USA > Oklahoma > A history of the state of Oklahoma, Volume II > Part 73
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84 | Part 85 | Part 86 | Part 87 | Part 88 | Part 89 | Part 90 | Part 91 | Part 92 | Part 93
DR. MARION GRANT WYATT was born in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1862, and is the son of a physician, Dr. George W. Wyatt, who in his lifetime was one of the prominent fig- ures in the medical profession in St. Louis, a graduate of the old McDowell Medical College, the first medical school of that city. He belonged to that fine school of practi- tioners of which St. Louis had so many splendid examples and whose standard of ethics and scholarship was very high and whose precedent was an inspiration to the younger members of the profession.
His son, Dr. Marion G. Wyatt, graduated with the class of 1884, in the Missouri Medi- cal College, and thus, while preparing for his future life work, he had the benefit of coming in contact with the nota- ble physicians who were the profes- sors in the Missouri Medical College of those years in addition to the practical experience gained under his father. The Wyatt home was just outside of St. Louis, on the old Gravois road, near Old Orchard, where the family in earlier years were neighbors and friends of General Grant, whose farm adjoined. The Doctor's earlier education was received in the public schools of St. Louis and in Washington University, where he graduated with the class of 1879.
When he had completed thoroughly his preparation for the medical profession he began practice in St. Louis, and remained in his home city until 1905, the year of his coming to Dewey, Washington county, Ok- lahoma, the center of the oil and gas re-
385
HISTORY OF THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA.
gion. Here he has continued his former success as a general practitioner, and be- sides, is the proprietor of the town's leading drug store. He is a Democrat in politics, and upon the organization of the Washing- ton County Jeffersonian Club at Bartlesville, in January of 1908, he was elected its secre- tary, and he is also secretary of the Wash- ington County Medical Society. His fra- ternal affiliations are with the Masonic or- der.
MATHEW DAWSON PARR, the pioneer real estate man of Bartlesville, was born in Har- din county, Kentucky, near Elizabethtown, May 24, in 1849, and is of Virginian an- cestry on both his father's and mother's sides. His maternal grandfather, Rev. Eli- jah Dawson, was a well known Presbyterian minister of Kentucky in early years.
Mathew D. Parr was born and reared on the farm, and he lived in Hardin coun- ty all his life until he came to Bartlesville, in 1902, receiving his education principally in the schools of Elizabethtown. At the time of his arrival here the town had a population of only six hundred and fifty, with no hint of the present splendid improvements in sidewalks, pavements and fine business blocks, and surrounded by beautiful resi- dential additions, improved with attractive and costly homes. All the great oil and gas development has taken place during this time, and in the work of building up the city Mr. Parr has taken a prominent part as one of Bartlesville's notable group of pub- lic-spirited citizens. He engaged in the real estate business on first locating here, and has since been actively identified with that line of endeavor. At the regular spring election of 1902 he was made the city treas- urer. He is a gentleman highly esteemed by all as a business man of the strictest honor, and he possesses the confidence of the people to an enviable extent.
His wife, to whom he was married at her home in Hardin county, Kentucky, where she was also born, was Miss Belle Worth- am, a member of one of the old families of Hardin county, her father in his day be- ing a prominent miller and business man there. Mr. and Mrs. Parr have two chil- dren, a son and daughter, Alice and Marion, and they had the misfortune to lose by death, in 1905, their elder son, Clarence Parr, a young man of twenty-five. In poli- tics Mr. Parr is a Democrat.
HENRY J. HOLM is one of the leading citi- zens in business affairs in Bartlesville. He established his home in this city early in 1904, purchasing an interest in the Bartles- ville Vitrified Brick Company, of which he is now the secretary, treasurer and man- ager. The company's plant is at the end of West Fourth street, and they manufac- ture building and vitrified paving brick on an extensive scale, giving employment to a large number of men, and this is one of the important industrial enterprises that have made Bartlesville notable as the man- ufacturing center of the state of Oklahoma. Mr. Holm is also interested financially in various other business enterprises, particu- larly in the oil and gas industry, and was elected a member of the city council in 1904.
His native home is Oakwood, Milwaukee county, Wisconsin, where he was born in 1861, and he was there reared and educated. After he became of age he engaged in rail- roading, and moving to Kansas, he became connected with the operating department and station service of the Santa Fe System, remaining at various points in Kansas be- tween the years of 1888 and 1896. He was located at Wellington, that state, at the time of the original Oklahoma opening, on the 22d of April, 1889, and in 1890 he was located at Purcell, Indian Territory. At the time of the opening of the Cheyenne and Arapahoe reservation, in 1892, he was re- siding at Higgins, in the Panhandle of Tex- as, and which was for some time the ter- minus of the Southwestern Kansas branch of the Santa Fe. Through his railroad serv- ice Mr. Holm is very familiar with the early history of Oklahoma Territory. He is a public-spirited member of the Commercial Club, which has been a potent influence in the upbuilding of the city, and is a member of the Masonic bodies, including the thirty- second degree.
Mr. Holm married Geneva Hopper, a na- tive of Kentucky, and they have three chil- dren : Kirol, aged eighteen; Vieva, sixteen ; and Everett, fourteen.
JAMES E. HICKEY. In connection with in- dustrial interests the reputation of James E. Hickey is not limited to the confines of Bartlesville, but his name is well known in engineering circles and railroad building in many parts of the west and south, while in other fields of endeavor he has also di- rected his energies, and his wise counsel and
Vol. II-25
386
HISTORY OF THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA.
sound judgment have contributed to the success of a number of the leading business concerns of Bartlesville. When he was but twenty-two he began work as a surveyor for the Chicago & Northwestern Railroad Company through Illinois, Wisconsin and Iowa, and following this he was engaged as engineer on the notable reconstruction work of the Union Pacific Railroad west of Chey- enne, also having charge of the building of the Aspen Tunnel on that line, a won- derful piece of work six thousand feet in length, the longest tunnel on the Union Pacific and the most important piece of engineering work on the reconstruction of that line. From the Union Pacific Mr. Hickey became connected with the engi- neering department of the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railroad Company, as engineer on construction of that company's branch lines in the Indian Territory. His party made the first survey of the Oklahoma City branch by way of Bartlesville and the Osage Nation, in 1902-3. the road being con- structed the following year. He was also engaged on the building of the branch ex- tending northwestward from Muskogee through Tulsa to Osage Junction.
After completing that work Mr. Hickey located permanently in Bartlesville, where he has built up a large business in surveying and engineering work in connection with the various interests that have contributed to the growth and development of the city and vicinity, particularly the great oil and gas industry. He is the president of the Osage Mapping Company, and as such has turned out the most complete and accurate maps, in the largest numbers, of the Bartles- ville and other oil districts. In January, 1908, he promoted and organized the Bar- tlesville Cement Construction Company, which erected a ten thousand dollar cement plant in this city, an important addition to the city's industrial development.
Although so largely a part of Bartlesville and Oklahoma, Mr. Hickey is a native son of Wisconsin, born in Milwaukee, in 1874. and he went to school there and at the Wis- consin State University, at Madison, where he received his technical education, prepara- tory to the profession of a civil engineer. He is yet young in years, but has earned for himself an enviable reputation in business and at the same time his honorable meth- ods have won him the deserved and 1in- bounded confidence of his fellow citizens.
Mr. Hickey is a member of the Benevo- lent and Protective Order of Elks and the Knights of Columbus, and in politics he is a Republican. The wife of Mr. Hickey was before marriage, Ella B. McGregor, of Bar- tlesville.
DR. THOMAS A. STEWART. One of the widely known and honored early physicians of Oklahoma is Dr. Thomas A. Stewart, who in later years has made his home at his country residence, a mile and a half north- west of Bartlesville, on Butler Creek. It is a rich farm of one hundred and nine acres, and general farming is carried on there. The land lies in the Osage Nation, the road in front of his residence being the dividing line.
Dr. Stewart was born in Switzerland county, Indiana, January 9, 1835, a son of Andrew and Rebecca (McHenry) Stewart. The father was born at the mouth of the Big Sandy River, in Kentucky, in 1806, but he lived a long number of years in Switzer- land county, Indiana, and spent the latter part of his life in Edgar county, Illinois, where he died at the age of eighty-four. His father was a Scotchman, born in the north of Ireland. The Doctor's mother is still living, having attained the remarkable age of ninety-three. She was born in Swit- zerland county, Indiana, of Irish and Scotch ancestry, and her home is now in Bartles- ville.
His native county of Switzerland re- mained as the home of Dr. Stewart through- out his early life, studying medicine at the old Eclectic Medical College of Cincinnati, where he graduated, and began his practice in his home county at the age of twenty- two. He continued to live in Switzerland county until he was forty years old. In 1875 he moved to Kansas, locating in Mont- gomery county, near Elk City, and he con- tinued his practice there for a time, but finally retired from the profession. In 1885 or '86 he came to Bartlesville, which was then but a small hamlet, and resuming his practice was the first physician here. con- tinuing his medical work for some time. He is a Democrat and served two terms as mayor of Bartlesville soon after its organ- ization as a city. The Doctor is a member of the A. F. & A. M.
FRED MCDANIEL, a prominent real estate dealer and owner, and largely interested in the finances and industries of Bartlesville-
387
HISTORY OF THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA.
Fred McDaniel is not only one of the strong- est representatives of the former Chero- kee Nation, but one of the ablest young men in this part of the state. His good part in the development of his residence city, which has occurred virtually within the past ten years, has been signally ac- knowledged in his selection to the mayoral- ty for four successive terms.
Mr. McDaniel was born near Tahlequah, the capital of the former Cherokee Nation, on the 14th of April, 1872, and this was also the scene of his father's birth. His parents were Walter and Jane (Vann) McDaniel, the former being a stockman of part Chero- kee blood and the latter, of pure stock. The boy was left an orphan when he was about six years of age, and until he was fifteen resided with an aunt at Tahlequah. He ob- tained the bulk of his education at the Cherokee Orphan Asylum, near Pryor Creek, and during the succeeding dozen years followed various occupations at Mus- kogee, Wagoner, Claremore and Talala. In 1900 he became a resident of Bartlesville, where he has since been recognized as one of its main developing factors. During his four terms as mayor, which covered the period from 1902 to 1905, inclusive, he was an earnest and untiring advocate of mu- nicipal improvements, and much of the pav- ing and general modernization of the city is attributable to his exertions and influ- ence. The climax to his eminence as a Cherokee citizen was reached in his selec- tion as a member of the commission of three (his associates being E. L. Cookson and W. W. Hastings), which, at the con- gressional session of 1905-6, wound up the affairs of the Cherokee government, or na- tion, as one of the steps preparatory to statehood.
As a private citizen in business and industrial life, Mr. McDaniel has achieved remarkably high standing. Besides found- ing the Red Cross Pharmacy, he is a leading promoter of local oil and gas developments; is a director in the First National Bank, and a stockholder in the Bartlesville Foundry and Machine Works and in the Bartlesville-Dewey Interur- ban Company. He also opened the Mc- Daniel addition to the city, comprising eighty acres in southern Bartlesville, which has become a handsome residence section of the place, and has been otherwise largely interested in property dealings and improve-
ments. Mr. McDaniel is a leading Demo- crat, having served as chairman of the county campaign committee, and is widely known for his activity in the fraternal and secret work of the B. P. O. E., Knights of Pythias, Red Men, Odd Fellows and Masons -in the last named having reached the thirty-second degree. He has been twice married-first, to Miss Ella Musgrove, by whom he has had one child, Frederick William McDaniel; and, in November, 1908, to Miss Roseanna Harnage.
MORTIMER F. STILWELL, secretary, treasur- er and manager of the Indian Territory Illuminating Oil Company, is a young man who is unusually prominent in business affairs, politics and the social life of his city. He was among the pioneers in the development of the oil and gas fields of the Osage Nation, and the company with which he is now so prominently connected had the lease, comprising over a million acres, on all the oil and gas territory in the Osage Nation until March 16, 1906, when the lease was renewed for sixteen years by Congress for 680,000 acres, that being the number of acres allowed under the law. Mr. Stilwell's uncle, Mr. Florer, was one of the promoters of this project, the original lease being granted by the Interior department in 1896, following an extended agreement with the Osage national council. The Indian Ter- ritory Illuminating Company is the largest independent operating company in petro- leum and gas in the Kansas-Oklahoma fields, and besides its own operations it has sub-leased many thousands of acres to other operators.
Mr. Stilwell established his residence in Bartlesville in February, 1903. At that time there had been only about fourteen wells drilled in the Bartlesville district, its great development taking place since that time, making the city and surrounding country one of the richest oil and gas producing dis- tricts in the world. For a young man he has also received unusual honors in political life. He was the nominee of the Republi- can party for treasurer of the new state of Oklahoma in the general statehood election of 1907. He is also a prominent figure in Scottish Rite Masonry, having received all the degrees up to and including the thirty- second, a member of the Consistory at Guth- rie, and in October, 1907, he was made a
388
HISTORY OF THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA.
Knight Commander of the Code of Honor, which is a nomination for the thirty-third degree.
Mr. Stilwell was born at Lawrence, Kan- sas, in November, 1873, and when he was but two years old his father died. The mother is still living, now the wife of T. M. Finney, a trader and merchant of Gray- horse, Osage Nation. M. F. Stilwell was brought to the Osage Nation when he was but three years old and was reared by his uncle, the late John N. Florer, who was the first Indian trader among the Osage Indians after they moved from the Kansas reserva- tion to the present Osage Nation in Oklaho- ma. As a cattleman and Indian trader he became wealthy and prominent throughout the southwest, his headquarters for a long number of years being at Grayhorse, in the Osage Nation. He died in January, 1907. In his uncle's home, Mr. Stilwell received a good education through private tutors, going also to school at Arkansas City, Kan- sas, and to business college at Lawrence, that state. He was reared to business pur- suits, in the cattle industry and in mer- cantile enterprises connected with his un- cle's large interests.
He was married at Ponca, Oklahoma, to Miss May DeFord, a daughter of Captain C. DeFord, a prominent merchant and bank- er of Jones City, Oklahoma county. Cap- tain DeFord was the first sheriff of Oklaho- ma county.
DR. GEORGE F. WOODRING is the pioneer physician of Bartlesville. His identification with its interests dates from 1889, when he came to the then small hamlet, and has ever since been actively engaged in the practice of his profession here, the pioneer physi- cian of Bartlesville. In January, 1908, upon the organization of the Washington County Medical Society, he was honored by being elected the first president of that body, which is affiliated with the State Medical Association and the American Medical As- sociation. He is also the district surgeon for the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railroad.
Besides his busy professional work, Dr. Woodring has also been prominent in the commercial and industrial development of Bartlesville and vicinity and in local poli- tics. He built on Second street the Wood- ring Building, in which he has his office, and he is interested financially in other busi- ness enterprises, such as oil and gas com-
panies. He is a Democrat in politics, and was the mayor of Bartlesville in 1897.
The Doctor was born at Pulaski, Giles county, Tennessee, November 15, 1856, and was reared and educated there. He studied medicine in the Hospital Medical College, at Louisville, Kentucky, and graduated in that institution with the class of 1876. His first actual connection with the profession as a practitioner was at Bunker Hill, about twelve miles east of Pulaski, and in the eighties he went to Elk City, Kansas, where for four years during Cleveland's admin- istration he was a member of the pension examining board. From Kansas he came to Oklahoma and became one of its pioneer physicians.
He was married in Elk City, to Miss Vi- ola Morgan, from Illinois, and they have one son, Guy M. Woodring. Dr. Wood- ring is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason, belonging to the Consistory at Wichita, Kansas, and also a Shriner, be- longing to India Temple, of Oklahoma City.
EDWARD C. D'YARMETT. Among those who now stand as distinguished types of the world's workers and one who is worthy of honorable mention in the state which he is helping to build is Edward C. D'Yarmett, a mechanical and mining engineer of Bartles- ville. He was born in Cambridge, Ohio, in 1872, and his parents were both natives of Virginia, in which state they are now living. They are of French ancestry, and his moth- er is a member of the Victor family.
Mr. D'Yarmett received his early school- ing principally at Columbus, Ohio, and his technical training leading to his engineering profession was received in the Baltimore Polytechnic Institute, from which he was graduated with the class of 1893. After leaving college he obtained a more practical knowledge of mechanics in the South Balti- more Car Works machine shops, going from there to Hampton, Virginia, and thence to Richmond as mechanical and construction engineer for the Virginia Electric Railway & Development Company, having charge of a large portion of the design and erection of the dam, canal and electric power plant which furnishes 12,000 horse power for elec- tric distribution. He was also assistant to Reuben Sheriffs, C. E., on the preliminary survey for the development of the water power of the Great Falls of the Potomac river and for the Swift Creek reservoir for
-
G. 9. Woodring M. A.
389
HISTORY OF THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA.
water supply for the city of Richmond, and was mechanical engineer for the Westhamp- ton Park Electric Railway of Richmond. From Virginia he went to Weeks Island, southern Louisiana, as superintendent and engineer in charge of the design and con- struction of the Myles Salt Company's mine, admitted to be the best equipped and most economically operated salt mine in the world.
From Weeks Island, in 1903, Mr. D'Yar- mett came to Bartlesville, intending to go into the oil business, with which he has been more or less connected ever since, but devotes his time principally, however, to his professional work as an engineer. He was appointed city engineer of Bartlesville in April, 1902, and is consulting engineer for numerous mining and industrial enter- prises. He advocates the principles of the Democratic party. Mr. D'Yarmett was married in Louisiana, to Miss Anna Hanf, a native of that state.
WILLIAM HUMPHREY ASPINWALL, one of the oil producers and civil engineers and also a former member of the city council of Bartlesville, was born in Titusville, Penn- sylvania, in 1872. His parents, Algernon Aikin and Martha (Humphrey) Aspinwall, are residents of Washington, D. C., where the father holds an official position in con- nection with the pension department. Both he and his wife are of distinguished ances- try. Algernon A. Aspinwall is descended, in the maternal line, from the Howland family of the Mayflower, and both he and his son are members of the General So- ciety of Mayflower Descendants. He is also the historian of the District of Co- lumbia branch of the General Society, and is considered one of the leading au- thorities on early New England history and genealogy. The original Aspinwall came to America in 1635, from Lancashire, England, and settled in Brookline, Massa- chusetts, where his descendants are still living. The well known Aspinwall resi- dence, built at Brookline in 1660 was stand- ing until about the year 1896, forming one of the historic landmarks of that city.
In 1885 Mr. and Mrs. Aspinwall moved with their family from Pennsylvania to Washington, where their son, William, re- ceived a liberal education, taking various courses in Columbian University and being graduated therefrom in 1894. In 1896 he
went to the oil fields of West Virginia, and since that time has been more or less con- nected with the oil industry both as an op- erator and civil engineer. He was in West Virginia eight years, and in 1904 located in Bartlesville. Most of his oil operations have been in the Al-lu-we shallow field, Cherokee Nation. Since coming to this city lie has taken part actively as a public-spir- ited citizen, through the Commercial Club and in other ways, in the growth and develop- ment of the city and surrounding country. He is an ex-member of the city council, and was appointed under the constitutional con- vention as provisional county clerk of Wash- ington county, pending the election of regu- lar officers, on September 17, 1907. In Oc- tober, 1908, he was appointed city engineer of Bartlesville.
Mr. Aspinwall married Mabel Louise Bos- worth, of New York City, who is also of distinguished New England ancestry. They have one son, George Bosworth Aspinwall.
JOHN A. FINDLEY. Over twenty years ago there came to this community a young man fresh from college, young and alert to begin the battle of life in the new south- west. He arrived in Bartlesville in August of 1897, but Bartlesville of that time con- sisted of only a few scattering frame build- ings at the old location on the Caney river. Shortly after his arrival here Mr. Findley purchased the Eureka drug store, of which he has been the owner and proprietor ever since, and when modern Bartlesville began to grow he moved the store from the old town to Second street, later to another lo- cation on that street and then to the south- east corner of Johnstone avenue and Third street, in the Masonic block, the heart of the business center of the city, where he re- mained until February, 1909, when he moved to his present location, 311 John- stone street, in his new, two-story brick building, 50x90, that was just completed. Mr. Findley is a graduate of a Kansas City college of pharmacy, and his store, besides enjoying a large general trade, is particularly a favorite with physicians who are scrupulous about the compounding of their prescriptions.
Bartlesville's pioneer druggist is a native Pennsylvanian, but when he was five years old his parents came west and located in Osage county, Kansas, where was reared and educated. He learned the drug busi- ness there, and before coming to Oklahoma
390
HISTORY OF THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA.
worked in drug stores in Kansas City. He belongs to the Masonic and Elks fraterni- ties and Modern Woodmen of America. He is a member of the Commercial Club, the leading business men's organization of the city, which has been instrumental, in no small way, in its upbuilding and improve- ment. Politically he is a Republican. His wife before her marriage was Miss Laura James, of Kansas.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.