A standard history of Oklahoma; an authentic narrative of its development from the date of the first European exploration down to the present time, including accounts of the Indian tribes, both civilized and wild, of the cattle range, of the land openings and the achievements of the most recent period, Vol. III, Part 105

Author: Thoburn, Joseph B. (Joseph Bradfield), 1866-1941
Publication date: 1916
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 660

USA > Oklahoma > A standard history of Oklahoma; an authentic narrative of its development from the date of the first European exploration down to the present time, including accounts of the Indian tribes, both civilized and wild, of the cattle range, of the land openings and the achievements of the most recent period, Vol. III > Part 105

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).

Mrs. Jennie E. Dimery received her early education in the public schools, following which she attended Doane College, at Crete, Nebraska, and finally graduated from the Lincoln (Nebraska) Business College. For five years thereafter she was engaged in teaching school, was assistant postmaster for two years and postmaster for four years at Beaver Crossing, and then entered business life as assistant cashier of a bank at that place. After six years she became cashier, which office she held two years, and was then employed in the courthouse until coming to Addington in 1901. Since that time she has been cashier of the First National Bank here. Mrs. Evans is a lady of many accomplishments, as well as of unusual business ability, and is widely and popularly

al in who hools ruan rsity

rac- that pa- orth mer- has ryer

of tical an ion fed the with ted the age gh- and

of ted ent her hat ent gh the ent nd eh, Ss. ry isa ter ng om In rd ng ed

1302

HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA

known in social, educational and religious circles of Addington.

PETER WINFERD SWARTZ. While Oklahoma is filled with enterprising men who are developing the material re- sources of this great state, there is also auother class, equally eutitled to distinction, who as educators are molding the plastic characters of the younger genera- tion, the men and women who will soon step into the places of responsibility and guidance in local and state affairs.

An Oklahoma educator of unusual experience is Peter Winferd Swartz, now superiuteudent of schools at Lind- say. Professor Swartz has been teaching siuce he was nineteen years old, having begun his work in that line in Garfield County, where he spent some of the years of his early youth, his father having been a pioneer settler in that section of the old Cherokee Strip.

In ancestry he represents some of that sterling stock that came out of the Kingdom of Wurtemberg, Ger- many, and settled in Pennsylvania, the Swartz family having located in that province in 1752. Mr. Swartz himself was born in Bushton, Rice County, Kansas, July 15, 1880, the son of an early settler in the Sunflower State. C. W. Swartz, his father, was born near Find- lay, Ohio, in 1860. When he was fourteen years of age his parents moved out to Illinois, and in 1876 to Kan- sas. In 1879, C. W. Swartz was married in Kausas to Miss Maggie Rishel, who was born in Pennsylvania in 1862. With the exception of one year spent in Colorado, C. W. Swartz resided at Bushton, Kansas, until 1894. In that year he came into the Cherokee Strip, which had been opened to settlement only the preceding year, and settled near where Meno, in Major County, is now located, it being at that time in Woods County. In 1905 he removed with his family from Major County to Amity, Oregon, lived there until March, 1914, aud is now a resident at Ensign in Alberta, Canada, where he looks after his interests as a farmer and stock man. Going into the old Cherokee Strip iu what is now Major County he bought a claim of 160 acres of land for the low price of $275. Since going into the far western province of Alberta in Canada he has secured a tract of railroad land, which he is now developing, and he is a man in prosperous circumstances. In politics, while an American citizen, he was a republican, is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and of the Modern Woodmen of America. His children were four in number, Peter W. being the oldest; Lucy is the wife of G. Spencer Lockett, who is a carpenter and builder at Amity, Oregon; Beatrix married Arthur Pra- ter, a farmer at Ensign in the Province of Alberta; and Floyd, who still lives with his parents.

Peter Winferd Swartz as a boy attended country schools at Bushton, Kansas, making the best of his ad- vantages during the winter terms, while the summer was spent in growing work on his father's farm. He lived with his father and helped run the homestead partly in Kansas and partly in Oklahoma, until he was twenty-five years of age. In the meantime, at the age of nineteen, he had secured a certificate and was granted the privilege of teaching his first school in the Lahoma district of Garfield County, Oklahoma. He remained there one year and spent three years in the Meno dis- trict school, and again for a year was at Lahoma. He was for one year connected with the schools at Fairview, in Major County, then for three years was principal of the high school at Purcell, and in the fall of 1910 he came to Lindsay and has directed the local school system as superintendent for full five years.

As an educator, Mr. Swartz is never content with

present attainments, and from year to year is growing in capabilities aud broadening the horizon of oppor tuuity. By attendance at such times as he was fre from his other work, he graduated from the Centra State Normal School at Edmond in 1905, receiving : life teacher's certificate. During the summer of 1900 he was an instructor in the Normal, and was employed in the same capacity during the summers of 1913, 1914 and 1915. In 1910 he won his degree A. B. from the Oklahoma State University at Norman, and in 19131 was awarded the degree A. M. by the same university his thesis being on political science. The summers of 1907 and 1908 he spent at the Chicago University spe cializing iu Latin, aud he spent each summer during 1912, 1913, 1914 and 1915 at Columbia University, New York City, where for his work he was granted the degree A. M. in education, and also received a superintendent's certificate from the Teachers College of Columbia Uni. versity.

Politically he is a republican, a member of the Metho. dist Episcopal Church South, and teaches the Young Men's Class in his Sunday school. Fraternally he is a past noble grand at Lindsay Lodge No. 196, Indepen. dent Order of Odd Fellows, is junior warden in Lindsay Lodge No. 248, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons. and a member of the Modern Woodmen of America. He is a member of the County Teachers' Association and has been identified with the Oklahoma Teachers' Asso- ciation for the past fifteen years. On August 17, 1913, at Bedford, Pennsylvania, he married Miss Edith Arnold of Bedford.

SCHUYLER C. FRENCH. This energetic insurance man of Tulsa up to six years ago had acquired some import- ant business interests in Michigan, of which state he is a native. Mr. French has been doing for himself since early youth, and has shown capacity in whatever relation he has stood with business affairs.

Schuyler C. French was born in Tekonsha, Calhoun County, Michigan, September 23, 1868. His parents were James M. and Catharine C. (Osborn) French. His father was born at Whitney's Point, Broome County, New York, in 1837, and died in 1913, while the mother was born in Tekonsha, Calhoun County, Michigan, in 1838 and died in 1906. Mr. French was the fifth of their six children, four of whom are still living. The French family located in Calhoun County, Michigan, among the pioneer settlers of that beautiful and prosperous dis- trict when James M. was nine years of age. Two years later he lost his father and as the oldest son had to assume the chief responsibilities of the household. At the age of twenty he married, went out to California, was engaged in the hotel business and in farming for about five years, then returned to Calhoun County and was identified with the hardware and produce business at Burlington, Michigan, and also with farming. Subse. quently he retired and lived at Marshall, Michigan, the last few years of his life. He began his political career as a democrat, and was a strong supporter of Stephen A. Douglas until after 1860, when he became a republican.

Schuyler C. French grew up in Calhoun County, Michi- gan, attended the public schools of Burlington, and his first practical experience was in the newspaper office of the Union City Local, now known as the Union City Register. After two years as a newspaper man he began assisting his father in the hardware business at Burling- ton, and three years later entered the wholesale hardware house of Buhl Sons & Company at Detroit, Michigan. He was also in the retail hardware business at Marshall, Michigan, from 1894 to 1898. In 1898 he went on the road representing the Morley Bros., wholesale hardware

Protivarty

ben

eir

och

the

lis-

ars

toll

for

wringt ppor- free ntra ng 1905 loved 191€ i the

1911 sity

spe urin

pen- Åsay

sons H an

Uni

913

mar ort

ine

ess

respe

the

belon

came

Lina

num

Unio

the

Bran

ante-

whig

on, a

erate

the

The e

Fred

and

P. b

child

I Page

whi

gia,

plete

that

spen

came

ber

wher

for

son

Dati

son

Mr. 1

Decer

perous

E, Ca

for t

Amer

Insur

stock

busin

reside

Mr.

He a

and

Aug daug

sidera

in th

The

state

Okla

Carte

and i

the se

well Okla

Knig

A. F. Y. M.

years

ing C

rear

dealer and of

1303

HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA

dealers at Saginaw, Michigan, and was with that firm and others in the hardware trade up to 1906. In that year Mr. French organized the New Process Steel Cast- ing Company, and was with that concern about three years.

Having sold out his business interests in Michigan Mr. French came to Oklahoma and located in Tulsa December 1, 1909. He has since been building up a pros- perous insurance and loan business associated with M. E. Carr. The firm of Carr & French are general agents for the London & Lancashire Indemnity Company of America and district agents for the Standard Accident Insurance Company of Detroit. Mr. French is also a stockholder in the Merchants and Planters Bank. His business offices are at 11 East Fourth Street, and his residence at 1430 South Cheyenne Street.

Mr. French is affiliated with Lodge No. 83 of the Knights of Pythias and with Delta Lodge No. 425, A. F. & A. M. He was very active in the building of the Y. M. C. A. Building and in raising the necessary money. He and his wife are members of the Presbyterian Church and in politics he takes an independent stand. On August 16, 1910, he married Miss Martha Lockwood, daughter of Marcus L. Lockwood, of a family of con- siderable prominence in Oklahoma, mentioned elsewhere in this work. Mrs. French was born in Pennsylvania. The first child born to their union died in infancy, and the second is Thomas Lockwood, born August 16, 1914.

FREDERICK PAGE BRANSON, of Muskogee, who is as well known as a leader in democratic state politics in Oklahoma as he is as one of the ablest members of the state bar, has been engaged in the practice of law in Oklahoma since 1903. He was born on a plantation near Cartersville, Bartow County, Georgia, March 1, 1879, and is a son of Levi and Rhoda ( Page) Branson, natives of North Carolina and members of old and highly respected families of the Old North State.

The Bransons and Pages both originated in England, the former being of the Quaker faith, while the latter belonged to the Baptist denomination. The Bransons came from Baltimore, Maryland, locating in North Caro- lina during colonial days, and those of the name are now numerous, being scattered over several states of the Union, some having drifted to Indiana, but in the main the majority are found in the states of the South. Levi Branson, the father of Frederick P. Branson, was in ante-bellum days a slave trader. He was originally a whig in his political views, and when the Civil war came on, although he opposed secession, he became a Confed- erate soldier and after the close of that conflict joined the democratic party. His military service completed, he engaged in planting and lived at Cassville, where Frederick P. Branson was born. He was twice married, and by his two wives had eighteen children, Frederick P. being a son of the second marriage, and the sixteenth child in order of birth.

In the old field schools of his native state, Frederick Page Branson received his early education, following which he attended Piedmont Institute at Rockmort, Geor- gia, and Emory College, Oxford, Georgia, where he com- pleted his literary training. He graduated from law at Mercer College, Macon, Georgia, June 11, 1903, and that same day was admitted to the bar of Georgia. After spending a vacation at his parental home, Mr. Branson came to Oklahoma, arriving at Oklahoma City, Septem- ber 16, 1903, and a few days later went to McAlester, where he was engaged in the practice of his profession for one year. While a resident of that place, Mr. Bran- son was married, August 3, 1904, to Miss Eula Jeans, a native of Tennessee. On September 15, 1904, Mr. Bran- son became a resident of Muskogee, and for the first

year after his arrival was a law clerk on the Dawes Com- mission, but resigned his position thereon to engage in the general practice of his profession.

In the spring of 1907 Mr. Branson, who had been inter- ested in democratic politics from the time that he attained his majority, received the democratic nomination for representative from Muskogee County in the First Legislature of Oklahoma under statehood. He was suc- cessful in his campaign and served one term with credit and distinction, but declined to become a candidate for re-election. In the summer of 1908 Mr. Branson was chosen a member of the democratic state committee, rep- resenting Muskogee County, and served as a member of this body until 1912, when he resigned. From 1910 until 1912 he had acted in the capacity of chairman of the committee, directing the campaigns of his party during those years with much success.

In 1912 Mr. Branson became a delegate to the National Democratic Convention, held at Baltimore, which nomi- nated Woodrow Wilson for the presidency, and prior to this time had held for three years the position of chair- man of the state election board, which, however, he resigned in 1912. On April 7, 1914, he was appointed to fill out the unexpired term of Judge R. C. Allen, who resigned as judge of the Third Judicial District, and when he accepted this appointment had a tentative agree- ment with the prospective candidates for this office that at the fall elections of 1914 he would not become a can- didate himself. This promise was lived up to, and instead he became the democratic candidate for county attorney of Muskogee County, to which office he was elected in November, 1914, and the duties of which he is discharg- ing in an entirely capable and diligent manner. In 1912 Judge Branson was a candidate in the democratic pri- mary election for congressman-at-large from Oklahoma, and carried fifty-one of the seventy-six counties of the state, but counties of largest population gave his oppo- nent a majority of 3,000 votes, which was enough to defeat him in spite of the excellent race which he made against large odds.

As an attorney Mr. Branson is known to be learned in the complexities of the various departments of his call- ing, and among his fellow-practitioners he has a high reputation. He is a member of the various organizations of his profession, and is popular with his fellow members in the various fraternal bodies to which he belongs and which include the Masons, in which he holds a master's degree, the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, the Knights of Pythias and the Woodmeu of the World. He belongs to the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. Mr. Bransom maintains offices in the courthouse.

JAMES BENNETT WHEELIS. Though still a young man, James Bennett Wheelis, county clerk of Cleveland County, is an old timer of Oklahoma, having practi- cally grown up in that part of Indian Territory and old Oklahoma Territory which is now his home, though his experience has also taken him into the cattle ranch and range district of Western Texas, and by training and natural endowment is well qualified for the respon- sible duties which he now performns for the people of Cleveland County.

The Wheelis ancestors were Scotch-Irish people who settled a great many years ago in the State of Louisiana, and it was in Union Parish, Louisiana, that James Bennett Wheelis was born July 31, 1879. Three years after his birth his parents removed to old Fort Arbuckle, situated in the midst of the picturesque Arbuckle moun- tains of Indian Territory. His father, T. W. Wheelis was also born in .Louisiana in the year 1849, grew up and married there Miss Nannie Cross, who was born in Louisiana and who died in Cleveland County, Okla-

1304

HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA

homa, in 1892. From the Arbuckle neighborhood T. W. Wheelis took his family to Wynnewood, Indian Territory, in 1886, and in 1889 moved into Cleveland County, about the time the Oklahoma Territory was first opened to settlement. In 1902 he moved to the Northwest, locat- ing at Kapowsin, Washington, seventeen iniles southeast of Tacoma, where he is now engaged in the lumber and sawmill business. He is a democrat and an active member of the Baptist Church. He and his wife had four children: James B .; J. H. Wheelis, who is a farmer uear San Antonio, Texas; Allen, in business with his father; and Oklahoma Harrison, in the lum- ber business at Shelton, Washington.

James Bennett Wheelis gained his first education in the publie schools of Wynnewood and in the country schools of Cleveland County. At the age of eighteen he left home and spent several years wandering about the country, for one year being engaged in sawmill work in Arkansas, and for two years on the eattle ranges in Western Texas. Realizing the need of a better educa- tion, at the age of twenty-one he moved to Dallas, Texas, and in 1900, after paying his own way, grad- uated from the high school.

On returning to Cleveland County, Oklahoma, Mr. Wheelis made himself a factor iu local affairs by con- ducting threshing machines, cotton gin and farming enterprise, all with satisfactory results for about a dozen years. In November, 1912, he was elected county clerk, and is now serving in his second two year term, having been re-elected in November, 1914. He has also given four years of service as member of the Cleveland County School Board. In a business way he is secretary of the Crittenden Oil and Gas Company of Norman, which is operated in the Healdton fields.

Mr. Wheelis is a democrat, a member of the Chris- tian Church, and is affiliated with Norman Lodge No. 38, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Norman Lodge No. 7, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and is an active member of the Norman Chamber of Commerce.

On August 9, 1905, he married Miss Paralee Lassiter. Their marriage was solemnized at the first Old Settlers Pienie held in Cleveland County at Crams Grove on Little River. Mrs. Wheelis is a daughter of W. R. Lassiter, who was also a pioneer farmer and settler in Cleveland County, and the Lassiters came to Oklahoma at the same time as the Wheelis family, and Mr. and Mrs. Wheelis grew up as neighbor ehildren. To their marriage has been born one child, Artie, born December 6, 1907.

J. P. JACKSON. A pioneer oil man in the Bartlesville district, J. P. Jaekson has spent most of his life on the frontier. and has witnessed or participated in praetieally every Oklahoma opening. On the day following the original opening in April, 1889, he bought a lot on Broadway in Oklahoma City, and was well acquainted with the first postmaster of that town, Samuel Roda- baugh, the two having been friends baek in Iowa. Mr. Jackson when he eame to Bartlesville in 1902 found only a few shacks marking the site of the town, and while he had previously been chiefly identified with grain and general farming, he has sinee devoted all his activities to oil and gas, and is now an official in several prominent companies.

J. P. Jackson was born at Lebanon, Indiana. Deeem- ber 22, 1852, a son of Thomas H. and Elizabeth (Snethen) Jaekson. His father was a native of North Carolina and his mother of Indiana. His father eame to Indiana in the early days, was married there, and in 1863. when J. P. Jackson was eleven years old, the family moved out to Towa. Twelve years later they

located in Cowley County, Kansas, where the mother died. The father is now living retired at Altus, Okla- homa. He was born in 1826, and is now upwards of ninety years of age. For ten or fifteen years he has lived in Oklahoma, and during his aetive career was a farmer and meehanie. Both parents were striet Christians. Of the thirteen children born to them, nine grew to maturity and are still living.

J. P. Jackson had an education in the commnon sehools, and as most of his life has been spent in new countries his advantages were limited so far as books were eoncerued. He lived at home with his parents until 1880, aud eame to manhood with a practical knowledge of farming. For a number of years he engaged in the grain business both in Kansas and Oklahoma, and that was his ehief work until he entered the oil business in 1902. The first two years after coming to Bartlesville he was mainly engaged in securing leases to oil lands. He was identified with the Copan Oil & Gas Company in its first drilling around Copan but later sold out his interests. He is now secretary and treasurer of the Coombs, Coombs & Jackson Oil Company, which was organized in 1906. He is also one of Sheets Brothers & Jaekson Oil Company, and has extensive holdings in the southwestern oil and gas distriet.

Mr. Jaekson is a member of the Benevolent and Pro- tective Order of Elks. He married Miss Lena Hurst, a native of Indiana. Their two children are: Stella, wife of S. A. Brown, of Elk City, Kansas; and Roseoe P., who is an irrigation farmer in Delta, Utah.

Mr. Jackson at the opening of the Cherokee Strip in 1893 went into Kay County, and secured a claim, where he lived and engaged in farming, grain dealing and also in politics. As a demoerat, he was the nominee of his party for a number of offiees, but was not eleeted owing to the republiean dominanee of that seetion of the state. For a number of years his home was in Southern Kansas, and he was in elose touch with Oklahoma beginning with 1876. In that year he hunted buffalo in the territory now ineluded in the forty-sixth state.

HON. LUTHER C. MCNABB. The lives of those who have won sueeess in American law are always in- teresting studies, and partieularly so when the subject under diseussion is so well known and pleasing a per- sonality as Judge Luther C. McNabb. His career is one which has been characterized by success fairly and honorably won, by the attainment of a dignified aud eminent position at an age when most men are but starting their life work, and by the sturdy, persevering characteristics which have enabled him to overcome early obstaeles and disadvantages in the following out of well-defined purpose.

Hon. Luther C. MeNabb, judge of the County Court of Sequoyah County, Oklahoma, was born at Big Springs, Meigs County, Tennessee, May 8, 1881, and is a son of Dr. Nathaniel P. and Matilda (Solomon) McNabb. On the paternal side he is of Irish aneestry, while maternally he is of German deseent, although his parents are both Tennesseeans, the father born in Brad- ley County and the mother in Meigs County. Dr. Na- thaniel P. McNabb, one of the leading medical praeti- tioners of Meigs County, has been engaged in prae- tiee at Big Springs for half a century, and is one of the prominent and influential men of his community. During the Civil war his sympathies were with the South and throughout the period of that confliet he served gal- lantly as a private under the banner of the Gray. He was given good educational advantages, and during a long and nseful career has enjoyed the regard and esteem of his fellow-men.

Address to a gathering of over 3,000 farmers on the streets of Sallisaw on Wednesday the 20th day of October, 1915. Subject "The Crimes of the Usury in Oklahoma." As a result of his fight the banks began to do a lawful business in the way of interest charges.

cas

off

tha

the

dig

Ge la

paren

of Bi

was s

was

hut h

about

prépa

he to

found

pens

pick

he 1

I'ni

gra

sas,

Nab

Lut

1305

HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA

Luther C. MeNabb is the fifth in order of birth of his parents' seven sons, and was reared in his native Town of Big Springs, where the foundation for his education was secured in the public schools. His literary education was completed at Grant University, Athens, Tennessee, but he had decided upon a career in the law and looked about for some means of securing the means necessary to prepare himself for that vocation. After his graduation he took up schoolteaching, but after a short time he found that that calling was an inadequate source of com- pensation for his purpose, and he finally seized the pick and shovel and entered the mines as a laborer. In bringing to the surface the precious "black dia- monds" of the coal country of Tennessee, Judge Me- Nabb finally secured the finances for his education and he matriculated in the law department of Cumberland University, Lebanon, Tennessee, where he was duly graduated in June, 1906, with the degree of Bachelor of Laws. His practice was commenced at Paris, Arkan- sas, but after about two years, in the spring of 1908, he came to Sallisaw, Sequoyah County, Oklahoma, where he has since remained. The young lawyer was not long in attracting a large and prominent clientele and as his cases in court continued to bring him before the people he grew in public favor. In the fall election of 1912 he was elected county attorney, the duties of which office he assumed in January, 1913, and his services in that capacity led to his election as county judge in the fall of 1914. He has shown himself an able and dignified wearer of the ermine and is popular with members of the bench and bar throughout the county. In politics, Judge McNabb is a democrat; fraternally, he belongs to the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Woodmen of the World, and in church faith he is a Methodist.

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.

Author: Thoburn, Joseph B. (Joseph Bradfield), 1866-1941 Publication date: 1916 Publisher: Chicago, New York, The American Historical Society Number of Pages: 660

Author: Thoburn, Joseph B. (Joseph Bradfield), 1866-1941
Publication date: 1916
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 660