USA > Oklahoma > A history of the state of Oklahoma, Volume II > Part 56
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In 1874 Mr. Neely removed to Tarrant county, Texas, and commenced his long and very creditable career as a pedagogue. The eighteen years he spent there were as princi- pal of the Rock Creek school, a period in rural schools and some time as an instructor at Ravenna College. He remained at the lat- ter institution until 1897, when he became identified with the public schools of Durant. He was principal of the East ward building
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there for three years, and was actively in- fluential in all the local and district move- ments of an educational nature. In the year 1904 Mr. Neely left the school room to the management of younger hands and heads, and soon after his resignation as principal was elected city assessor of Durant on the Dem- ocratic ticket. In the spring of 1902, after filling that office with fidelity and efficiency for three terms, he was chosen one of the jus- tices of the peace, in which capacity he has also amply justified the confidence which the people of Durant, as well as those of every community in which he has resided, have al- ways reposed in him. He owns a comfort- able home on Pine street and is considered one of the fixtures of the city, whose pres- ence and activities have always contributed to its higher advancement.
As stated, William Neely, the grandfather, migrated from the state of New York to Warren county, Kentucky, at an early period in his life, and there passed his remaining years. Besides James, the father of Albert Neely, his family consisted of the following : Mary, who married Samuel Lawler and spent her life in Simpson county, Kentucky. James Neely was born in 1796 and died in 1852, an earnest Methodist and an upright citizen. He married Margaret Bogan, who passed away in Fannin county, Texas, at the age of eighty- three, in 1890. The three children of their union were: Charles, who died at Mill Creek, Oklahoma, leaving a family, John, who died at Morris City, Illinois, with a family, and Albert, of this sketch. On December 20, 1873. Albert Neely married Louise Crabb, daughter of Roy ( Moss) Crabb, who reared a family of nine children. The Crabbs and the Rochesters with which they are connected were old English families which have sup- plied America with good rich blood. The issue of Mr. and Mrs. Neely's union are as follows: Claude L., who married Cora Cravens, is a teacher in Bryan county and is the father of Alton, Inez and Eugene; Har- ry, assistant cashier of the First National Bank of Durant, who married Myrtle Ter- rell and has a daughter, Margaret; Eugene, who died unmarried; Duke, of Durant, who married Gertrude Powell, and Margaret, who died young. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Crabh were : James, who was killed while serv- ing in the Confederate army : Robert, of Fan- nin county, Texas ; Esther, who died in Ken- tucky as the wife of Chesterfield Reed; John
F., who spent his last years in Parker coun- ty, Texas; Mrs. Neely, who is the fifth child; Henrietta, who also married Chesterfield Reed, of Kentucky, and is deceased; Nathaniel, who died unmarried; Mary, wife of Hoover Moore, of Fannin county, Texas; Agatha, now Mrs. James Truett, of Kentucky; Roy; and R. L. Crabb, of Fannin county, Texas. Mr. and Mrs. Albert Neely are both Presbyterians, and he himself is an Odd Fellow.
WILLIAM F. DODD, of Caddo, is a leading druggist and jeweler, president of the State Board of Pharmacy and a prominent Demo- crat and citizen of public affairs. He was born in Murray county, Georgia, on the 20th of May, 1866, and his father was Joseph W. Dodd, a native of Habersham county of that state, where he was born in 1843. The latter was reared in his native locality, served in the ranks of the Confederate army, and re- mained in the state of Georgia until 1891, when he removed to Fannin county, Texas. The American branch of the family' was of Scotch-Irish ancestry and was early founded in the Old Dominion. The paternal grand- father, a farmer, was a Virginian, but re- moved with his family to Habersham county, where he died soon after the Civil war. The children born to Joseph W. Dodd and his wife (nee Louisa White) were as follows; Wil- liam F., of this review ; Mary, deceased wife of Isaac Davis who left a son in Georgia; Mattie, who married W. G. Stone, of Dallas, Texas; Nannie, now Mrs. G. A. Strawn, of Atlanta, that state; J. H., of Mineral Wells, Texas: Anna and Lucy, residing in Savoy, that state, the latter being the wife of Wil- liam Durrett; and Emma, of Josephine, Tex- as, who is Mrs. James T. Keith.
William F. Dodd received his education in the country schools and a seminary of Mur- ray county, Georgia, and after attaining his majority left home for the career of an in- dependent man. In 1887 he located in Tex- as, five years of the seven which he spent in the state being passed as a resident of Savoy. He learned the jeweler's trade while acquir- ing experience in various towns of the state, and when he came to Caddo, Oklahoma, in 1894, his tradesman's tools and his household goods constituted about all his earthly wealth. He first engaged window space in Phillips Brothers' store, and in 1902, after establish- ing a good jewelry trade, added drugs to his enterprise, purchasing for that purpose the stock of Ira L. Smith. His house is now
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one of the most prosperous and popular in Caddo.
The social qualities inherent to Mr. Dodd's nature, combined with executive abilities and broad practical intelligence, have given him decided strength both as a politician and a man of public affairs. The Democrats have twice elected him mayor of the place, and during his incumbency of the office the streets were straightened, residences forced back to the legal building line, and general public improvements conducted which materially added to the attractiveness of the city as well as increased the value of real estate. He also served as president of the school board for many years, and is now at the head of the Commercial Club of the city and of the Bry- an County Oil and Gas Development Com- pany. The latter is a consolidation of the Caddo and Durant companies and is capital- ized at $200,000. MIr. Dodd's strong influ- ence as a Democrat and his personal fitness for the office prompted the governor of Ok- lahoma to appoint him on the State Board of Pharmacy in March, 1908, after which he was elected president. Naturally, he is an enthusiastic fraternalist, having a welcome membership in the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, Woodmen of the World and Elks.
In March, 1892, Mr. Dodd married, in Tex- as, Miss Irene Davis, whose father was a physician of Missouri. The child born to them is Clarence Lester Dodd. The family home is a modest tasteful cottage on Hunter street. Both parents are members of the Baptist church, and are highly esteemed for their sub- stantial and admirable traits.
MARION E. GOODING, of Durant, is the att- ditor and the general manager of the Rock- well Brothers Lumber Company, whose ex- tensive business is transacted through a sys- tem of twenty-four yards scattered through New Mexico, Texas and Oklahoma. He is also secretary of the Durant Chamber of Commerce, which is behind all the import- ant and progressive movements and enterpris- es of the city, and is active in the promotion of the oil fields of Bryan county. There are few forces tending to develop this section of the country in which he is not an active fac- tor, and in which he has not earned an honor- able prominence during the decade of his residence at Durant.
Mr. Gooding was born in Lamar county, Texas, February 14, 1866, and his education
was obtained in its public schools. His fath- er, Larry S. Gooding, who now resides with him, is one of the pioneer newspaper men of Texas, establishing the Paris Advocate at an early day and conducting it for many years. The elder Mr. Gooding was born in Rock Is- land, Illinois, in 1831, settled in Paris when a young man, married Martha A. Woolridge there, and not only became well known in journalism but served Lamar county in sev- eral official capacities. Although in sympathy with the southern cause he did not actively support it, being at the time of the Civil war a county officer. He left Paris in the eighties and for a time made Hillsboro his home. There his wife died in 1890, and he even- tually joined his son in Durant.
Marion E. Gooding was reared and edu- cated in his native town of Paris, where also he commenced business as a clerk in a drug store. As employe and proprietor he was en- gaged in that line of business in Paris, Hills- boro, Albany, Gainsville and Wichita Falls, Texas. From the last named place, in Feb- ruary, 1898, he removed to Durant, then and there assuming a responsible position with the Rockwell Brothers Lumber Company. He is now not only its auditor and general manag- er, but a large stockholder in the business and virtually devotes his entire time to the pro- motion of its large affairs. As secretary of the Durant Chamber of Commerce he has been active in the movement which has assured the building of the Muskogee, Oklahoma & Gulf Railway within the coming year, and he is one of the promoters of the Bryan County Oil and Gas Company, engaged in a systematic prospect of their large body of leases along the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railway from Caddo to the Red river. His interest in the fraternities is at present confined to the Knights of Pythias and the Elks, in the latter order being a charter member of the Durant Lodge and secretary of it.
On the 12th of April, 1888, Mr. Gooding married, at Albany, Texas, Mollie, a daughter of Henry M. Rockwell, whose sons com- prise the Rockwell Brothers Lumber Com- pany and were its organizers. Mr. Rockwell was a soldier both of the Mexican and the Civil wars, in the war of the Rebellion being connected with a regiment from Indiana, from which state he migrated to Texas. His death occurred at Albany in 1897. The children born to Mr. and Mrs. Marion E. Gooding are :
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Ethel G., born January 22, 1889, and Dor- othy, October 30, 1898.
STEPHEN A. WHALE, president of the Cit- izens' Loan and Realty Company of Durant, Bryan county, first identified himself with Ok- lahoma in October, 1905, and entered into the enterprising spirit of the place by founding the institution of which he is the head in the following year. The company named is a corporation, with a capital stock of $100,- 000, the making of loans and the handling of real estate constituting its chief business. The patronage which it has received has fully justified the hopes of its promoters and placed it in the class of well established institutions of a financial and business character.
Mr. Whale is a native of Pittsburg, Penn- sylvania, born March 1, 1862, receiving his education in the schools of the Smoky City and his first working experience in its glass factories and other industrial plants. In 1879 he accompanied the family to Golden Pond, Trigg county, Kentucky, where he worked on his father's farm for three years. He then returned to Pittsburg, and for two years en- gaged there in the fruit and vegetable busi- ness; returning to his father's farm for two years. He then went to Marshall county, Kentucky, and secured a clerkship in Aurora. With the accumulation of a small capital, he continued for several years as a modest mer- chant, at the same time handling land and timber, the latter feature of his business being largely developed in connection with the Ayer and Lord Tie Company. His private deal- ings in land proved quite profitable, and when he disposed of his interests in this line, save a few hundred acres, he sought the new and developing territory of Oklahoma as a favor- able field for the advancement of his pros- pects. Besides his identification with the in- terests of Aurora, as already mentioned, Mr. Whale became a stockholder in the Bank of Marshall County, the Hardin Bank and the Citizens' Bank of Murray, Kentucky. When he located at Durant in the fall of 1905 he was therefore thoroughly grounded both in business and finances. His previous experi- ence enabled him to make judicious invest- ments in both city and country real estate, he became a stockholder in the First National Bank, and in 1906 became one of the chief promoters of the Citizens' Loan and Fealty Company, of which he was elected presi- ‹lent.
The Whale family is of French origin. Wil- liam Whale, its American founder, was the grandfather of Stephen A. and came to the United States when Anthony, the only child of the family, was quite young. They settled in New York City, where the husband soon died, the widow bringing her son to Pitts- burg, Pennsylvania, where he was reared and at quite an early age learned the brickmak- er's trade. The widow afterward married Peter Hoover, by whom she became the moth- er of the following : Joseph, who died in Penn- sylvania ; Xavier, now a resident of Pittsburg ; Mary, who married Jacob Dietz and also died in Pittsburg and Louisa, who married John Hoover, of Pittsburg, where they still reside. Anthony Whale, the father, served in the U'n- ion army during the Civil war, enlisting at Pittsburg and serving in the Army of the Potomac in General Sigel's corps. He mar- ried Margaret Angel, who died in 1898, and their children were as follows: Stephen A., of this sketch; Joseph, who died in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, in 1908; George, of Chicago, Illinois ; Frank, of Paducah, Kentucky ; Mar- garet, who married A. E. Duncan and died in Marshall county, Kentucky; Gertie, who died unmarried, and William J., who resides in Pa- ducah, Kentucky. On August 1, 1886, Stephen A. Whale was united in marriage, in Marshall county, Kentucky, with Mrs. Nannie A. Eg- gner, nee Berkley, daughter of Seaburn Berk- ley, a farmer and an old settler of Kentucky, whose wife was Martha Frizzell. Mr. and Mrs. Whale have become the parents of Stella A., Mabel, Ethel, Ula and Ruby. Mr. Whale is a member of the blue lodge and chapter of Masonry, and of McAlester Consistory, Scot- tish rite degree. He is also a member of both lodges of Woodmen. In politics he is a Dem- ocrat.
CHARLES A. WOODWARD, justice of the peace of Durant and actively engaged in the insur- ance business, has been a resident of Okla- homa since 1895, when he migrated from Wil- cox county, Alabama, and became a farmer in Blue county, Choctaw Nation. He was born in Choctaw county, Alabama, March 15, 1860, a son of country parents. reared on a farm and obtained what education he could from the dis- trict schools of his home locality. At sixteen years of age he commenced to clerk in a store at Butler. Alabama, and some years later be- came proprietor of a business at Melvin. His next mercantile venture, which was indifferent, made him a resident of Pine Hill, Wilcox
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county. Alabama, for five years, and upon winding up his involved affairs in 1895 he sought a new home in Oklahoma among his own people.
Mr. Woodward at once settled in Durant, improving and cultivating land which he af- terward allotted for his family. He actively farmed and raised stock until 1906, when, he engaged in the insurance business. While per- sonally devoting his time to office work, his farms are under his supervision, being actively worked by fifteen experienced tenants. His estate of 2,500 acres is located. in several bodies, near Durant, Caddo and Fort Tow- son, and the 1,200 acres under cultivation are given over with marked success to corn, oats and cotton. Mr. Woodward was elected jus- tice of the peace as a Democrat, and is ob- viously a citizen of popularity. energy and broad executive ability. He is also a strong figure with the fraternities, being a member of the chapter and council of Masons: special district deputy grand chancellor of Durant Lodge No. 132, Knights of Pythias, and fur- ther identified with the Elks and Woodmen.
Charles A. Woodward is a son of William Woodward. a farmer and once sheriff of Choc- taw county. Alabama. The father was born of slave-holding parents in South Carolina, came to Alabama as a young man, and, in Choctaw county. married Miriam Edwards. Their children were as follows: John, a resi- dent of Choctaw county, Alabama: Gaston. who died in that state, and Charles A. Wood- ward, of this notice. The father died in 1878, and the mother survived him until June. 1908, passing away while a resident of Dur- ant. In October, 1885, Charles A. Woodward was united in marriage with Miss Annie Mitchell, the ceremony occuring in Choctaw county, Alabama. Mrs. Woodward's father was William Mitchell, a farmer and merchant. who married Emily Yates, a native of the Choctaw tribe. Their children are as follows : Lena, wife of R. E. Bailey, of Durant ; Helen D., wife of W. C. Moody, of Ada, Oklahoma ; Leclaire, Emily, Charles A., Jr., Gaston, An- nie Frank and Christine Woodward.
DR. GAPPA M. RUSHING, of Durant, has been identified with the practice of medicine and the social life of Oklahoma for the past decade, having located in that city in 1898 and devoted himself to his profession and to the duties incumbent on every worthy and repre- sentative citizen. He was born in Coffee county. Alabama, February 16, 1868, and in
that county his father, Dr. F. M. Rushing still resides. There the elder physician has vir- tually passed his life, his many years of prac- tice covering faithful professional service for the Confederacy and being interspersed with an honorable career as a state leg- islator and a judge. The high school at Elba furnished Dr. Gappa M. Rush- ing with his advanced literary training, and his medical studies were pursued at the University of Alabama. Mobile. from which he was graduated in 1891. In the same year he removed to Texas and opened his first office in Robertson county, six months later lo- cated at Nevada, Collin county, where he re- mained for nine years. or until his advent to Durant, as stated above. Wherever he has resided he has been actively identified with the medical societies instituted for the improve- ment of the personnel of the profession and for their advantageous social intercourse. At the present time he is superintendent and secretary of the Bryan County Board of Health. In politics Dr. Rushing affiliates with the dom- inant party of his county, and as a fraternal- ist enjoys membership in the order of Elks.
The father, Dr. F. M. Rushing, was born near Montgomery, Alabama, in the year 1828. was liberally educated in his native city where he commenced the study of medicine, and fin- ished his professional course at Tulane Univer- sitv. New Orleans, Louisiana. He is the son of a slave-holding planter, inherited a portion of the estate, and was by ancestry, rearing and education a thorough southerner in character. He had been practicing some years when the Civil war commenced, and he went to the front as surgeon of an Alabama regiment, doing able and noble service along the lines of his profession. He afterward located at Elba, where his long and wisely conducted practice enabled him eventually to retire in comfortable circumstances. His accomplish- ments were even broader than his profession. including a fine capacity for public speaking and strong ability as a legislator. He was called upon to serve in both houses of the Alabama legislature was honored with the judgeship of Coffee county for sixteen years, and then retired to his homestead in the town of Elba. where he is revered for his useful life which has so largely been spent in the alleviation of suffering and the promotion of justice and the public good. It was in the vigor of his early manhood that he married Miss Fannie
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Yelverton, who died at Elba, Alabama, in 1878. Their children were: Bamma, who married John Harper and resides in Elba; William, also of that place; John, a student at West Point who resigned on account of ill health in his senior year and died at Elba in 1901; Gappa M., of this review ; F. M., Jr., of Dur- ant, Oklahoma; Bonnie, wife of William Hamm, of Elba, and Minola, who married the late Peter Libert, of that town. Dr. Gap- pa M. Rushing married December 28, 1892, at Farmersville, Texas, Miss Janie Sowell. daughter of M. D. Sowell, who was a mer- chant and a banker and formerly a resi- dent of Arkansas. The children of their un- ion are Marion, Myrtle and William W. Rushing.
WALTER F. CLOWER. A farmer, whose extensive and finely improved country es- tate lies adjacent to the town of Caddo, Bryan county, Walter F. Clower is also an enter- prising and substantial citizen, a supporter of the most progressive and stimulating insti- tutions of the locality. He has resided within the limits of the county for the past nineteen years, and has developed from a young man, poor both in property and influence, to a posi- tion of independence and honor among his fellows. Born in Lee county, Alabama, Feb- ruary 11, 1857, Mr. Clower is the son of George A. Clower, a leading planter and own- er of many slaves who was a financial victim of the Civil war. Thomas Clower, the grand- father, was a Virginian who migrated from Warren county, that state, to Harris county, Georgia, where he became widely known as an untiring supporter of Methodism. His children consisted of Simeon, Bryant, Thomas, George A. (born in Harris county in 1818), and Jane, now Mrs. Samuel Nunn, whose husband is a wealthy farmer of Auburn, Ala- bama. The life of George A. Clower, the father, was strictly rural, as became that of a planter's son. His first wife, who died early, bore him a son named Thomas, who was a Confederate soldier and now resides at Opelika, Alabama. For his second wife he chose Mary A. Fleming, who died at Birming- ham, Alabama, in 1881, the mother of Wal- ter F., of this review; Jennie, wife of J. M. Riley, of Birmingham, and George, a resident of Vicksburg, Mississippi. The father died at Opelika, Alabama, in 1898.
The Civil war so destroyed the educational advantages of Walter F. Clower that he ceased to be a pupil at the age of twelve and gave
his attention to the serious duties of assisting in the mending of the family fortunes. At sixteen he left home and became a clerk at Opelika, Alabama, spending two years with J. E. Williamson, a merchant of that place. He afterward returned to the home farm, but in 1876 removed permanently to the southwest. He first located at Weimar, Texas, and was a resident of the county for the following thir- teen years, after which he removed to Caddo, Oklahoma, and spent ten years clerking for C. A. Hancock. Leaving the store, he began farming in modest fashion near Caddo, and has developed into one of the leading agricul- turists of his county. Mr. Clower came to Oklahoma practically empty-handed and his wages as an employe became the nucleus of his present handsome competency. As his marriage in 1892 made him a citizen of the Choctaw Nation, he took his family allot- ments joining the townsite on the east, and of his extensive estate 800 acres are under cultivation. The entire tract has been sub- stantially improved with tenant houses, fences and barns, while his splendid country res- idence crowns the hilltop and overlooks a charming landscape. His near residence to Caddo makes him a virtual townsman, and there is nothing which has contributed to its advancement since he became a resident of the locality in which he has failed to be a strong factor. He was one of the promo- ters of the Caddo National Bank and is still a stockholder, having also an interest in the Bryan County Oil and Gas Development Com- pany, a corporation which is actively prospect- ing the territory adjacent to Caddo for the products indicated in its title. In his farm- ing operations, Mr. Clower produces cotton, corn and oats. For a number of years he raised thoroughbred hogs and still keeps his farm sufficiently stocked to dispose of all his surplus corn. On April 26, 1892, Mr. Clow- er married Sallie M. Pate, who is one-thirty- second Choctaw Indian, and is the daughter of J. L. C. and E. A. Pate who were the par- ents of Mrs. E. Folsom, Mrs. Pate, Mrs. Mer- rill, Mrs. Swinney (of Durant), and Mrs. Rutherford and Mrs. Clower, of Caddo. The children born to Mr. and Mrs. Walter F. Clow- er are Joe, George, Maud, Hazel, Fleming and Louise.
DAVID ROBINSON, a resident of Bokchito, and one of the leading farmers of Bryan coun- ty, was born near Cove, Arkansas, but within the limits of McCurtain county, Oklahoma,
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on the îth of March, 1861. Lewis Robin- son, his paternal grandfather, married a full- blood Choctaw and accompanied the tribe from Mississippi to their new home and both died in the country of the Choctaw Nation. Their children were Solomon, who became the father of David Robinson; Margaret, a resident of Bokchito; Lewis, who died near that place and left a family ; Mary, who lives near Cove, Arkansas, and Betsy, who mar- ried William Watson and died leaving a fam- ily. Solomon Robinson was born in Mississip- pi, and was an infant when his parents brought him to Indian Territory. He was reared in old Wolf county, learned the blacksmith trade, married Elizabeth Watson, a halfblood Choc- taw, and died in 1871 at about forty years of age. His widow survived him until 1900. when she died near Cove, Arkansas, the moth- er of the following: Lavina and Susan, both of whom died single; David, of this review : Amsiah, who lives at Cove: Caroline, now Mrs. Michael Mowdy, of the same place, and Peter Robinson, of Boswell, Oklahoma.
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