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 27

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 27

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Edwin Thacker lived and died in Middlesex County, Virginia, where his will, dated April 2, 1704, and pro- bated May 1, 1704, is still of record. This will disposed of a large estate, consisting in the main of lands, slaves, and livestock, and included a bequest to be paid "out of my money in England and Virginia and out of my tobaccos to be sent;" and it mentions a brother "Henry." This Edwin Thacker is probably the "Col. Thacker" of Virginia history whose daughter married Henry Washington, of Middlesex County, Virginia, who was an uncle of the famous "George"' and whose son, "Thacker Washington,"' married a daughter of Sir John Peyton. Nothing is known of the Henry Thacker men- tioned except that, in 1690, he married Elizabeth Payne, a grandaughter of Col. John Walker, who was a member of the Virginia Council under the "Great Charter or Commissions of Privileges, Orders, and Laws," of No- vember 13, 1618.

Thirteen of the Virginia Thackers served in the war of the American Revolution, one of them being Charles Thacker, of Fluvana County, Virginia, who was an officer and for whom the subject of this sketch was probably named.

Robert K. Thacker, grandfather of Mr. Justice Thacker, was born and raised in Greenville County, Vir- ginia, where he owned a medium sized plantation and some slaves; and family tradition as well as the fact that there are, and were, comparatively few people of this name in Virginia, points to the Revolutionary stock and beyond those Thackers to Edwin or Henry in early colonial days as ancestors; but the line can not be defi- nitely traced at this time back of Robert K., except that family tradition says that Henry Washington married into this branch of the family.

This Robert K. Thacker married Emma Gee, of Bruns- wick County, Virginia, whose father was reputed to have been a very large land owner in that county; and their only son, William J. Thacker, father of the subject of this sketch, inherited from his mother the 1,900-acre tract of land upon which, or a remnant thereof, the sub- ject of this sketch was born and raised.

William J. Thacker married Allie P. Parham, of All Brunswick County, Virginia, who was also a member of an old Virginia family, and of this union Charles M., of this sketch, was the first born; William P., the next born, died at the age of twenty years; Robert E., the third ont born, still lives on a remnant of the old Virginia 0 homestead; John H., the fourth born, died at the d, E age of eighteen years; Miss Emma M., the fifth born, passed her entire life on the old homestead Ap until in 1900, when she came to live with Charles M. and exclu two younger brothers at Mangum, Oklahoma, where she died in 1904; Harry Milton, the sixth born, is serving on I. the bench of the County Court of Greer County, Okla- ore homa; and Thomas Tillman, the seventh born, who is a nuarlinotype operator by vocation and is studying dentistry, ras Lihas made his home at Mangum, in this state, most of the time since early in 1899.

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HENRY C. MARTIN. An alert, popular and progressive young man who is closely concerned with important pub- majo lic utility and industrial interests in Oklahoma, Henry

C. Martin is advertising manager for the various and extensive corporations of which Anton H. Classen is the executive head, and is also private secretary to Mr. Classen, president of each of the following named cor- porations, for all of which Mr. Martin has charge of the advertising or publicity departments: The Okla- homa Railway Company, the Classen Realty Company, the Oklahoma Electric Terminal Company, and the Belle Isle Improvement Company, the office headquarters of all of which are in the fine Terminal Building in the City of Oklahoma.

Henry C. Martin is a scion of fine old southern fami- lies and in the distaff line is a descendant of William Henry Harrison, a member of a distinguished old family whose name was prominently identified with the annals of Virginia history for several generations and the name later having been one of prominence and influence in the State of Tennessee, where the mother of Mr. Martin was born and reared. Henry C. Martin was born at Lincoln, Talladega County, Alabama, on the 15th of March, 1884, and is a son of Thomas B. and Catherine A. (Harrison) Martin, the father having been a prosperous planter and slaveholder prior to the Civil war. He whose name initiates this review acquired his early education in the public schools of his native state and supplemented this discipline by a thorough course in the celebrated Valparaiso University at Valparaiso, Indiana, in which institution he was graduated as a member of the class of 1904, with the degree of Bach- elor of Science, and in which he completed also a full commercial course. After his graduation Mr. Martin went to Marshall, Texas, where he served five months as court reporter. He then went to Austin, capital of that state, where he held the position of committee clerk during the session of the Twenty-ninth Legisla- ture. From Austin he went to Havre, Montana, where for five months he held the position of assistant chief dispatcher of the Montana division of the Great Northern Railroad. He was then transferred to the general offices of the company, in St. Paul, Minnesota, where he remained one year. He then entered the service of the General Electric Company at Minneapolis, that state, but a few months later he resigned his posi- tion to accept one with the Twin City Rapid Transit Company, with offices in Minneapolis. With this repre- sentative public utility corporation of the two great cities of Minnesota he continued until 1909, when on the 15th of March of that year, his twenty-fifth birth- day anniversary, he accepted his present responsible post in the City of Oklahoma. Within the intervening period he has in the fullest sense justified the estimate of con- fidence placed upon him by Mr. Classen, who is one of the leading capitalists and most progressive citizens of Oklahoma, and by other interested principals of the various important companies which he represents. Apro- pos of his services the following merited estimate has been made: "In the discharge of his varied duties he has not only exhibited industry and adaptability, but also efficiency and initiative ability of the highest order, loyalty to his work and unvarying courtesy and tact. In addition to the exacting demands thus placed upon him, Mr. Martin has found time and opportunity to identify himself with varied social and business organi- zations the good fellowship of whose members it is always well for such vast public service interests as are represented by Mr. Martin to enjoy. A charter mem- ber of the Oklahoma City Advertising Club, which came into prominence in 1909 and which has been a potent force in the furtherance of civic and material progress and prosperity in the capital city of the State, Mr. Martin served most effectively as secretary of the club from 1910 to 1912, inclusive, and was for four years

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a member of its board of directors. Up to 1913 he accompanied representatives of this club to all conven- tions of the Associated Advertising Clubs of the World, including those held at Kansas City, Omaha, Boston and Dallas, and in 1911 he was treasurer and a director of the Southwestern Division of the Associated Advertising Clubs of the World."

In 1912 Mr. Martin effected the organization of the Oklahoma Boat Club, of which he has been president from the inception and in the splendid achievement of which he has been a dominating force, especially in the building of the attractive club house at Belle Isle Park, his enthusiasm in this connection having been instru- mental in encouraging the wonderful growth and popu- larity of all manner of aquatic sports in the section of the state lying tributary to Oklahoma City. The devel- opment of beautiful Belle Isle into one of the finest and most popular pleasure resorts iu the West has been due in large measure to his admirable initiative and executive ability and untiring efforts. He is all that is loyal and progressive in his civic attitude and is an enthusiast iu the legitimate exploiting of the manifold advantages and attractions of the city and state of his adoption. He is a valued factor in connection with general business aud industrial activities and both he and his wife are popular figures in the representative social life of Oklahoma's capital city and metropolis.

In the City of Minneapolis, Minnesota, on the 11th of March, 1910, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Martin to Miss Minnie Doan, daughter of Henry C. and Laura (Moore) Doan, the former of whom was born in the Dominion of Canada and the latter in the State of Iowa. Mr. and Mrs. Martin have two children-Howard Bur- dette, born August 11, 1911; and Minnie Bernice, born December 27, 1912.

TOM D. MCKEOWN. None appreciative of the beau- tiful traditions and noble history of the fair Emerald Isle can fail to revert with pride and satisfaction to his ancestral record when he can claim descent from staunch old Irish stock, and none can place a higher estimate along this line than does Judge Mckeown, of Ada, Pontotoc County, who is presiding on the bench of the Seventh Judicial District of the State of Oklahoma. In view of the statements just entered there is marked con- sistency in reproducing and perpetuating in this history the following pertineut estimate that has been written concerning Judge MeKeown, who is of Irish lineage but an exponent of the best in American citizenship and a scion of a family that was early founded in this country :

"He is Irish. They call him the Irish judge. In one of his campaigns a compatriot likewise of Irish descent spoke of him as 'That Irishman from Ada,' and by this title he has since been affectionately known throughout his district. He was a district judge before he forgot that he had passed the age of thirty years, and he was elected a second time by virtually unanimous consent of the voters of his district. He lives next to the people he serves. He knows their needs, their desires, and they love him. His attitude is not one of personal expe- diency-it is genuine optimism and love of living, with a love of humanity that exhibits itself in his genial and smiling face. Relative to the judicial career and functions he has a theory that has impressed him as being necessary to the successful conducting of his official duties. It is that the judge should not remove himself from his people while wearing the robe of dig- nity such an official is supposed to assume; that to keep in touch with his constituents forces him to put the human element in his decisions-the element that defines justice far better than the wording of constitutions and

statutes. Tom McKeown loved the people that love him. "'

Judge Mckeown was born in South Carolina, on the 4th of June, 1878, and is a son of Theodore and Nannie (Robinson) MeKeown. His father likewise was born in South Carolina, of sterling Irish lineage, and the family was founded in America prior to the Revolution, in which representatives of the name were found enrolled as patriot soldiers in the continental line. In a later generation members of the family were soldiers in the Mexican war. Before the Revolution an ancestor of Judge Mckeown in the paternal line had been sent by King George of England to assume the office of keeper of the port at Charleston, South Carolina, and this statement is significant as indicating the high source of the family lineage in America. The venerable parents of Judge MeKeown now reside at Ada, and it is need- less to say that they receive from him the deepest filial care and solicitude.

In the acquirement of his education Judge Mckeown was dependent almost entirely upon his owu resources and his character has been moulded and strengthened through fellowing with self-reliance aud definite ambi- tion. After duly availing himself of the advantages of the public school he provided ways and means that euabled him finally to attend a course of lectures in the law department of Cornell University, at Ithaca, New York. Before the Supreme Court of South Carolina he was admitted to the bar of his native state on the 5th of May, 1899, and in earning money to complete his education he had previously given effective service as a teacher in the schools of South Carolina. His profes- sional novitiate as an attorney and counselor at law was served in South Carolina, and finally he removed to Malvern, Arkansas, where he remained eighteen months and where he was associated in the practice of law with Col. M. M. Duffy, who had previously served as United States consul at Winnipeg, Manitoba, under the admin- istratiou of President Cleveland.

Through correspondence with H. L. Muldrow, for- merly a prominent citizen of Tishomingo, and Lafay- ette Walker, an influential citizen of Holdenville, Judge, service McKeown was persuaded in 1900 to establish his resi- ritory, deuce in what is now the State of Oklahoma. In Feb- years welfare eare i veying old For places joined Doakst and ree earlier ruary, 1901, he engaged in the practice of law at Ada, the judicial center of Pontotoc County, and here, at various times and for varying intervals, he has been associated in practice with such representative lawyers as Hon. John Crawford, formerly a member of the Okla- homa Legislature; Judge John F. McKeel, a pioneer member of the bar of this section of the state; and Judge Clinton A. Galbreath, of the Oklahoma Supreme Court Commission.

By appointment of Judge Robert L. Williams, first who ho chief justice of the Oklahoma Supreme Court and now notebes governor of the state (1915), Judge Mckeown became the men It m a member of the first bar commission appointed after the admission of Oklahoma to statehood. In 1910 he more in was elected to the bench of the Seventh Judicial Dis of three trict of the state, which at that time comprised five mendous and whe counties and had the services of two judges, his coad jutor on the bench having been Judge Robert L. Rainey were si

This nee streams, who had served as a member of the first State Legisla ture of Oklahoma. Judge Mckeown was re-elected in 1914 for a term of four years, and his district now necessity comprises two counties. In his service on the bench torrents camp. he has emphatically been one of those humane judge fashion The In sophistica who have tempered justice with mercy, with no sacrific mad ever of the higher judicial ethics. Prior to his election t the bench Judge McKeown served one term as cit attorney of Ada, besides which he had taken an activ part in every democratic campaign in Oklahoma from lost indef

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the time he established his home within the borders of this now vigorous commonwealth. He is known as a specially effective campaign orator, and the committees regulating campaign activities have usually sent him among the rural communities, where his earnest speeches have been specially convincing and influential. In May, 1915, he was appointed, by Governor Williams, a mem- ber of the Oklahoma Supreme Court Commission, for a period of four months. The judge is an honored mem- ber of the Pontotoc County and the Oklahoma State Bar associations, besides being identified with the American Bar Association. He is affiliated with the Masonic fraternity, the Independent Order of Odd Fel- lows, and the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, besides which he holds membership in the Ada Commer- cial Club and the Ada Country Club. Both he and his wife are members of the Baptist Church.

At Ada, Oklahoma, in the year 1902, was solemnized the marriage of Judge McKeown to Miss Anna Sanders, a daughter of Capt. Mark M. Sanders, whose family was one of prominence in Tennessee for several gen- erations.

MARTIN J. MUELLER. Simon Peter is a Choctaw In- dian of good breeding and an English education who lives in McCurtain County. His chief claim to distinc- tion among his people and really to more than ordinary mention in the annals of Oklahoma history, lies in the work he did as guide and interpreter for surveying crews sent into this nation by the Dawes Commission to pre- pare the nation for the allotment of lands. The wooded region of the nation, covering practically all of Me- curtain and Choctaw counties, because of the scarcity of settlements or other means of guide, presented the great- est problem that confronted the surveying crews. In many sections of the region it was necessary for them to have at hand always one or more persons familiar with the country to save them from getting lost.

Simon Peter was guide to the party to which belonged Martin J. Mueller, then entering the third year of his service for the United States Government in Indian Ter- ritory, and who later as Indian agent wrestled for five eb years with a thousand complex problems relating to the welfare and progress of the 4,000 Choctaws under his care in McCurtain County. During a part of the sur- veying work in this section the party was camped near ers old Fort Towson and Doaksville, one of the historic old places of the Choctaw Nation, and here Simon Peter

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joined them. He showed them the old cemetery at nd Doaksville, pointed out the tombs of many men of note and recounted at the campfire the tales of bad men of earlier years. One of these tales related to an Indian rst who boasted as he was dying that there were twelve or notches on his gun, and who was buried in the midst of me the men he had killed.

ter It may not be inappropriate here to give something he more in regard to Simon Peter. Two surveying parties of three each camped jointly near Doaksville. A tre-

is- ire mendous rain fell one day while the parties were out and when they sought to return to camp the streams ey were swollen so that it was impossible to cross them. This necessitated a long journey around the heads of the streams, but this journey did not do away with the omnecessity of crossing a larger stream that flowed in wild el torrents from the mountains between them and the camp. An Indian, reared where mountain streams go icemad every year, towed them over with his horse in a #fashion most expertly done by the Choctaws.

The Indian was Simon Peter, without whom the un- iasophisticated young men from the states might have been omalost indefinitely in a wild country. Simon Peter's name

and deeds were being praised next day in camp when a youth from Chicago, by prearrangement with a friend in the party, became one of them for an excursion at hunt- ing. Deer and turkeys were plentiful in the hills and the season was on for satisfying and successful sport. The Chicago man wanted a guide but Simon Peter was not available, and a teamster with a camp on Wild Horse Creek went instead. They set out the next morning into the forests and hills of the game country to the north. After traveling several miles they decided to separate and return to camp, the Chicago man on one side of a swollen stream and the teamster on the other. They called back and forth to one another for a long time and then the voice of neither could longer be heard by the other. The Chicago man was lost. It was nearing evening, clouds covered the sky and memory of direc- tions left him. Finally he discovered fresh deer tracks and followed them until darkness made them no longer visible, and he then turned back and began search for the stream he had left, but could not find it. The sur- veying party returned to camp at five o'clock and heard the story of the teamster who had just come in, after which they built a great log fire in the hope that the lost visitor might thereby find the camp, but when morning came and he did not return, searching parties were or- ganized, each of which returned to report an unsuccessful hunt. Later in the afternoon, Simon Peter came tramp- ing into camp with the stranger in custody. The city- bred huntsman told of striking all his matches in the darkness to find a corner the surveyors had marked, of shooting his gun for a signal until all his ammunition was gone, of wandering again until he found a dilapi- dated, deserted cabin from which he took the door for a bed, of the wind rocking the cabin until he was forced to seek a quiet place by a tree for further rest, of hear- ing a cowbell and finding a horse early next morning, of hearing the crow of a rooster and finding a human being, a red man who understood no English but pointed the direction of the home of Simon Peter, of his persuading Simon Peter to take him to the camp, and of a constant prayer upon his lips that Simon Peter would not lose the way. The young Chicagoan left for home next day.

The activities for two years of United States Govern- ment inspectors and marshals in removing nestors and other trespassers from the marketable timber lands of the Choctaw Nation constitute the most exciting and highly dramatic period of the last fifty years of Indian history. After allotments had been made. and Congress had segregated the unallotted lands, the Government began its first serious effort to eject men from these lands who had no right there. In a section of the nation assigned to Martin J. Mueller there were forty-seven sawmills and all but two of them were located on un- allotted lands. The squatters were not easily moved, many of them openly defying the officials, and it re- quired two years to fully complete the task of their ejection. One entire town capitulated under order of the Government and from the tract on which it was lo- cated nearly 200 people moved their houses and personal belongings, and two sawmills and a planing mill were taken to other territory. This town was located three miles south of Kosoma and among other things boasted of a postoffice. One sawmill was large and the other small and several million feet of lumber were stacked about them. The owners in the original order to vacate were given sixty days to complete the task but later the Government saw the time was too short and granted them six months. At the end of the time not a mill or a house was left on the site. Within a radius of ten to fifteen miles there were other mills belonging to the

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HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA

owners of these at this town and they were also made to vacate.

Among the first investigations made by Mr. Mueller, in 1908, was one regarding the rights of the. Ingram Lumber Company. This company had for twenty years operated sawmills on the Indian lands unmolested and the Choctaw Nation received very little revenue from their business. Mr. Mueller found that the company had cut commercial lumber off of 500 to 600 acres of land in the region of their mill and that the land was Govern- ment or unallotted land. Five million feet of logs, most of which had been cut from unallotted lands, were then in Buck Creek and in possession of the company, and they were continually cutting and hauling fresh timber from this class of lands. The manager of the company at Kosoma was asked who was president of the concern, to which he replied that he did not know. Mr. Mueller told him that the company's depredations had been re- ported to the commission to the Five Civilized Tribes and that the commission had decided to replevin the lumber and the timber. Mr. Mueller was to advise the United States marshal to meet him at Antlers and ac- company him to Kosoma to serve the papers on the local manager, but when he went to Antlers he found that the manager had departed for Muskogee to sur- render himself. In the meantime, the replevin suit had been instituted in the United States Court. Mr. Muel- ler's charge that timber and lumber were being moved in contempt of the court order was proven next day when he and his Indian police met six wagons and teams bearing lumber that was covered by the replevin order.

Another mill, owned by Zach Clay, that had been in operation for thirty years, was abandoned by Clay dur- ing this investigation. It was estimated that Clay had cut enough black walnut from Indian lands to make ties for the Frisco Railroad for trackage from Fort Smith, Arkansas, to Paris, Texas. Other mnill owners also left the country, some going to Canada and some to Mexico, while others made settlement with the department in sums ranging as high as $15,000. Sawmill men had gone on Indian lands before the allotment period by permis- sion of governors of the Choctaw Nation, agreeing to pay the nation a royalty of fifty cents per 1,000 feet. The nation, however, received but a small percentage of that to which it was entitled.

The case which follows is an example of the problems which Agent Mueller had to face when he was placed in charge of the McCurtain County office in 1910. Simon Wakaya was a Choctaw Indian, possessed of forty-five head of cattle and a little money supposed to be hid in his small cabin near Kulli Tuklo, where he lived alone, having no relatives of near blood save cousins. One day report was made to United States Indian Agent Mueller at Idabel that the house in which Wakaya lived had been burned and that his body lay in a crisp in the ruins. An investigation was instituted by the Indian agent which revealed a gunshot in the Indian's skull. A few days later the county records showed that a bill of sale for the cattle owned by Wakaya had been filed there; also there appeared of record a will that Wakaya was sup- posed to have made. Agent Mueller and his interpreter proceeded to interview those whose names appeared as witnesses on the will and this convinced Mr. Mueller that the instrument was a forgery. In due time the will came on for probate and was not approved by the county judge. Attorneys for the beneficiary appealed to the District Court. Three days later trial of the case was called, but it progressed only a part of the way through the taking of testimony when the district judge halted proceedings and ordered the arrest of three men on the charge of perjury, murder and arson.

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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