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 56

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 56

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Mr. Asp represented the Twenty-fifth District of Oklahoma as a delegate to the state constitutional con- vention, in 1906, and was assigned to membership on the judiciary committee and the legal advisory com- mittee. He prepared personally, and with remarkable ability and circumspection, the draft of a complete state constitution, and this he presented to the conven- tion. He and his supporters . made such a vigorous championship of the measure and so earnestly urged its adoption in its entirety that they became known under the facetious cognomen of the "Twelve Apostles." Mr. Asp had much to do with the framing of the con- stitution that was finally adopted as the basis for claims to statehood and he loyally supported the cause of Oklahoma until the desired end had been gained and it had become one of the integral commonwealths of the nation.

Of his unremitting and zealous efforts in securing to the new state the full benefits from the school lands high commendation was given by Hon. John R. Wil-

A d f

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liams, secretary of the state school land commission, in an article that was published in the Daily Oklahoman of April 26, 1914, and the following extracts from the article are eminently worthy of reproduction in this connection :

"In the early part of the year 1893, and after three great openings of lands to homestead settlement with reservations for public schools only, it was found by a few public-spirited citizens, notably Hon. Henry E. Asp and Dr. David R. Boyd, the latter then president of the State University of Oklahoma, that soon the public domain would be exhausted and that we would have no lands reserved for donation to the future state for higher education and public buildings. A bill pro- viding for the opening of the Cherokee Outlet was then pending before Congress. Asp and Boyd appeared in Washington and endeavored to secure an amendment to the bill, reserving Section 13 in each township for higher educational purposes and Section 33 in each town- ship for public-building purposes, but, owing to stern opposition, failed to secure its adoption by the commit- tee on territories. Senator Orville H. Platt, of Con- necticut, the then chairman of the committee, was in sympathy with the purpose of these men and, sharing their disappointment, conceived and suggested another plan whereby the result might be wrought, and with his own hands drafted an amendment to the bill, which authorized the president of the United States, after making in his proclamation reservations of sections 16 and 36 for public schools, 'to make such other reser- vation of lands for public purposes as he may deem wise and desirable.' This act was approved by Presi- dent Harrison on the last day of his term, March 3, 1893.

"Upon the inauguration of President Cleveland Mr. Asp and Dr. Boyd interceded with him along the lines of securing additional reservations of land for higher educational and public-building purposes. The result was that, on August 19, 1893, President Cleveland issued his proclamation opening the six-million acre strip to homestead settlement, reserving Section 13 in each town- ship, where not otherwise disposed of, for university, agricultural-college and normal-school purposes; also Section 33 in each township, where not otherwise re- served, for public buildings. These two reservations were made subject to the approval of congress, and were approved by that body May 4, 1894.''

For his effective interposition in the above connec- tion the State of Oklahoma must owe to Mr. Asp a per- petual debt of gratitude and commendation, and in many other ways has he manifested his deep and abiding interest in all that touches the present and future wel- fare of the state of his adoption.

In the Masonic fraternity Mr. Asp has completed the circle of the York Rite and received also the thirty- second degree of the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite, in Oklahoma Consistory No. 1, Valley of Guthrie. He is also a member of the adjunct organization, the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. He and his wife are communicants of the Protestant Episcopal Church and in the capital city their attractive home is at 416 West Thirteenth Street.

In the year 1880 was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Asp to Miss Nellie M. Powers, daughter of Nathan M. and Ellen M. Powers, of Winfield, Kansas. They have no children save an adopted son.

JOSEPH CARL GREGG. One of the active members of the present city government of Tulsa, Joseph C. Gregg has been the leading factor in supplying that city with wholesome and clean amusement, and at different times has been proprietor of perhaps half a dozen theaters in

the city. He is still in the business, and one of the best known citizens of Tulsa.

Joseph Carl Gregg was born at Nashville, Washington County, Illinois, April 24, 1881, a son of Park E. and Lou (Anderson) Gregg. Both parents were born in Indiana and are still living, and all their six children are alive, Joseph C. being the second in order of birth. His father was for a number of years a contractor and builder at Oakland City, Indiana, moving next to Nashville, Washington County, Illinois, where he was in the grocery trade, and continued the grocery business at Belton, Missouri. He finally removed out to Los Angeles, Cali- fornia, continued merchandising for a time, and in 1907. located at Guthrie, Oklahoma. After spending four years in that city he returned to Los Angeles and is now living retired. He is a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and in politics a democrat.

Joseph C. Gregg was educated in the public schools of Missouri and Los Angeles, California. His first work for wages was driving a milk wagon in Los Angeles. In 1906 he came to Guthrie, Oklahoma, and for a time was identified with the restaurant business. In 1907 he be- came special agent for the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad Company at Guthrie, and continued in the rail- way service until 1910. In that year he took up the general theater and moving picture business at Enid, and opened the Wonderland Theater, which he conducted for about two years. Since then Mr. Gregg has been in Tulsa, and at different times has opened the Wonder- land, the Yale, the Palace, the Orpheum and the Lyric theaters. All these he has since sold except the Lyric, which he still manages.

In April, 1914, Mr. Gregg was elected city commis- sioner of finance and revenue, and is giving much of his time and attention to this department of the city's gov- ernment. He is a democrat in politics, affiliated with the Knights of Pythias, Tulsa Lodge No. 946, B. P. O. E., and with the Loyal Order of Moose. In 1909 Mr. Gregg married Cora Coleman. She was born in Marietta, Kansas. Their two children are: Ralph and Margaret.

VERIS E. McINNIS. It is not unusual for one to meet, in a community as full of men restless to reach still higher successes, whether in business, or political or pro- fessional life, as Oklahoma City undoubtedly is, men who have worked their way to position and independence over the hard and tedious self-made road. In this class is found Veris E. McInnis, a lawyer of standing at the Oklahoma bar, and a man who has worked his way up through a collegiate and university training, over the rough paths that must be traveled by the young prac- titioner, to a place of recognition in his chosen pro- fession.

Mr. McInnis was born at Monticello, Mississippi, in 1880, and is a son of William F. and Caroline (O'Mara) McInnis. The American ancestors of the family were David M. and Rachel Rebecca McInnis, who were mar- ried in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1780, and in 1814 emi- grated to the United States in a company of 118 per- sons, which landed in Virginia, but later formed a small colony in North Carolina. There Mr. and Mrs. McInnis reared a family of eleven children. The grandfather of Veris E. McInnis was a Mississippi planter prior to the war between the South and the North, and when hostili- ties broke out offered his services to the Confederacy, was accepted, and served bravely and faithfully as an officer throughout the war, in which several of his sons, uncles of Veris E. McInnis, were also engaged.

William F. McInnis was born in Mississippi, there grew to manhood, and early turned his attention to mer- cantile pursuits. He was a man of good business talents, and until 1890 continued to be actively engaged at Mon-

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ticello, being also prominent in public affairs and for some time serving as postmaster and superintendent of schools. In 1890 Mr. McInnis went to Mckinley, Texas, where he spent five years in business, and in 1895 went to Sherman, Texas, there carrying on successful activities until his death, August 14, 1910. Mrs. McInnis, also a native of Mississippi, still survives the father.

While attending the public schools of Texas, Veris E. McInnis formed the decision that his would be a professional career, and that his training therefor should come about through his own efforts. Accordingly he learned stenography and shorthand, applying himself so 'earnestly to learning these vocations that when he was still a lad of fifteen years he was doing stenographic work, with the receipts for which he was alle to take the literary course at Austin College, Sherman, Texas. He was graduated therefrom in 1899 with the degree of Bachelor of Sciences. Mr. McInnis pursued his law course at the University of Texas Law School, Austin, Texas, being graduated from that institution with his degree of Bachelor of Laws in 1902, and while there acted in the capacity of stenographer for the law de- partment of the university.

Being admitted to the bar at the time of his gradu- ation, Mr. McInnis entered upon the practice of his profession at Sherman, in partnership with A. L. Beaty, which firm subsequently became Smith & Beaty and later Smith & Wall. Mr. McInnis left Texas in 1906, in the employ of the Frisco Railroad Company, and until the close of the year 1907 held the position of traveling claim agent of the law and claim department in Okla- homa, Texas, Kansas and Missouri. On January 1, 1908, Mr. McInnis located permanently at Oklahoma City, in charge of the personal injury claims of the Frisco lines in Oklahoma, but in 1909 gave up this office to devote himself to his regular practice, which he has con- tinued successfully to the present time. Mr. McInnis maintains offices at No. 232 American National Bank Building. He practices in all the courts and has been successfully connected with several cases that have at- tracted attention and have given him prestige in his calling.

Mr. McInnis is a member of the Kappa Alpha (South- ern) fraternity and of the Oklahoma City Golf and Country Club. His religious faith is that of the Pres- byterian Church, and he attends with the congregation of the First Presbyterian Church of Oklahoma City. Mr. McInnis is unmarried and resides at .No. 1214 North Broadway Street, Oklahoma City.

JOHN F. MOYER, From many states and nations came the pioneer white settlers of Indian Territory, and the majority of them, except the missionaries, were from the old South. It is probably true that nine-tenths of the white men who have become intermarried citizens were originally Southerners, notwithstanding a goodly admixture of those of Northern parentage. Indian Ter- ritory was a melting pot of its own in the creation of a new citizenship as regards white men.

The case of John F. Moyer, a prominent live stock dealer and rancher at and near Antlers, is an illus- tration of the manner in which speech, habits and cus- toms of other regions were either abandoned or thrown into the pot to form parts of the ingredients of the new 'race of Indian Territory. Mr. Moyer's parents were English people and natives of Canada. They came to the United States in an early period and settled in Michigan, where Abram Moyer engaged in the lumber business. Later they lived in Southwest Missouri. John Moyer at the age of seventeen went to Little Rock, Arkansas, where for two years he was engaged in a shingle mill.

At nineteen he entered the Indian Territory, lost himself in a measure from the outside world, and for nearly thirty-five years has been an integral part of the life of this interesting region. Very necessary to this region was the blood of such ancestors as were his, since the form of civilization and manner of progress would not have been properly balanced under Southern influence alone. The formative period of Indian Terri- tory history was that in which Mr. Moyer figured. It was the period in which ideals of other regions were thrown to the winds that swept through the timbered mountain valleys, and in which customs of other times and places were forgotten. Brain and brawn and some measure of education were the prime factors, and that man counted for most who had ability to accomplish something.

It was rather by accident that John Moyer became a citizen of Indian Territory. River excursions from Little Rock to Fort Smith were frequent in the early '80s and of particular interest because Fort Smith was then regarded as a frontier community. Into that town came all manner of Indians and all manner of white men from the Indian Territory. It was the seat of the United States Court for Indian Territory, the court being presided over by Judge Parker.

The excursion steamer that brought Moyer to Fort Smith left him there, and he had not meant that it should be so. While viewing the interesting sights of the town he talked with a man who had driven there in a wagon from Savannah, Indian Territory, a place situated in the coal mining region. The man said he was looking for some one to make the return journey with him. Here was a chance for adventure, and Moyer seized it. Having fifty dollars in money, he bought some overalls and a cotton shirt, and the following day the journey to Savannah began. Having had no experience in mining he remained but a few days at Savannah and then set out for Stringtown where he had heard the lumber industry was developing. He knew that business. At Stringtown he worked at a mill owned by Sam Scratch, but remained only a short time when he went to Atoka, and found employment there for two years. While at Atoka he attended Sunday school in the pioneer Baptist Church that Doctor Mur- row had erected and that venerable missionary was his Sunday school . teacher.

At that time Colonel Nelson, a fullblood Choctaw and a preacher of the Methodist faith, was running a store at a postoffice called Nelson in what is now Push- mataha County. Nelson needed a clerk in his store and Moyer was employed. He crossed the mountain country and at Nelson settled in a community that was inhabited almost exclusively by fullbloods. He soon learned enough of the Choctaw language to trade with the Indians and remained there until the Town of Antlers was platted. Colonel Nelson moved his store to Antlers and Moyer came with him. Later he engaged in the mercantile business on his own account.

As a pioneer of the Town of Antlers Mr. Moyer assisted in the organization of the Antlers National Bank and has been a director of that institution ever since. Associated with him in the organization were Cartain La Seureur, W. P. Cochran, S. J. Newcomb, William Fletcher and Miss Octavia La Seureur. Eight miles northeast of Antlers, at the foot of the mountain, Mr. Moyer has his fine ranch, and he raises and deals extensively in cattle and horses and grows feed and puts up large quantities of hay. His own allotments as an intermarried citizen were selected in the Chickasaw country and are in what is now Carter County.

Meantime, in 1886, Mr. Moyer married Mary Jane

B.K. Woodson

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Ellis. She was of Chickasaw and Choctaw blood. The marriage ceremony was performed at the home of Col- onel Nelson and by Colonel Nelson in his magisterial capacity. To this marriage were born four children, and the only one now living is Grover S., aged sixteen. Mrs. Moyer died in 1902. Two years later he married Daisy Tucker. Their two children are Mary Ruth, aged ten, and Lucile, aged seven. Mr. Moyer has three brothers and one sister: James, W. R. and R. A. Moyer, all of whom live at Moyer Spur in Pushmataha County, the first two being in the livestock business and the last in the drug business; and Mrs. Mary Esther Nichols, widow of a railroad man and living at Harrison, Arkan- sas. Abram Moyer, the father of these children, was for many years a successful lumberman, came into Indian Territory to engage in that industry about 1884, and now lives retired at Antlers. Mr. John F. Moyer is a member of the Christian Church, is affiliated with the Masonic Order and the Knights of the Maccabees, and is an active member of the Texas Cattle Raisers Association.

FRED MCDANIEL. The appointment of Fred McDaniel as postmaster of Bartlesville on February 13, 1913, was a well deserved honor bestowed upon one of the native sous of the old Cherokee Nation and for many years one of the most public spirited and successful of Bartles- ville's business men. Fred McDaniel has been actively identified with the life of Bartlesville since the beginning of that city's marvelous growth and prosperity.

Fred McDaniel was born near Fort Gibson in the old Cherokee Nation, April 14, 1872, a son of Walter and Jane (Vann) McDaniel. His father was of Scotch-Irish ancestry but with important intermingling of Cherokee blood, while the mother was of pure Cherokee stock. Fred was their only child, and about a year after his birth his mother died and his father married again, but died when he was six years old. Both the children of the second marriage are also deceased.

Fred McDaniel spent his childhood largely in the home of an aunt near Tahlequah, and finished his education in the Cherokee Orphan Asylum near Pryor Creek in 1888. For a man who has reached commendable distinction in later years he overcame many disadvantages and hard- ships as a boy. He worked on farms and in stores and at any legitimate occupation until 1894, and in that year became deputy district clerk at Claremore.' In 1897, on leaving that office, he found employment in a store at Talala under the direction of Chief Rogers, and early in 1900 located at Bartlesville. His first year in that city was in the employ of George B. Keeler in the merchandise business, and he has since brought the score of his activities and has been prominent as a real estate man, in insurance fields, also in the oil and gas industry and in political life. He established at Bartlesville the Red Cross Pharmacy, and has been connected with the. First National Bank, the Bartlesville Foundry and Machine Works and the Bartlesville-Dewey Interurban Company. As a real estate man he opened McDaniel Addition comprising eighty acres in Southern Bartles- ville.

While successful as a business man Mr. McDaniel has also been a man of leadership in local politics. In 1903 he was elected mayor of Bartlesville and served four consecutive one-year terms, and in 1908 was re-elected for two years, but served only 11% years before the inauguration of the commission form of government. As a former Cherokee citizen he was selected as a member of the commission, with E. L. Cookson and W. W. Hastings as associates, which during 1906-07 wound up the affairs of the Cherokee govern- ment as one of the steps preparatory to statehood. In

the democratic party he has served as chairman of the County Campaign Committee and is one of the most influential democrats in Northeastern Oklahoma. He assumed the duties of his office as postmaster at Bartles- ville on March 16, 1915. The Bartlesville office is a first class office.

Mr. McDaniel is a York and Scottish Rite Mason and a member of the Mystic Shrine, and also affiliates with the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. His first wife was Miss Ella Musgrove, and his one child, Fred- erick William, comes from that union. In November, 1908, he married Miss Rosanna Harnage, a native of the Cherokee Nation, and a son was born by the second marriage, F. Maser MeDaniel, born in 1909.

BENJAMIN NELSON WOODSON. Probably few of the men of Oklahoma who have been so uniformly successful in varied lines of activity have found the time to so generously devote to the welfare of their communities than has Benjamin Nelson Woodson, who at various times in his career has been lawyer, jurist, legislator, agriculturist, prominent politician and able journalist, and who, at this time, is editor and proprietor of the Walters New Era, at Walters. Mr. Woodson was born at Houstonville, Lincoln County, Kentucky, February 25, 1850, and is a son of James P. and Mary (Ison) Wood- son.

James P. Woodson was born in Rockingham County, North Carolina, in 1818, and was seventeen years of age when he went to Casey County, Kentucky. Later he moved to Lincoln County, in the same state, and in 1854 went to Honey Grove, Texas, where he passed the rest of his life, dying in 1892. He was a hardware merchant during the greater part of his life and through good business ability and steady industry accumulated a satis- fying competence. In early life a whig, with the organi- zation of the republican party he gave it his support, and his religious views were those of the Methodist Epis- copal Church, of which he was a lifelong member. He was a Mason. During the Civil war he joined the Con- federate army, but saw no active service. Mr. Woodson married Miss Mary Ison, who was born in Garrett County, Kentucky, in 1819, and she died at Honey Grove, Fannin County, Texas, in 1891. Eleven children were born to them, namely: Martha Ann, Bettie and Jennie, who are all deceased; Emma. who married James Boone, a retired contractor and builder of Fort Worth, Texas; Virginia, widow of the late George Daley, a druggist, residing in California; Benjamin Nelson, of this notice; James, deceased, who at the time of his demise was holding a position in the state auditor's office, at Austin, Texas; Lorena, who is the widow of Joseph Kendell, an educator and at the time of his death the state superin- tendent of the State Normal at Denton, Texas, Mrs. Kendell being now a resident of Dallas, Texas; John T., who is a merchant of Childress County, Texas; Robert, who is a merchant of Era, Colorado; and William, who died in infancy.

Benjamin Nelson Woodson belongs to a family which originated in England and came to the Virginia Colony in 1620. He received his preliminary education in the public school at Honey Grove, Fannin County, Texas, and was subsequently graduated from Pritchett College, Glasgow, Missouri, in 1875, receiving the degree of pro- ficiency. Later he entered the law department of the University of the City of New York, where he was grad- uated in 1876, at which time Ulysses S. Grant, Junior, was sworn in, although a graduate of Columbia Univer- sity. Returning to Honey Grove, Texas, Mr. Woodson engaged in the practice of law, and was elected state's attorney for Fannin County, an office which he retained

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for two terms. On April 22, 1889, he removed to Okla- homa City and engaged ir. the practice of his profession, remaining there for five years with a full measure of success. He was the representative of Texas on the famous committee of fourteen that was selected at a mass meeting in Oklahoma City to survey and lay off the city into lots and blocks, streets and alleys, and took an active part in all the public affairs of the city until he left for Kay County. He was chairman of the com- mittee that settled the contest on the Gault 80 of the city. In 1893 he went to the Cherokee Strip, where he was appointed county judge by Governor Renfrow, a capacity in which he acted to the end of the term and lived there for seven years, and in 1901 came to Kiowa County, Oklahoma, where he opened an office for the practice of his profession in Hobart. While there he was honored by election to the last Territorial Senate, the twelfth session, in which he represented Kiowa and Washita counties, in 1904. After five years in Kiowa County, Mr. Woodson removed to a ranch and proved up a homestead in the south end of Greer County, which afterwards became Jackson County, this property being situated nine miles from Altus. He was there elected county judge in 1911 and served as such two years, and January 1, 1913, came to Walters and pur- chased the Walters New Era, a democratic organ which had been founded in 1901 by J. A. Stockton. The suc- cess which has been attained by Mr. Woodson in his journalistic work would seem to prove, as claimed by many, that editors, like poets, are born, not made. The qualities which make a successful journalist are inbred and no amount of study can supply the lack of a keen- ness of observation, acute perceptions of the tastes of the public, and accurate judgment on matters treated in various newspaper departments. While it has a respectable foreign list, the New Era circulates princi- pally in Cotton and the neighboring counties, and is the democratic organ of Cotton County, as well as the official city paper of Walters. The commodious and well- equipped offices are located on Broadway, and are fitted with all appliances and machinery to be found in the modern newspaper and printing office.

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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