USA > Oklahoma > A history of the state of Oklahoma, Volume II > Part 74
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COLONEL WILLIAM HIGGINS, ex-deputy clerk of the U. S. district court, ex-secre- tary of the state of Kansas, commander of the Bartlesville G. A. R. Post, and one who has been conspicuously identified with many interests which have subserved the pros- perity of the country, was born at Norris- town, Montgomery county, Pennsylvania, in April, 1842. His parents, Patrick and Jane (Flannigan) Higgins, were both born in Ireland and were married in Philadelphia. In 1848 the family moved to St. Louis, Missouri, and from there, in 1854, to Kan- sas, first settling in Leavenworth county, then a part of the Kickapoo Indian reserva- tion. Subsequently they removed to what was then known as Lykins county, but which later became Miami county, locating at Paola, the county seat. During this time their son, William, was pursuing his edu- cation, and he was subsequently sent to school at Lexington, Missouri.
In 1857 he joined other boys in a some- what adventurous essay into frontier life, becoming a "bullwhacker" for freighting teams across the plains, which took him over the old trail through western Kansas and Wyoming-Laramie, Fort Bridger, etc. -as far as Salt Lake. He continued in this western life until 1860, when he returned to Paola, and there, on the 17th of June, 1861, he enlisted in the First Battalion of Kan- sas Troops, composed of five companies and intended to be a part of the Eighth Kansas Regiment. This regiment was filled, how- ever, before the First Batallion could be recruited into it at Fort Leavenworth, and Mr. Higgins and his comrades who enlisted at Paola joined the "Nugent's Indians," a Missouri company organized independently but in regular government service, and were engaged principally in scouting along the Kansas-Missouri border. Mr. Higgins was mustered out of this organization in Janu- ary, 1862. and then joined the Ninth Kan- sas, in which he was assigned to special
duty, remaining with the Ninth until he joined the Fifth Kansas Regiment, in 1863. In this regiment his services were mostly in western Missouri, eastern Kansas, Arkan- sas, and Indian Territory.
Colonel Higgins, as he is familiarly known throughout Kansas and the southwest, re- turned to Paola after he was mustered out in June, 1865, and established the Miami County Free Press, conducting the same for two years, and he then established the Le- roy Pioneer, in Coffey county. From there he later went to Baxter Springs and was connected with the Sentinel of that place for two years, after which he took charge of the mechanical department of the Working- men's Journal, at Columbus, Kansas, the organ of the "Leaguers," during the fierce contention over the Joy Purchase lands in Southeastern Kansas in the early seventies. He made this a Republican paper, and con- tinued in charge as its owner and publisher until * 1876, when he was appointed claim agent for the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railway, with jurisdiction from Parsons, Kansas, to Denison, Texas, and from Par- sons to Junction City, remaining in that position for four years. In 1881 Colonel Higgins became connected with the legal department of the Santa Fe System, remain- ing in that capacity until in August, 1888, when he received the Republican nomina- tion for secretary of the state of Kansas, to which high official position he was re-elect- ed in 1890 for another term, serving four years altogether during Governor Hum- phrey's administration.
Colonel Higgins attained marked distinc- tion as a secretary of state, and some time after retiring from the office he returned to Cherokee county and engaged in mining. In 1899 he went into the Indian Territory and was engaged for some time in the work of appraising values on Indian leases. He has been a resident of Bartlesville since 1903, and was deputy district clerk of the United States court here from July, 1906, until the inauguration of statehood, on the 16th of November, 1907. Following his services in this office he engaged in the real estate business. He was appointed post- master of Bartlesville, January 22, 1909, and this appointment was confirmed, February 9, Colonel Higgins taking charge, March 1, 1909. He has always been known as a strong and influential Republican, and has
JillianHiggins
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held conspicuous places in the councils of his party. He is the commander of the Grand Army post at Bartlesville.
Mr. Higgins married Miss Laura V. Knisley, a native of Wheeling, Virginia, and they have two children. The daughter, Helen W., married Frank T. Metzler, of Col- orado Springs, Colorado; and the son, The- odore Crosbee, is a resident of Bartlesville.
SAMUEL O. BOPST is a pioneer merchant of Bartlesville. He came to the city in 1884, and has lived here ever since, one of its most prominent business men and citizens. At the time of his arrival here Bartlesville was a mere straggling collection of a few small buildings on the Caney river, and dur- ing the first twelve years of his residence here he was employed in the store of John- stone & Keeler. He then engaged in busi- ness, in partnership with George B. Keeler, with the firm name of Keeler & Bopst, while later N. C. Keeler bought out George B. Keeler's interest and the firm name then became Bopst & Keeler, while still later Mr. Bopst became sole proprietor of the business, which has increased with magni- tude and importance commensurate with the remarkable growth of Bartlesville. This is one of the largest and most successful furniture and house furnishing stores in northern Oklahoma, and a model establish- ment of its kind.
During all these years Mr. Bopst has been connected with other interests, which have placed Oklahoma in the fore front of the wealth producing districts of the Union. He is the treasurer of the Caney Valley Oil and Gas Company, one of the largest and most successful oil producers in the Bartlesville district. Of the forty-eight wells this company has drilled there were only two dry holes.
Mr. Bopst was born in Atchison county, Missouri, in 1855, and was reared on a farm and learned the mercantile business in his father's store at their home town, Nishna, in Atchison county. He married after com- ing to Bartlesville Miss Racia Hampton, a native of Illinois, and their four children are Ella, Roy, William and Jennie. Mr. Bopst is a representative not only of the pioneer life of Bartlesville but of its modern sub- stantial commercial and industrial interests as well. He belongs to the Masonic Scot- tish Rite, thirty-second degree, the Odd Fel- lows, Knights of Pythias and Elks frater- nities.
FRANK M. OVERLEES. Among the names of the men who have been indissolubly iden- tified with the annals of Bartlesville from the earliest epoch in its history to the pres- ent time is prominently recorded that of Frank M. Overlees, a former merchant and mayor, a capitalist in large enter- prises of oil, gas and real estate and pres- ident of the St. Louis, Bartlesville & Pacific Railroad Company. He came to Bartlesville in 1887, that is where Bar- tlesville now stands, there being noth- ing here at the time save a postoffice and the store of Johnstone & Keeler, whose sketches are found on another page of this work. He was employed in various capac- ities, principally in connection with the cat- tle business, for some years, finally, in 1893, going into business for himself as a stock- man and merchant. In the fall of 1899,, where now stands Mr. Overlees' office was a stubblefield, and in October of that year he built the three-story brick and stone building at the corner of Second street and Johnstone avenue, and this and the stone building that was put up by Mr. Keeler on the opposite corner were the first two-story or substantial structures of any kind to be erected in Bartlesville. What is now Third street was then the old Osage Agency road, and there were scarcely any hints of Bartles- ville's present appearance as a city, with its numerous splendid business blocks, paved streets and modern city improvements.
With William Johnstone, Mr. Overlees forms the original promoter and pioneer of the Bartlesville oil district, which later proved to be one of the richest in the world. It was in the spring of 1898 that Mr. John- stone and Mr. Overlees secured for John and Michael Cudahy an oil lease from the Inter- ior department on section 12, township 26, range 12, on which the city of Bartlesville was built. The Cudahy Brothers drilled wells on this lease, the first in the Indian Territory to produce oil. The restrictions of the Interior department, however, post- poned development of this field until 1903. since which time Bartlesville has enjoyed its remarkable growth. With the growth and development Mr. Overlees has been one of the most active and continuously effec- tive spirits. In connection with the Com- mercial Club he has been one of the most potent influences in the building up of the city and the development of its splendid re- sources. He is extensively interested in oil
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and gas properties, in city real estate and other enterprises. He was the principal pro- moter and is the president of the St. Louis, Bartlesville & Pacific Railroad, projected to build from Joplin to the vicinity of Carmen, Oklahoma, with headquarters, shops, etc., in Bartlesville.
Mr. Overlees is also one of the prominent Republicans of the new state, and is an in- fluential leader in local politics. A unique and interesting item of history in connection with his political career is the fact that in April, 1899, he was elected the mayor of the town whose voting strength then reached a total of thirty-six votes and thirty-three of the number were polled for him, leaving on- ly three for his opponent.
Although born in Goshen, Indiana, Octo- ber 25, 1867, Mr. Overlees left there when a child with his parents and they located near Morrisonville in Christian county, Ill- inois, from whence they removed to Neosho county, Kansas, settling on a farm near Par- sons. That was the home of the son Frank until he came to Bartlesville in 1887. He was married after coming to the territory to Miss Carrie Armstrong, a granddaughter of the Rev. Charles Journeycake, the noted chief of the Delaware Indians. Rev. Jour- neycake was a Baptist minister, of half Dela- ware Indian and half French blood, a gentle- man of the most scholarly attainments, of splendid mental faculties, of great wisdom, and was looked upon with devotion and rev- erence by all of his people and by everyone who came in contact with him. Mr. and Mrs. Overlees have three children, Earl Ray, William Edward and Milo H. Mr. Overlees is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Ma- son, belonging to the McAlester Consistory.
NELSON F. CARR has the honor of being the honor of being the oldest pioneer on Caney river in the Indian Territory, and he has lived within three miles of the present town of Bartlesville for over forty years, the own- er of a valuable farm on which oil wells have produced enormously. At the time he came to this country the Osage Indians were still living on their Kansas reservation in Montgomery, Chautauqua and Neosho counties, they having come to the present Osage Nation in 1869 and 1871. The Dela- wares came from Wyandotte county, Kan- sas, in the spring of 1868, and Mr. Carr's coming here in 186? was in anticipation of these removals, he being an Indian trader,
and having carried on business with the Osages at Oswego. His place on the Caney became and remained for several years the trading headquarters of large numbers of these Indians. He was also engaged in farming and stock-raising and in 1870 he es- tablished the first corn mill on the Caney, operated by water power and located immed- iately across the river from the present site of Bartlesville, but he later sold the mill to Jacob H. Bartles, who converted it into a flour mill which still stands on the original location.
Although when he came west Mr. Carr was poor financially, with his family he now owns 750 acres of rich farming land under fence, comprising his original location when he came in 1867. In the history of the oil development of the Bartlesville field the Carr farm has the distinction of being the largest, steadiest and richest producer. He leased the oil rights on this farm to the Caney Valley Oil & Gas Company, which has drilled thereon thirty-seven oil wells, not one of which turned out to be dry, but each one a good producer. These wells have been a source of large revenue to Mr. Carr.
Although so long and prominently iden- tified with the interests of the southwest he is a native of the far east, Saratoga county, New York, born on the 2d of September, 1884, He left his native state in 1859 and came to Kansas, locating at Fort Scott, Bourbon county, on the border, and was one of the pioneers there. Shortly after locating there he enlisted in Company B, Sixth Kan- sas Infantry, and served throughout the Civil war in western Missouri, eastern Kan- sas and Arkansas. From Fort Scott he went to Labette county, then Neosho county and later divided, and became the first postmaster of the town of Oswego. This was soon after the close of the war, and in 1867, as above stated, he came to the Chero- kee Nation, Indian Territory, and located on the Caney river, three miles north of the present city of Bartlesville. On the 11th of November, 1907, after having lived on the Caney farm for a period lacking only five weeks of forty years he moved with his family to their new residence in Bartles- ville.
His wife before marriage was Miss Sarah A. Rogers, a member of the same Cherokee family to which the late chief, William Rogers, belonged. They have six children : Mrs. Jennie Johnson, William A. Carr, Mrs.
Nelson F. Carr
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Lula Keeler, Frank M. Carr, Mrs. Josie May Bower and Beulah M. Carr. Mr. Carr is a Mason and belongs to the Grand Army of the Republic. Being one of the oldest pio- neers on the Caney river, he is considered an authority on the early history of this part of the Old Indian Territory. His mem- ory is particularly fresh and exact on all these matters, and besides, he has a fund of most interesting reminiscences of frontier life. In politics he is independent, voting for the man rather than the party.
WILLIAM JOHNSTONE. Bartlesville, substan- tially built and prosperous in appearance and reality, snugly situated in the valley of the Little Verdigris, and with the signs of its chief industry all around in the army of skeleton derricks for oil and gas, in its days of wealth and abundance pays much honor to its earliest pioneer. William Johnstone is, in fact, a central figure in the develop- ment of Bartlesville, and not only possesses the somewhat incidental honor of being first, but has been foremost in public spirit and effort for years in building up the town.
Born in Montreal, Quebec province, Can- ada, in 1859, one of the comparatively small number of Canadians that have come into Oklahoma, Mr. Johnstone's continuous res- idence in Indian Territory and Oklahoma dates from the time he was seventeen years old. His father was Samuel Johnstone, a native of Dumfries, Scotland, who after a brief residence in Quebec province came into the states in the early sixties and set- tled with his family at Glenwood, Pope county, Minnesota. That was an isolated section of country for some years, and as a result William Johnstone had meagre edu- cational advantages while he was growing to manhood. His father being a merchant at Glenwood, he had ample training in this business. In 1876 the family moved to In- dian Territory, and were among the early white residents to settle permanently in the Indian country. Their home was at Coody's Bluff, in the Cherokee Nation, where the father had a store, but later he returned north to spend his remaining days.
In 1882 Mr. Johnstone established a gen- eral store and trading place near the Little Verdigris river and on the old post road be- tween Pawhuska and Coffeyville. For many years he was the only merchant of import- ance within a radius of many miles, and he supplied the wants of many residents
of both the Cherokee and the Osage coun- try. For a long time Bartlesville had little to distinguish it, but with the discovery of oil and gas, about the close of the last century, a new era of prosperity and growth was inaugurated. He retired from the ac- tive work of merchandising, and was exten- sively engaged in banking and various mon- eyed enterprises. He was president of the Bartlesville National Bank, but in May, 1908, he sold his interest and retired from active business on account of his health. Besides being so intimately identified with the town's industrial and material growth, Mr. Johnstone has from the first lent his support to education and schools. He has been president of the Bartlesville school board since it was established, and to his energy and liberality are largely due the city's present fine school system and mod- ern school buildings. Mr. Johnstone is a member of the Commercial Club, and is a Scottish Rite and thirty-second degree, Con- sistory, Mason. His first wife was Lillie (Armstrong) Johnstone. Her surviving children are: Mrs. Rilla MI. Pemberton, Nellie and Leo. His present wife was be- fore her marriage Miss Stella Bixler, a na- tive of Illinois. In politics he is a Repub- lican.
HON. JOSEPH J. CURL, who is vice- president of the First National Bank, cap- italist and prominent citizen, and member of the Constitutional convention, residing at Bartlesville, Oklahoma, is a native of Bristol, England, born in 1868. When a child, he accompanied his parents to Ameri- ca, they at first locating in Cleveland, Ohio, but soon thereafter in St. Louis, where Jo- seph J. was reared and educated, his special training being for commercial life. He was engaged in business at St. Louis until 1902. when he came to Bartlesville, where he has since resided. At first he embarked in the oil business, being one of the prominent dealers and a pioneer in such traffic during the boom days of this industry, following the first drilling. Subsequently, in the fall of 1902, he became vice president and man- aging officer of the First National Bank in connection with his large oil and other in- terests. He retired from the oil business to devote his time and energies to bank- ing. He is still the vice-president and managing officer of the First National Bank of Bartlesville, the oldest banking house in the place and one of much financial
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strength, as was shown during the great money-market stringency in the autumn of 1907.
Mr. Curl is also president of the Bartles- ville Interurban Railway Company. He is one of the most active and useful members of the Commercial Club of his city and po- tent in the expansion of the city's business interests, as well as the surrounding coun- try. He is the president of the company which publishes the Eraminer, the leading daily newspaper of the city, which is an able exponent of the observance of good government and wholesome laws. Progres- sive, Mr. Curl naturally finds a place in that most excellent and ancient order-the Ma- sonic fraternity-in which he has been ad- vanced to the Thirty-second degree. He belongs to the Shriners and is connected with that popular order, the Elks.
While out of the city in which he resides, and without his knowledge he received the Democratic nomination, in 1906, for mem- ber of the Constitutional convention and was elected over his Republican opponents, although there was a normal Republican majority of three hundred within the dis- trict. His rare ability and training as a business man were all recognized by his opponents and a number of the most impor- tant committees had him as a member, he taking an active part in the making of the now quite famous constitution. He served as chairman on banks and banking, and was a member of the committee on railroads and public service ; corporations-public and private; legislative appointments; geologi- cal surveys, etc. He was one of the most constant and hard workers in that conven- tion, by which the new state is to be ever guided.
Mr. Curl was united in marriage to Miss Viola Cass, of Avon, Illinois. Four children have come to bless this happy home circle : Lewis, Willis, Alice and Gertrude Curl.
DR. FRED ROSCOE SUTTON, one of the lead- ing physicians and surgeons of Bartlesville, was born at Emporia, Kansas, in 1874, and is a graduate of Baker University, Baldwin, that state, with the class of 1894. His med- ical training was received in the University Medical College, from which he was gradu- ated in March, 1898, and he began his prac- tice at Cleveland, Oklahoma. But being ambitious to further perfect himself in his profession, he went to New York and for an
extended period took post-graduate work, particularly in surgery, in the New York Post Graduate Medical College. At the close of that period he received the appoint- ment of assistant chief surgeon for the Cali- fornia and Western Divisions of the Atch- ison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad at Los Angeles, California, with which company he remained at that city for five years, having direct charge of its hospital and office work there-a position that entailed such ardnons and continuous duties as to greatly impair his health and induce him to return to Ok- lahoma and re-engage in private practice. He accordingly came to Bartlesville, and has built up a large and lucrative practice here, particularly in surgical work, his ex- tensive post-graduate and hospital-railroad experience having fitted him particularly for this specialty. Besides his professional work he is thoroughly identified with the varied business and social activities of Bartlesville.
Dr. Fred Sutton is also the son of a phy- sician, Dr. George W. Sutton, who was born in Kentucky, in the county directly oppo- site Cincinnati, in 1840, and was educated mainly in that city. He received his pro- fessional training in the Cincinnati Medical College, of which he is a graduate of the class of 1865, but previous to this he had spent about four years in the Civil war, en- listing at Cincinnati, in an Ohio regiment, and rising to the rank of captain. In 1871, a few years after the close of the war, he moved to Emporia, Kansas, and besides building up a large and successful practice there became prominent in the public and political affairs of that state, always an ar- dent and earnest Republican. His wife, the mother of Dr. Fred R., was before marriage Miss Kate King, a native of Indiana. It was Dr. Fred R. Sutton, more than anyone else, who was instrumental in the rapid rise to prominence of Senator Preston B. Plumb, who at the time the Doctor first knew him was a poor, struggling young farmer on an almost worthless piece of land near Empo- ria. He helped him financially in obtaining a legal education, and later, through his in- fluence in local politics, made him county attorney. From this position Mr. Plumb made gradual progress to the United States senatorship.
In 1887 Dr. Sutton, almost worn out from the hard work of a large city and country practice, received from Senator Plumb the suggestion that he take the position of gov-
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ernment surgeon at the Osage Indian agen- cy at Pawhuska, Indian Territory, which he accepted, and he has lived in this section of Oklahoma ever since, his home being now at Cleveland, in Pawnee county. While in later years he has acquired large business and financial interests that take most of his time, he still engages in a restricted practice from mere love of work. Dr. Sutton was the founder and is still the president of the First National Bank of Bartlesville, one of the strongest financial institutions of the oil and gas region. He married Miss Edith Frampton, a native of Pennsylvania. The Doctor belongs to the A. F. & A. M. at Bartlesville, and the Consistory at Guthrie, and also to the Elks, having organized Bar- tlesville Lodge, No. 1060, B. P. O. E. of Bar- tlesville. He is a member of the Washing- ton County Medical Society, the American Medical Association, and is councilor for the State Medical Association.
JUDGE THOMAS LEWIS ROGERS, who died at his home in Pawhuska, January 1, 1909, at the age of seventy-one years, four months and twenty-one days, was prominent both as the descendant of an eminent Cherokee- Osage family and, in his own person, as a successful farmer and live stock raiser, seven miles southeast of the place. His relations to the Osage Nation were noteworthy and most commendable to both his head and his heart. In the preliminary negotiations lead- ing up to the acquirement of a permanent reservation for the Osages, Judge Rogers prominently participated as a member of the Osage council selected to treat with the gov- ernment and with the Cherokee Nation for the lands comprising the Osage Nation, as organized in 1872. He served as a member of the Osage council for several terms, and for many years was supreme judge of the nation itself. In Masonry he had attained the thirty-second degree, being a member of the Pawnee Chapter and Commandery, Guthrie Consistory and the Oklahoma City Shrine. After holding ritualistic services at midnight, on the following day Wah- sha-she Lodge of Pawhuska, of which the deceased was a member, took charge of the body, and, with members of the B. P. O. E., conveyed it to the Methodist church. As noted by one close to him, "He was a firm believer in fraternal orders and longed to see those who were near and dear to him under the benign protection of one of the
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