A history of the state of Oklahoma, Volume II, Part 53

Author: Hill, L. B. (Luther B.)
Publication date: 1909
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 810

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On July 23, 1903, Mr. Bynum married Miss Anna Decker, daughter of Anderson Decker, of Pulaski county, Missouri, where Mrs. By- num was born and their three children are Fred, Elmer and Roy.

ROBERT P. BREWER has been engaged in the banking business in Oklahoma for the past

twelve years and is cashier of the First Na- tional Bank of Quinton, which institution he organized in 1902, being associated with the First National Bank of Checotah, in 1897, and acting as its assistant cashier until he organized the Quinton institution. The First National Bank of Quinton has a capital stock of $25,000 and a surplus of $10,000, after paying a number of annual dividends, and has more than doubled its capital stock in earn- ings since its inception. Its president is W. V. Galbraith, of Ft. Worth, Texas; its vice president, B. M. Cates, of Hoyt, Oklahoma, and both men are of financial prominence, the former being general live stock agent of the M. K. & T. Railway Company.

Mr. Brewer represents one of the families of the state conspicuous for its connection with its educational matters, for his father, Theodore F. Brewer, came to the Choctaw Nation more than a third of a century ago and organized the Spaulding Female College at Muskogee, and was its president and active head for thirty years. He holds the chair of secondary education in the Oklahoma State University and is also chairman of the Okla- homa State Textbook Commission. As a Methodist minister he has passed his life in the cause of religion as well as in education.

Rev. Brewer's native place is Gibson coun- ty, Tennessee, where he was born January 20, 1846. His education was obtained in Andrew College and he came out to Arkan- sas some years after the Civil war. He was a member of General Bedford Forrest's cav- alry and is chaplain general of the Oklahoma Confederate Veterans' Association. He mar- ried Miss Elizabeth Webster, of Corinth, Mis- sissippi, and the children of the union are Robert P., of this notice, and Miss Bessie, who is director of music in the Northwestern State Normal School of Oklahoma. Rev. Brewer has been a living force in church and school work in Oklahoma ever since his advent hither and is a strong and active sup- porter of the first state administration of Ok- lahoma.

Robert P. Brewer was born in Booneville, Arkansas. December 3. 1876. He attended Webb's Training School, a Tennessee institu- tion, and took his advanced work in the South- western University of Texas, at Georgetown. He graduated from that college in 1896 with the degree of A. M. and immediately identi- fied himself with banking, his first official connection being with the First National Bank of Checotah. Mr. Brewer has demonstrated

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his ability as a financier in the management of the institutions with which he has had con- nection and in the conduct of his personal affairs, and is deservingly popular as a citi- zen by reason of his manly qualities, his de- votion to duty and his unselfish and liberal at- titude toward his people and his town. He was married at Neosho, Missouri, January 3, 1901, to Miss Lucile Barnett, whose father is Dr. Barnett, now of Quinton, but for many years surgeon of the Long-Bell Lumber Com- pany of Louisana. Mr. and Mrs. Brewer have two children-Elizabeth and Robert, Jr., seven and four years old, respectively. In his political tendencies Mr. Brewer clings to De- mocracy, as expounded by the old school and without partisan bias. He is a Scottish Rite Mason ( thirty-second degree) in Consistory No. 2 McAlester. His social qualities are strongly and liberally developed ; and the peo- ple of Quinton cheerfully name him as among her first citizens and business men.

JAMES H. FITZER. Born in one of the Mis- sissippi valley states east of the "Great Father of Waters" and reared to manhood on the great plains of Kansas, James H. Fitzer has developed physically and mentally under the influence of our peculiar western civilization, and its chief characteristics of overturning ob- stacles and meeting emergencies have come to be a dominant part of his makeup and ac- counts in no small way for the degree of fi- nancial prosperity he now enjoys.

Mr. Fitzer was born October 20, 1873, in Montgomery county, Illinois, his parents be- ing William H. and Mary D. ( Carter) Fitzer, who now reside on Beaver Creek, Oklahoma, near Quinton. They were married in Hardin county, Kentucky, and in 1882 with their young family they emigrated to Arkansas, stopping temporarily at Eureka Springs, later continuing their journey to Missouri and fi- nally reaching the broad prairies and pure air of Osborne county, Kansas. At each of their destinations they followed the tilling of the soil and were always in a condition of limit- ed means. In 1894 they followed their son, James H., to the Choctaw Nation, and have since followed their chosen vocation in Ok- lahoma. William H. Fitzer was born in Ohio in 1839, and during the war between the north and the south he served as a Fed- eral soldier, and since in a modest way and at each opportunity he and his have indicated their political tendencies by supporting the Republican party. In his family were the

following children: Louisa, wife of Wade McMullen, of St. Joseph, Missouri; James H., mentioned below; William W .; Adaline, wife of Curtis Simmons; Mary D., wife of Samuel Smith; and Barney D., all of the Beaver Creek neighborhood; and Stella A., the wife of Fred Butler, of Featherstone, Oklahoma.

James H. Fitzer was prevented in youth from acquiring more than the rudiments of an education, and with this equipment he was forced to take up the duties of independent citizenship. In the winter of 1894 he came to the Choctaw Nation and located at old Skullyville, where he rented a farm. His per- sonal property at that time consisted of a pony team and wagon, and when he mar- ried in the following year his humble home was remarkable only for its simplicity, a sim- plicity of the old pioneer. He married on the 6th of June, 1895, Miss Frances Bra- shear, a daughter of a Choctaw, William Brashear, whose wife was also a Choctaw, and they lived on the Red River for many years, where Mrs. Fitzer was born, Febru- ary 23, 1811. About twelve years later they moved into Sans Bois county, and there they reared their family. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Fitzer are Pearl B., Jewell, Jack H. P., Raymond W., Ivory Ellen, Ruby Ellen May and James Sherman H.

At the time of the allotment Mr. Fitzer selected his family portion in different lo- calities in the nation, and now has four hundred and sixty acres on the Canadian riv- er, nine hundred and fifty acres in the vicinity of Featherstone and four hundred acres on Beaver creek. During the past several years he has been quite extensively engaged in the cattle business and his annual output from his range totals some four hundred, while his farming interests, carried on chiefly by tenants, aggregates several hundred acres. In- dustry and economy seem to have been his watchword, but above all he has placed the education of his children, which is attested by his residence in Quinton, where good schools are accessible, and in that town he has comfortably and substantially improved property.

DR. THOMAS T. NORRIS, of Crowder, was born in LaGrange county, Indiana, Septem- ber 12, 1876. His father is David J. Norris of that county, whose birth occurred in Hun- tingdon county, Pennsylvania, in 1846, and he is a son of Thomas Norris, in his life time

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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA.

a farmer and of Scotch-Irish descent. He was the father of twelve children by his wife Nancy Snyder, whose people were of Irish origin. David J. Norris married Mary Heif- ner, a daughter of Joseph Heifner, whose par- ents were from the fatherland of Germany, and soon after their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Norris located in Indiana and have passed their livesas modest farmers in LaGrange coun- ty. His length of residence there has con- tributed to an extensive acquaintance and his political activity as a worker in local Demo- cratic matters has made him known among the leaders in business and politics through- out the county. Of his seven children, Hiram is with the U. S. pension agency at Indianap- olis ; Flora married Thomas Atwater and re- sides in Santa Fe, Kansas; Thomas T. is mentioned below ; and Roland and Ruth are with their parents, while the others are de- ceased.

Dr. Thomas T. Norris passed an unevent- ful boyhood at the parental homestead, and the common schools of the neighborhood grounded him in the elementary principles of an English education. After reaching man- hood he entered the Peabody Normal at Nash- ville Tennessee, and there spent a year in pre- paring himself for the professional training which was to follow. Entering then the Nash- ville Medical University he completed the course there and graduated with the class of 1901. In choosing a location for practice he looked toward the coming state of Oklahoma as offering rare opportunities, and coming hither he finally located in Crowder, May 26, 1902, then an embryo town with prospects as its chief assets. But conditions seemed favorable for the building up of an important trading point at the junction of the two rail- roads, and he welcomed the chance to add his mite to the achievement of that result. He has contributed his share toward individual home building, and was one of the promoters of the Crowder Trust Company and its sec- retary for a time.

The Doctor holds a membership in the State and Pittsburg County Medical societies and also in the American Medical Association. He is local surgeon for both the Missouri. Kan- sas & Texas and the Ft. Smith & Western Railroad companies. His political affiliations are with the Democratic party, and he is a member of South Canadian Lodge No. 22, A. F. and A. M., Albert Pike Lodge of Per- fection No. 2 Consistory of McAlester, and a

member of the Mystic Shrine, Oklahoma City.

DUDLEY B. BUELL, postmaster of Krebs, and a member of the law firm of Buell and Kyle, with office in McAlester, came to the Indian Territory in 1904. Mr. Buell is a native of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, born in May, 1878, and is a descendant of William Buell, who came to this country in 1630 and made settle- ment in Connecticut. From William Buell. the head of the family in America, the line is traced down through his son Samuel, Cap- tain Samuel, Thomas, Joseph, and Thomas W. Thomas W. Buell, the father of Dudley B., was born in Hamilton, New York, Octo- ber 4, 1829, and was reared on his father's farm. In 1858, a young man fairly well edut- cated and possessing more than ordinary bus- iness force and judgment, he joined the pro- moters of the Northwestern Mutual Life In- surance Company, of Milwaukee, with which for more than twenty years he was actively identified. the greater part of that time as su- perintendent of agencies. He is now living retired in Milwaukee. His wife, who before her marriage was Miss Mary Emma Bliss, also traces her family history back to the Colon- ial period, the first of the Blisses having set- tled in Connecticut in 1640. Mrs. Buell's father moved from Connecticut to Rochester, New York, where she was born, and from whence, some years later, they went to Madi- son, Wisconsin, where, in 1870, she became the wife of Mr. Buell. The fruits of their union are: Fred J., postmaster of Burling- ton, Wisconsin; Florence E., wife of Dr. F. J. Brown, surgeon of the State Penitentiary of Wisconsin; Dudley B., and Victor, of Pittsburg county, Oklahoma. Mrs. Buell is related by marriage to the Davidsons of Wis- consin, the governor of the state being her nephew and a cousin of Dudley B. Her fath- er was active in state politics as a Republican, and was several terms a member of the Wis- consin state legislature.

Dudley B. Buell received a liberal educa- tion. He has a diploma, dated 1894, from St. John's Military Academy of Delafield, Wisconsin. That year he entered the Colum- bia Law School in New York City, where he took a four years' course in three years, and was graduated in 1892. Then he spent one year in the law office of Judge Warren T. Williams, of Milwaukee, and in December, 1899, he opened an office with Byron D. Paine, a son of Judge Paine of the Wisconsin su-

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perior court, under the firm name of Buell and Paine, which continued for a period of five years, during which time Mr. Buell gain- ed a valuable experience. In 1904, he came west and took up his residence in Krebs, which practically joins McAlester, and Jan- uary 1, 1908, formed the connection indi- cated at the beginning of this sketch. Jan- tary 28, 1908, he was appointed by President Roosevelt to succeed Mrs. Rena Russell in the post office at Krebs. In April, 1906, Mr. Buell married, in McAlester, Miss Jean I. Crutcher, of Springfield, Missouri, where she was born November 28, 1887, daughter of William C. and Jennie ( Sweet ) Crutcher.

WILLIAM N. VERNON. One to whom great credit is due for the healthy and enduring growth of the town of Kiowa, in Pittsburg county, is William N. Vernon whose con- nection with it dates from its inception and whose activity as a citizen embraces the law, real estate and loans. The connection of Judge Vernon with the movement that re- sulted in the transfer to Oklahoma's domain as permanent settlers of a large number of the Mississippi Choctaws is of moment, and more than a mere incident in the history of the settlement of the state, for he was one of the first to conceive of the project and his time and capital organized and brought out to their new home the first carload of these settlers, which led to an exodus from Mis- sissippi of several thousands of Choctaws who were allotted lands and became a part of the social and industrial fabric of the new ter- ritory.

A residence of nearly thirty years in Texas and his active identity with its affairs during the period of its most active settlement, ably equipped Judge Vernon for the part he is now playing in the settlement of his adopted state and in the exploiting of her resources to the home-seeking world. Few possess a more ac- curate knowledge of its possibilties and few have a firmer grasp of the situation or a more plausible solution of the few problems to be worked out before all the obstacles to a grand rush of desirable immigrants to the state's borders have been removed.

William N. Vernon was born in Lowndes county. Mississippi, February 23, 1854. As his father was a planter and, after the war, in poor circumstances, the college of the coun- try district provided all the schooling he ac- quired. An uncle, Colonel Dowd. advised him to study law and when a youth he began

a course of reading with the firm of Green and Pickins at Corinth, Mississippi. But be- fore he finished his course he came to Texas and assumed a cowboy's life. He was happily diverted from this course, after several months of service, and finally admitted to the bar in Collin county, where he passed fifteen of the twenty-nine years of residence in the state. 'Business and professional matters took him over much of central Texas and he formed a wide and valuable personal acquaintance in those sections. For several years prior to his removal to the Choctaw Nation he resided in Rockwall, where also his parental home was maintained for some years.

Judge Vernon is a representative of the Vernons of Alabama in which state his father- Dr. S. M. Vernon, was born. Dr. Vernon settled in Mississippi after he had obtained his literary and professional education, the latter being received from a medical college in Nash- ville, Tennessee. Not only did his learning and professional attainments win him high standing, but the people of Itawamba county sent him to the legislature several terms. He was a loyal Democrat, as is his son, of this sketch. He moved to Texas in the early seven- ties and first made his home in Rockwall, final- ly locating in Collin county where his death occurred in 1888, at the age of seventy years. Dr. Vernon was an ardent supporter of south- ern institutions and served in the Mississippi department of the Confederate army. He was a member of the Baptist church and was a warm friend of liberal education, having him- self been a teacher in his early life, before entering his career as a physician. He mar- ried Miss Hassie Dowd, a daughter of Rev. William Dowd, a Baptist minister, and she died in Rockwall, Texas, in 1878, the mother of William N., of this review ; Mrs. Kate E. May, of Albuquerque, New Mexico ; and Amos C .. also of that city.

William N. Vernon came to Kiowa when it was a hamlet of two hundred people and its situation in the midst of a splendid grazing and agricultural region clearly pointed out to him the possibilities of a live trading point and a new metropolis in Pittsburg county. The result was that he interested a friend with capital in the building of permanent busi- ness houses, nine of the brick store buildings of the place being immediately erected. He was one of the stockholders of the Merchants' and Planters' Bank, which was merged into the First National Bank, and was its vice pres- ident. His own home attests to his faith in

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Kiowa, for his residence is one of the costly ones of the place and is picturesquely situated at the base of a royal ridge, or uplift, adjoin- the west limits of the town.

THOMAS D. EDWARDS. The name of Ed- wards has been prominently identified with the mining industry of Pittsburg county, through the substantial operations of D. Ed- wards and Son, of McAlester and Edwards, Oklahoma. Thomas D. Edwards, the surviv- ing member of the firm, was associated with his father in the McAlester district from 1885 until the latter's death in 1903. Daniel Ed- wards was a determined, industrious and able Englishman, his earlier years in the McAlester district being spent as a miner. His ambition, however, induced him to modestly develop a small tract of leased land half a mile west of McAlester in the early nineties. This en- terprise proved moderately profitable and when he sold the property he opened up a mine near Kiowa under the name of D. Ed- wards and Son, which became one of the most important mining properties of the coun- ty and with which he was identified at the time of his death in 1903. The profitable operations of the two mines included in the property and their ultimate sale at a hand- some figure placed the estate of D. Edwards among the important properties of the county and evinced a substantial achievement which was little short of phenomenal. But the life training of the deceased had been a prep- aration for these later years of success. As

a young boy he commenced work in the Eng- lish mines and in 1877 came to the United States and stopped for a time in the coal fields of Tioga, Pennsylvania; thence he went to the Coal Creek district of Colorado and finally to the fields of Indian Territory, when he commenced his career as an operator at Mc- Alester. He sold his first mine for $30,000 and his estate disposed of a mining property in 1906 for fully three times that amount. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Edwards were: Thomas D., and Anna, who is now the wife of R. E. Albright, of Kiowa, Oklahoma. A short time after the death of the father the widow and children erected comfortable homes in the town of Kiowa where they now reside.

Thomas D. Edwards, is a native of Eng- land. born March 19, 1868, and was nine years of age when he became an American boy. He was chiefly associated with his fath- er in his mining operations and at the death of the senior member of D. Edwards and Son

became the active head of the company. Since disposing of the mining properties of the es- tate he has been engaged in various private enterprises which he has brought to a profit- able and successful issue. He has had an ac- tive identification with the First National Bank of which he is now vice president. The chil- dren of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas D. Edwards were : Daniel and Bessie May Edwards.

CHARLES LAFLORE, president of the First National Bank of Kiowa, Pittsburg county, represents one of the oldest and most promi- nent families of Choctaw blood in the state, the ancestral name being attached to one of the most prosperous counties of the new com- monwealth. For many years he served as a peace officer, both in Arkansas and Indian territory, being for eight years captain of the United States Indian Police for the Union Agency at Muskogee. For more than thirty years, however, his permanent residence has been a fine agricultural homestead at Lime Stone Gap, Atoka county. From all points of view Captain LaFlore is a noteworthy and pic- turesque character, and has proved an invalna- ble factor in the development of this section of the former Indian country. His connec- tion, in this regard, is largely as a fearless and faithful governnient official who has played a large part in guaranteeing to set- tlers and property owners that necessity to permanent residence-security of life and be- longings.

Mr. LaFlore is a native of Towson (now Choctaw county. Oklahoma), where he was born July 21, 1841, a son of Forbis and Rebecca (Fisher) LaFlore. His grandfath- er, Louis LaFlore, was a Frenchman who married a full blood Choctaw of the origin- al Mississippi tribe and nation, while his un- cle, Greenwood LaFlore, was a Choctaw chief, said to have made the treaty by which his people were removed, in 1832, to the Indian Territory. The father, Forbis La- Flore, was a man of good education and de- cided ability, practicing law among his peo- ple for many years, long and ably serving them in the Choctaw legislature, going as a delegate to Washington in 1852, and stand- ing in every way as one of their most trust- ed and prominent representatives. To his marriage with Rebecca Fisher were born three children who reached maturity: Matil- da, who married Dr. T. J. Manning, a Geor- gia physician: Charles, of this sketch; and Henrietta, who died as the wife of John Dou-

Peter magtubby

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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA.

ley. The mother of this family died in 1858 and Forbis LaFlore wedded as his second wife, Annie Marie Marrer, who became the mother of Forbis, Lucy Bentley and Carrie (Mrs. Perry, of Coalgate). The father died in 1886, but his widow still survives.

Charles LaFlore obtained his education in Armstrong's Academy, Indian territory, at Paris, Texas, and Fort Smith, Arkansas, being a student in the latter city at the out- break of the Civil war. On account of mi- nor physical disability he was unfitted for service in the ranks but for some time was identified with the commissary department. At the close of the war he commenced farm- ing and for a few years also operated a grist mill at Boggy Depot, in 1876 buying the farm in Atoka county on which he now resides. In 1842 he was appointed United States deputy marshall, stationed at Fort Smith, Ar- kansas, holding that position until the court was transferred to Indian Territory, when he was commissioned from Paris, Texas. While serving as deputy marshal he was also connected with the United States Indian Police for the Union Agency at Muskogee, finally attaining the rank of captain which he held for some eight years. He then re- tired from his farm and in 1905, when the Merchants' and Planters' Bank was organ- ized at Kiowa he was elected its first presi- dent, remaining at the head of the institu- tion when, in 1907, it was merged into the First National Bank.

In 1862 Mr. LaFlore married Mary An- geline Guy, sister of ex-Governor William R. Guy, of the Chickasaw Nation, and aunt of Congressman Charles Carter of Ardmore. Oklahoma. Five children have been born of this union, three of whom are living. An- nie E. became the wife of George Webb, of Ardmore. The next two daughters were twins, Chockie and Chickie-so named be- cause the father was a Choctaw and the mother, a Chickasaw. Chickie married Lee Bruce, of Ardmore, a prominent Democratic candidate for governor, and died leaving a daughter, Lorena Bruce. Chockie became the wife of Charles Maupin, of Texas. Mand A. is the wife of Edgar Chivers, who resides at Mansville, Oklahoma. The deceased daugh- ter, Daisy, died as the wife of Haines Nelms, a resident of Texas. Mrs. Mary A. LaFlore. the mother of this family, died in 1893. and in 1896 Mr. LaFlore wedded Louisa F. Pat- rick, a native of Livingston county, Missou- ri.

PETER MAYTUBBY. The late Peter May- tubby, of Caddo, Bryan county, was a re- inarkable man, an honor to his Indian blood and to the Choctaw Nation in which he so long resided. Although he made his mark in the territory of the latter tribe, he was a full-blood Chickasaw, naturally took a deep interest in the policies of the Chickasaw Na- tion, and obtained such a measure of merited confidence among his countrymen that he was often pressed to become a candidate for their governorship. But his large agricultural, bus- iness and property interests, as well as his strongest family ties, remained with the Choc- taw Nation, and therein he passed his last days as the state of Oklahoma was about to take on its form of government, dying on the first of May, 1907.

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A history of the state of Oklahoma, Volume II, Part 53

Author: Hill, L. B. (Luther B.) Publication date: 1909 Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing company Number of Pages: 810

Author: Hill, L. B. (Luther B.)
Publication date: 1909
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 810