes with the Democratic party.

PROFESSOR B. C. KLEPPER. Foremost in the ranks of the educators of Pottawatomie county stands the name of Professor B. C. Klepper, recently the principal of the Asher public school. The school had been under his charge for five years, since 1903, and it is worthy of record that the office was never more competently or satisfactorily filled. In the fall of 1908, Professor Klep- per accepted the principalship of one of the ward schools in the city of Shawnee. His connection with the interests of Oklahoma covers a period of thirteen years, antedating the arrival of the first railroad here, and in

all that time he has directed his energies to the building up of its schools, an im- portant branch in the line of work leading up to good citizenship.

Professor Klepper was born in the state of Tennessee in 1871, a member of a prom- inent old family of that commonwealth, and a son of B. M. and Mary (Howard) Klep- per, the former from Tennessee and the latter from Virginia, and the father died in his native state at the age of seventy-two years. B. C. Klepper was their only child and he grew up in Tennessee, receiving an excellent education in Washington College, and at the age of twenty-five he entered upon his long and successful career of teaching. It was in 1895 that he came to Oklahoma, teaching for a time near Te- cumseh, and he then accepted the principal- ship of the Earlsboro schools. From there he went to Avoca, this county, and after two years there came to Asher to become the principal of the schools here. The Asher school is a large four-room building, with an enrollment at the present time of two hundred and sixty pupils. Four com- petent teachers are employed, and all are under the direct supervision of the princi- pal, Professor B. C. Klepper.

He married, May 31, 1899, Hattie Sur- ber, who was born in Butler county, Kan- sas, reared and educated in Tecumseh, Ok- lahoma, whence the family had removed at the opening ; she was a daughter of John H. Surber. Their two children are Herbert B. and Randal Gaw Wayne. Professor Klepper votes with the Republican party and has membership relations with the Odd Fellows fraternity, Lodge No. 127, which he has represented at the Grand Lodge. He is a member and an earnest worker of the Methodist Episcopal church, South, filling the office of clerk and superintendent of its Sunday-school.

FRANK H. McDIVITT, proprietor of Sun- rise Farm, a fine estate of one hundred and sixty acres in Brinton township, was born in Pana, Illinois, November 9, 1871. His father, W. E. McDivitt, a successful and well known physician of Illinois for many years, was born and grew to years of ma -. turity on a farm in Ohio, and during the

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Civil war he served as a brave and loyal soldier. He married Sarah Hartup, also an Ohioan by birth, but she died in Illinois on the 12th of October, 1884, aged sixty years, leaving four children: Nancy E., Whittaker (who is a civil engineer and architect of Shawnee), Jennie May, at home; Frank H. and Mary E., a teacher in Shawnee public schools. The father is now living retired from an active profes- sional career, a resident of Shawnee. The paternal grandmother of Frank H. was a first cousin of U. S. Grant.

In the state of his birth, Illinois, Frank H. McDivitt attained to manhood's estate, receiving in the meantime a public and high school education. In 1893 he became a resident of Oklahoma, residing for some years on the claim of his sister, Jennie M. McDivitt, adjoining the town of Shawnee, but this was before the advent of the rail- road here and even before the town had been organized. In 1902 he purchased one of the choice farms of Brinton township, known as Sunrise Farm, which he has brought to a high state of cultivation and on which he has erected a nine-room resi- dence costing twenty-eight hundred dollars. He also has a large barn for stock and grain, and is engaged quite extensively in the raising of high grade stock, including road horses, hogs and cattle.

Mr. McDivitt has been twice married, first in Schuyler county, Illinois, to Anna White, who was a teacher of music before her marriage and a daughter of W. P. and Harriet (Glandon) White, the father a vet- eran of the Civil war and a resident of Brooklyn, Illinois. The mother is deceased, as is also the first wife of Mr. McDivitt, who at her death left two sons, W. Lysle and Harold. She was but twenty-seven years of age at the time of her death. Mr. McDivitt afterward married her sister, Bertha, and they have five children: Bruce T., Myrle, Mary Alice, Olive B. and John G. Mr. McDivitt is a Republican, stanch and true, as have been the family for sev- eral generations, and religiously the mem- bers of the McDivitt family have long been connected with the Methodist church. His paternal grandmother was a cousin of Bish-

op Simpson, a noted Methodist divine of the early days, and the family trace this religious connection back for over one hun- dred years. Pottawatomie county numbers Frank H. McDivitt among her most valued citizens.

WILLIAM H. BROWN, proprietor of the Canadian Valley Farm, one of the most valuable estates of Pottawatomie county, is numbered among the early settlers of the valley. It was in 1888 that he came from his home state of Iowa to Indian Territory, farming for a time on leased land in the Chickasaw Nation, and in 1892 he came from there to Pottawatomie county, Okla- homa, and bought forty acres of his present estate, his first residence being a small board house. He is now the owner of a rich and fertile farm of two hundred and sixty acres, adorned with a pleasant, com- modious residence costing seventeen hun- dred dollars, and the homestead is located three miles west of Shawnee.

Mr. Brown was born in Westmoreland 'county, Pennsylvania, east of Pittsburg, November 2, 1866, his parents being George S. and Frances (Bowman) Brown. The father lived to the age of four score years and ten, a brave and loyal soldier dur- ing the Civil war and a member of the Grand Army Post at Shawnee. His wife died just fourteen years ago, aged fifty- seven, and of their six children, three sons and three daughters, the sons and one daughter are residents of Oklahoma, and another daughter resides in Minnesota.

William H. Brown was but a boy at the time of the removal of his parents to Frank- lin county, Iowa, near Hampton, where he grew to manhood on a farm. He was mar- ried in the Chickasaw Nation in May of 1889, to Minnie Moore, who has proved a faithful helpmate in the journey of life and nobly shared with him the hardships of es- tablishing a home in the southwest. She was born in Moultrie county, Illinois, a daughter of John and Rachel (Maple) Moore, well-known residents of Pottawato- mie county. The mother died at the early age of thirty-two years, leaving three chil- dren. Five children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Brown: Thomas, Carl and Car-

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rie, twins, Lester and Martha. Mr. Brown is a Democrat in his political affiliations.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN KENNEDY. Potta- watomie county numbers among her ear- liest residents Abraham Lincoln Kennedy, a pioneer of 1889. At that time he located at King, now known as Dale, where his brother, Ranson B., was a trader, and one of the first to settle at King. Abraham L. Kennedy was born near Silver Lake, Shawnee county, Kansas. His father, Evan Ross, was one of the first to locate at Silver Lake, nine miles west of Topeka, and he operated a ferry boat on the Kaw river there until the memorable exodus to California in 1849, doing an excellent busi- ness as a ferryman. Mrs. Kennedy was a member of the Pottawatomie tribe of In- dians, Susan Kebeto by name, and of their seven sons the following grew to mature years : Evan Ross, whose home is in Kan- sas; John E., of Shawnee; Abraham L., who is mentioned later ; Allen, also of Kan- sas, and Ranson B., who died at Dale, Oklahoma, in March, 1891. He was born on the 8th of March, 1850, and was, there- fore, just in the prime of life at the time of his death. To him belonged the credit of being one of the first residents, the first merchant and the first postmaster of Dale, and he was well known in Pottawatomie county. He left a widow and six children.

Abraham L. Kennedy spent the early years of his life in his native county of Shawnee, Kansas, and one of his boyhood's friends there was the Hon. Charles Curtis. He received a good business training at Haskell Institute, which he attended for three years. After coming to Oklahoma in 1889 he was engaged in trade at Dale for a number of years, and was also the assistant postmaster there for four years. He now owns a good farm in Bales town- ship, and gives his entire attention to its cultivation and improvement. He is a member and for eight years a clerk of the fraternal order of Woodmen, and is a mem- ber of the Catholic church.

Mr. Kennedy married the widow of his brother, Sarah M. McKelvey Kennedy. She is a daughter of David L. and Eleanor (Rankin) McKelvey, both of whom are

now deceased, the father dying in Iowa and the mother in Colorado when eighty-seven years of age. By her first husband Mrs. Kennedy had six children: Charles Wil- son, Marion E., George T., Doshia Phil- lips, David R. and Clara May. Unto Mr. and Mrs. A. L. Kennedy have been born two children, Nettie Maud and Walter Evin.

W. M. JARVIS is prominently known throughout the southwest as an agriculturist and stock raiser and as the proprietor of The Heliker & Jarvis Seminole Company, one of the largest ranches in Seminole county, Oklahoma. This valuable tract contains ten thousand acres, eight thousand acres of which are under cultivation, and the land is very rich and especially well adapted to the raising of cotton, corn and alfalfa. Seventy-four tenant houses have been built on this farm, as well as a black- smith shop and a good store. On the In- dian lease land there is also a school house with an attendance of eighty-four pupils, superintended by a capable and efficient teacher, and church services are held in this school house once a month and Sunday- school every Sunday. The farm is under the management of Heliker & Jarvis, and these gentlemen are just and liberal in their dealings with their tenants and are num- bered among the most prominent business men in this part of the state.

W. M. Jarvis came to the Indian Terri- tory in 1880, and in 1890 to Pottawatomie county, Oklahoma, first locating near Mc- Loud, from whence in 1900 he came to his present large estate. He has thus been a resident of what is now the state of Okla- homa for twenty-eight years, one of its ear- liest pioneers and now one of its leading business men. He was born in Shelbyville, Shelby county, Illinois, August 12, 1863, and is a representative of an old Virginian family. His father, Samuel Jarvis, was a Civil war soldier and died in Pottawatomie county, Oklahoma, when sixty-six years of age, a life-long farmer and a member of the Christian church. His mother, Sarah Foltz, was born in Pennsylvania and is of Penn- sylvania Dutch descent. She is now living in this county, the mother of six children.

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Their son. W. M. Jarvis was fourteen years of age when he went to Iowa and from there he came to the Indian Territory and rode the range for years.

In Coles county, Illinois, he was united in marriage to Nettie Horsley, who was the first white child born in the Osage Nation of Indian Territory. The Indian chief of the nation some time later wished to adopt her, and being refused the parents were no- tified to leave that country. Her father, Theodore Horsley, died in Logan county, Oklahoma, a well known cattleman. Mrs. Jarvis was educated in the Osage Mission school, and her marriage has been blessed by the birth of seven childen : Ethel, Pearl, Floyd, Lois, Henry. Gladys and Elaine. Mr. Jarvis is an active Republican worker, and has served as a delegate to the state conven- tions. He is a member of the Masonic fra- ternity and a charter member of McLoud Lodge No. 157, which was organized at Dale. He is a man of excellent business qualifications, fair and honorable in his deal- ings, and he is one of the best known men of Pottawatomie county. Mrs. Jarvis is a member of the Christian church.

JOHN B. SMITH, who is farming in Earls- boro township, was born in Lawrence coun- ty, South Carolina, near Tylersville, August 9, 1840, a son of Noah and Jane (Owens) Smith and a grandson of Archer Smith, who moved from his native state of Maryland to the Carolinas. Noah Smith was born on the east shore of Maryland, and was but a boy at the time of his father's removal, at- taining to mature years in South Carolina and there marrying the daughter of John Owens, a native Irishman and a soldier in the Revolutionary war. By her first mar- riage Mrs. Smith had one son, James Meades, now deceased, and John B. is the only child by her second marriage. She was born in 1799, and died at the age of seven- ty-eight years. Mr. Smith died at the age of sixty-eight. He was a life-long farmer, a Democrat politically and a member of the Presbyterian church.

During the early years of his life John B. Smith enlisted for service in the Civil war, serving under Stonewall Jackson and Gen- eral Lee, and he took part in many of the

noted battles of the war. Returning home after the close of the struggle he lived for forty-seven years in one house and in the same locality in South Carolina for fifty- three years, and then going to Collin coun- ty, Texas, in 1893, he was engaged in farm- ing there near Anna until his removal to the territory of Oklahoma in 1894. Soon after his arrival he purchased the farm of John Berry in Earlsboro township and he has lived there ever since, developing and im- proving his land.

In his home state of South Carolina in 1872 Mr. Smith married Sarah. Carolina Liles, a daughter of Abel and Nancy Liles, and their children are: Jane Jacks, de- ceased ; Martha E. Green, of Dent town- ship, Pottawatomie county; Edgar, who is married and lives in Shawnee; and Claude, Lawrence B. and John P., at home. The great loss of the family was in the death of the wife and mother, a beautiful Christian character and loved and honored by all who knew her. Mr. Smith is a Mason, a mem- ber of Palmetto Lodge No. 190.

GEORGE O. BROWN, proprietor of the fa- mous Red Apple Fruit Farm in Brinton township, Pottawatomie county, has not only attained distinction as the owner of one of the most famous apple orchards in the entire state of Oklahoma, but is also one of the state's earliest pioneers, his resi- dence here covering the intervening years since 1892. Forty-five acres of his farm is devoted to the raising of the choicest apples, but besides this he raises many other kinds of fruit and is one of the largest hor- ticulturists in the southwest. His choice varieties of apples have won many medals, including the silver medal from the Louisi- ana Purchase Exposition at St. Louis in 1904, and the diploma medal at Missouri Rapids for the best Ben Davis apples.

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A history of the state of Oklahoma, Volume I, Part 82

Author: Hill, L. B. (Luther B.) Publication date: 1908 Publisher: Chicago : Lewis Pubishing Company Number of Pages: 645

Author: Hill, L. B. (Luther B.)
Publication date: 1908
Publisher: Chicago : Lewis Pubishing Company
Number of Pages: 645