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 77
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84 | Part 85 | Part 86 | Part 87 | Part 88 | Part 89 | Part 90 | Part 91 | Part 92 | Part 93 | Part 94 | Part 95 | Part 96 | Part 97 | Part 98 | Part 99 | Part 100 | Part 101 | Part 102 | Part 103 | Part 104 | Part 105 | Part 106 | Part 107 | Part 108 | Part 109 | Part 110 | Part 111 | Part 112 | Part 113 | Part 114 | Part 115 | Part 116
Albert Chapman Farley was born in Mercer County,
Virginia, October 18, 1867. The Farley family is one of Colonial American stock, its ancestors having come from Ireland and located in Virginia. His father, H. F. Farley, was born in Virginia in October, 1835, and is still living at the age of eighty years in Exeter, Mis- souri. Farming was his occupation throughout his active years, and in 1895 he moved to Southwest Missouri, and for several years has been retired. During the war between the states he was for four years in McCaus- land's Brigade under General Lee in the Confederate army. H. F. Farley married Araminta Hughes, who was born in Virginia in 1839. Their children are: A. P., an attorney in West Virginia; Albert C .; Sally, who lives in Monroe County, West Virginia, the widow of William M. Ellison, who was au extensive cattle buyer and a prominent man in that state; Emma Anna, who died at the age of eleven years; William A., who occu- pies a farm at Washburn, Missouri; and Mima, wife of Charles G. Via, living on a farm near Winslow, Arkansas.
Professor Farley grew up on a farm in West Vir- ginia, attended public schools, aud in 1885 was gradu- ated from the Third District Normal School of that state. In the meantime he had already taught four terms in West Virginia, and after finishing his normal course moved to Northern Arkansas and continued his work in the district schools. He also continued his edu- cation, and from the Mount Vernon College as it was then called, was graduated with the class of 1892 and the degree A. B., and two years later was granted the degree A. M. Then followed about twenty years of active work in the State of Missouri, during which he was superintendent of schools in Washburn four years, in Republic six years, in Eldorado Springs three years, at Excelsior Springs four years and at Harrisonville three years. He has taken the opportunity given by his summer vacations to attend the University of Missouri, where he specialized in agriculture, manual training and several of the sciences.
Professor Farley came to Oklahoma in 1911 to become superintendent of the public schools of Perry, remained there until 1913, when he accepted the position of instructor in mathematics in the high school at Enid, and in December, 1914, was called to Lawton as presi- dent of the Cameron District Agricultural College. While in Missouri he served as school commissioner of Barry County from 1894 to 1896, and also held member- ship on the county board of education in that state under appointment from various state superintendents. Mr. Farley has long been identified with the profes- sional organizations in the field of education and has been almost constantly at work for more than twenty years engaged in supervising and inspiring other teachers.
In politics he is a democrat, and is a member of the Baptist Church. While living at Excelsior Springs he was an active member of Lodge No. 1001 of the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and has filled all the chairs except that of exalted ruler. He is a member and past noble grand of Perry Lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. He is a past ad- visor of Excelsior Springs Camp of the Modern Wood- men of America. He is also a member of the Lawton Chamber of Commerce.
At Shady Spring, West Virginia, in 1888, Professor Farley married Miss Lucile Lilly, whose father, J. E. Lilly, was a prominent stock raiser at Shady Spring. They are the parents of two children, Sydney J., who graduated from the high school at Eldorado Springs, Missouri, and is a travelling salesman in Texas; Ross
e
of
te
S.
d
a
18
10
3,
centu
case
He b
durin
peric
phile
bom
1914
attor
cour
En
pie of
cer
se
La
be
Har
shor
D., & 8 COR
a res
1209
HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA
D., a graduate of the Harrisonville High School and now a commercial salesman in Iowa.
WILLIAM MACE HARRISON. To William Mace Harrison, a resident of Muskogee for more than a quarter of a century, belongs the distinction of having tried the first case in the United States Court in the Indian Territory. He has been engaged in practice here since 1889, and during this time has been associated, during various periods, with some of the ablest attorneys in the state, while his personal reputation has grown and extended, so that he is accounted one of the leaders of the Okla- homa bar, a recognition that led to his appointment, in 1914, to his present office of United States probate attorney at Muskogee.
William Mace Harrison was born at Monticello, the county seat of Drew County, Arkansas, August 27, 1854, and is a son of William Mace and Permelia (Fairchild) Harrison. His father was born and reared on the eastern shore of Maryland, and came of Revolutionary stock and English ancestry. He began life under rather inaus- picious circumstances, for he was a cripple and the son of poor parents, but through assiduous private study gained a good education, and through perseverance over- came the obstacles which lay in his path and eventually rose to prominence and independence. The years passed in hard, unending study finally gained for him a teacher's certificate and he entered upon his career as an educator, gradually drifting to Vicksburg, Mississippi, where he secured a position as clerk in a mercantile establishment. Later he removed to what is now Drew County, Arkan- sas, and there took up his residence at a little hamlet bearing the picturesque name of "Rough-and-Ready." Upon the organization of Drew County, William Mace Harrison, Sr., removed to Monticello, the county seat, and there lived for many years. He had not ceased to study with the acquiring of his teacher's license, but had applied himself to gaining a knowledge of the law, and soon after locating at Monticello took the examination and was admitted to practice in the courts of Arkansas. He rapidly rose in his profession, attracted to himself a lucrative business, was next honored by election to the office of judge of the Circuit Court, in which he served for many years, and was finally elevated to the high office of justice of the Supreme Court of Arkansas. Thus the poor, uneducated, crippled boy grew through the force of his own efforts into a man reaching one of the most distinguished positions with which an honored profession could reward him. Truly a lesson may be found in his career. Prior to the beginning of the Civil war, Judge Harrison had been elected to the Senate of the state, and was one of the few members of that body who counselled Arkansas remaining with the Union. During the period of the great conflict that followed, he was known as a Union man, and when the war closed he joined the ranks of the republican party. When he. be- lieved that that organization, because of its policy during the reconstruction period, had become corrupt, he trans- ferred his support to the democratic party, with which he continued to act until the time of his death. It was as a democrat that he was elected judge of the Circuit Court, but it was a republican governor who appointed him to a vacancy on the Supreme bench of Arkansas, an appointment which was not political, but which came as an appreciation of his conscientious labors, and a thorough belief in his fitness for the office and his knowl- edge and erudition, While a member of the Supreme Court, Judge Harrison removed to Pine Bluff, Arkansas, in 1869, and resided there until the time of his death, in 1900, in that city, he being then eighty-two years of age.
His wife died in 1897. Of their children, five sons and
two daughters, two are deceased, one son and one daughter.
William Mace Harrison of this review was fourteen years of age when his parents removed to Pine Bluff, and his education came from St. John's College, a Masonic School, at Little Rock, and the University of Arkansas. In 1880 he was graduated from law at the University of Virginia, and it is interesting to note that one of his classmates was Woodrow Wilson, who was to become President of the United States. Mr. Harrison practiced law at Pine Bluff, Arkansas, until 1887, in which year he removed to Sherman, Texas, but after about two years there changed his place of residence to Muskogee, where he resumed the practice of his calling in the spring of 1889. In Muskogee he has been associated with several lawyers in the practice of his calling, as partners, in- cluding G. W. Pasco, Z. T. Walrond, Judge John R. Thomas and Judge F. L. McCain. Under an appoint- ment from President Cleveland, Mr. Harrison served as United States commissioner, and during that time was located at Cameron, in the Choctaw Nation, Indian Terri- tory, On February 26, 1914, he was appointed United States probate attorney at Muskogee, and still retains this position. While residing at Pine Bluff, Arkansas, Mr. Harrison served as city judge and as assistant prose: cuting attorney. In politics he is a democrat. Mr. Harri- son is a past grand chancellor of the Knights of Pythias, and is well known in that order, having helped to or- ganize, in 1890, the Grand Lodge of Knights of Pythias in Indian Territory. He is a Presbyterian, as are the members of his family.
In 1887 Mr. Harrison married at Holly Grove, Arkan- sas, Miss Margaret Dial, daughter of Capt. J. H. Dial, a prominent planter of Eastern Arkansas. Three children have been born to this union, of whom one is deceased, the survivors being: Jere Fairchild, an expert electrical engineer, now connected with the Carolina Electric Light and Power Company, at Raleigh, North Carolina; and William Mace III, who is fourteen years of age and a student in the public schools of Muskogee, Oklahoma.
JOSEPH H. EVANS. From his youth to the present time Mr. Evans has been closely and prominently identi- fied with the oil industry, of which he first became a representative in his native State of Pennsylvania, and during a period of virtually forty years he has continued a prominent and influential figure in the developing of oil and gas fields in different sections of the Union, his long experience having made him a recognized authority in this line of industrial enterprise of which he has be- come one of the prominent and successful exponents in Oklahoma. Mr. Evans has been concerned with the development of important and extensive oil and gas enterprises in Oklahoma since 1904, and has the distinc- tion of having been the first person to initiate operations in the practical exploiting of the natural-gas fields of this state. He is one of the progressive, well known and highly esteemed citizens of Tulsa, in which city he main- tains his business headquarters at 1112 South Main Street, and his residence at 410 South Denver Street. He is first vice president of the Devonian Oil Company, with headquarters in the City of Pittsburgh, Pennsyl- vania, and he was one of the organizers of the Okla- homa Natural Gas Company, of which he is first vice president, his holdings in connection with oil and gas development work in Oklahoma being of broad scope and importance.
Joseph H. Evans was born in the Village of President, Venango County, Pennsylvania, on the 16th of May, 1851, and is a son of John and Mary (Kiser) Evans, the former of whom was born at Courtney, Washington County, that state, and the latter at Elk City, Clarion
1210
HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA
County, Pennsylvania. The father died in 1867, at the age of fifty-five years, and his widow attained to the age of seventy-two years. Of the eleven children four are living, the subject of this review having been the sixth in order of birth. John Evans was a representative of a family early founded in Pennsylvania, and the lineage traces back to sterling Welsh origin. He became a suc- cessful farmer and lumberman in the old Keystone State, where for many years he operated a sawmill and manu- factured lumber upon a substantial scale, besides having been the owner of a well improved farm. In politics he was aligned with the whig party until the organization of the republican party, when he transferred his al- legiance to the latter, of the principles and policies of which he thereafter continued a staunch advocate.
Joseph H. Evans gained his early education in the public schools at Snydersburg, Clarion County, Pennsyl- vania, and at the age of sixteen years he found employ- ment as a teamster in the hauling of oil products from wells in the field about Shamburg, Venango County, that state, where later he assisted in the operation of the oil pumps and the dressing of tools. In 1871, at the age of twenty years, Mr. Evans engaged in contracting for the putting down of oil wells, and after devoting his attention to independent operations in this enterprise about one year in Pennsylvania, he went to Minneapolis, Minnesota, in which city he obtained a position as a timber cruiser for one of the leading companies engaged in lumbering operations in that state. In this capacity he made extended trips of inspection through the wilds of Northern Minnesota, along the course of the Missis- sippi River and as far north as Lake Itasca. He thus gained much experience in connection with pioneer lum- bering operations in the Gopher State, where he con- tinued his services as a cruiser and inspector until 1876. In this, the Centennial year, he returned for a visit to the old home of his mother, at Elk City, Pennsylvania, and there resumed his association with oil operations. In that year he put down, on the farm of his maternal grandfather, Joseph Kiser, the first oil well in that locality. This well gave a production of 125 barrels a day and the output was placed on the market at prices ranging from $3.50 to $4.25 a barrel. In 1877 Mr. Evans removed to Bradford, McKean County, that state, where he continued to be identified with the drilling of oil wells and the developing of the incidental business until 1888. In the year mentioned he became a pioneer and expert in the developing of the oil fields in the vicinity of Lima, Ohio, but in the following year he returned to Pennsylvania and established his residence in the City of Beaver, the judicial center of the county of the same name. In 1891 Mr. Evans became one of the organizers of the Devonian Oil Company, at Pittsburgh, and was made the first secretary of the company upon its incor- poration. Of this position he continued the incumbent until 1909, since which time he has served as first vice president of the company, the operations of which have been of large and important order. As an active execu- tive and practical authority Mr. Evans assisted in the driving of wells and the developing of the oil business for this company in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, with headquarters in the City of Pittsburgh, where he continued to maintain his resi- dence until the spring of 1904, when he came to Okla- homa Territory and established his residence at Tulsa. He has been one of the able and influential pioneers in the developing of the excellent and valuable oil and natural-gas fields of Oklahoma, and was the very first to initiate the development of natural gas within the bor- ders of the present state, as intimated in the opening paragraph of this article. This notable work was accom- plished by his opening of the gas well in the Hogshoot
District, in Washington County, from which locality the gas was piped to the City of Muskogee. In 1905 Mr. Evans here organized the Caney River Gas Company, and in 1907, the year that marked the admission of the state to the Union, he organized the Oklahoma National Gas Company, of which he has since served as first vice president. This corporation has extensive and valuable holdings and its producing properties are among the best in the Southwest. At Tulsa Mr. Evans is a director of the Exchange National Bank and vice president of the McEwen Manufacturing Company, which represents one of the important industrial enterprises of the city.
In politics Mr. Evans has never swerved in his al- legiance to the republican party, and though he is liberal and loyal in all that makes for good citizenship he is essentially a man of business and has had no predilec- tion for the honors or emoluments of public office or for participation in the turbulence of so called practical politics. Mr. Evans has been affiliated with the Masonic fraternity since 1874, when he became an entered ap- prentice in Sherburne County Lodge, No. 96, Ancient Free & Accepted Masons, at Elk River, Minnesota, a lodge in which he remained until after being raised to Master Mason. In the City of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, he retains his affiliation with Pittsburgh Commandery, No. 1, Knights Templar, and with the consistory of the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite, in which he has received the thirty-second degree.
In June, 1877, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Evans to Miss Jennie M. Donaldson, who was born in the State of New York, and they have two children -- Harry C. and May D.
WIRT FRANKLIN. Maintaining his residence at Ard- more, the attractive metropolis and judicial center of Carter County, Mr. Franklin is actively and prominently identified with oil production in the fields of this part of the state and is one of the wideawake, progressive and popular young business men and public-spirited citizens of the favored commonwealth in which he has found ample opportunity for the achieving of independence and definite success.
Mr. Franklin is a scion of colonial stock in both the. paternal and maternal lines, and is a representative of the sterling old family of which Benjamin Franklin was a distinguished member. William H. Franklin, grand- father of him whose name introduces this article, was born in Mercer County, Kentucky, on the 13th of June, 1813, and as a young man he became a pioneer settler of Macomb in McDonough County, Illinois. He was a prominent lawyer and influential citizen of that county and was a member of the. Illinois militia during the Black Hawk war. He attained the patriarchal age of more than ninety years and died in the City of Houston, Texas, while there for a visit, in 1904. The original progenitors of the Franklin family in America came from England in the seventeenth century and settled in Vir- ginia. each succeeding generation having given strong and worthy men to aid in civic and material develop- ment and progress in various states of the Union.
William Blake Hudgins, the maternal grandfather of the subject of this sketch, was born in Kentucky, in the year 1820, served as a stalwart and gallant soldier in the Seminole Indian war and was a pioneer in Missouri, where he became a prosperous agriculturist and stock- grower. He died at Fayetteville, Arkansas, in 1894, and his death was the direct result of a severe wound which he received while serving in the Seminole war, the bullet having never been extracted from his body.
Wirt Franklin was born at the home of his maternal grandmother, in Richmond, Missouri, on the 22d of March, 1883, the home of his parents at the time having
R
Ci fe ti
he be
bee bee mo (H M Ma his eat
tb
tio
Ri
1211
HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA
been at Junction City, Kansas, and his mother having been at the time of his birth a guest in the home of her mother. Mr. Franklin is a son of John H. and Irene (Hudgins) Franklin, the former of whom was born in McDonough County, Illinois, in 1853, and the latter of whom was born at Richmond, Missouri, on the 12th of May, 1855. John H. Franklin was reared to adult age in his native county, and in addition to receiving good edu- cational advantages he there learned the trade of teleg- rapher. As a telegraph operator he found employment at Richmond, Missouri, where he met and wedded Miss Irene Hudgins. In the meanwhile he gave close attention to the reading of law. In company with his young wife he finally returned to Macomb, Illinois, where he proved himself eligible for and was admitted to the bar of his native state. Within a short time he removed to Junc- tion City, Kansas, where he engaged in the practice of law. In 1887 he removed to Russell, that state, where he built up a large and important law business and became a prominent and influential citizen. During the administration of President Harrison Mr. Franklin served four years as deputy auditor of the fiscal de- partment of the United States War Department, in the City of Washington, D. C., and in 1892 he returned to Illinois, where he continued in the practice of his pro- fession in Toluca, until 1895. In the autumn of the fol- lowing year he removed to Lacon, Illinois, where he con- tinued in practice until 1907. He then, just prior to the admission of Oklahoma to statehood, came to this vigorous commonwealth and engaged in the practice of law at Lawton, the judicial center of Comanche County. He has since continued his successful practice at that place and has gained secure prestige as one of the representa- tive members of the Oklahoma bar. His political alle- giance is given to the republican party, and while a resi- dent of Kansas he served as prosecuting attorney of Russell County, besides which he held in Illinois the office of state's attorney of Marshall County, a position of which he continued the incumbent twelve years. He and his wife are members of the Congregational Church and in the state of their adoption their circle of friends is limited only by that of their acquaintances. Of their children the eldest is Mabel, who resides in Los Angeles, California, and who is the widow of William H. Ocker, her husband having been a skilled operator of wireless telegraphy. Blake is a lawyer by profession and is serving as assistant general counsel for the Pacific Mutual Life Insurance Company, in Los Angeles, Cali- fornia. Wirt, the subject of this review, was the next in order of birth. Veta completed in 1915 a post graduate course in domestic science and arts at Columbia Uni- versity, New York City, and is now at the parental home. Junia is the wife of Frank M. Head, who is engaged in the insurance business at Lawton, Oklahoma. Harry is in the employ of the Crystal Oil Company, in the Heald- ton oil field of Oklahoma.
Wirt Franklin gained his rudimentary education in the public schools of Russell, Kansas, 1889-91, and there- after attended the public schools of the City of Wash- ington during the four years that the family home was maintained in the national capital. Thereafter he con- tinued his educational work in turn at Macomb, Gales- burg and Lacon, Illinois, in the high school of which last mentioned city he was graduated as a member of the. class of 1900. For the ensuing two years he was a student in Columbian University, now designated George Washington University, in the City of Washington, and in the meanwhile he had learned stenography and type- writing.
In February, 1902, Mr. Franklin assumed a position in the service of the Dawes Commission, at Muskogee, Indian Territory, and he held this association two years.
Thereafter he did effective service as law clerk in charge of the preparation of decision matters pertaining to enrolment matters in the Choctaw and Chickasaw nations. He resigned this post in October, 1905, and, duly fortified by prior study and by attendance in the law depart- ment of the Columbia University, he then engaged in the practice of law at Muskogee, in partnership with Samuel A. Apple. The firm opened also an office at Ardmore, and the partnership alliance continued until June, 1906, when the law business of the two offices was consolidated at Ardmore, where Mr. Franklin built up and con- trolled a substantial law practice, in which he devoted special attention to Indian citizenship cases presented before the Department of the Interior and before Indian committees in Congress, and to land contests in the land offices of the Dawes Commission.
Since 1913 Mr. Franklin has found it expedient to lay aside his law practice and give his time to his important activities in connection with the oil-producing industry, of which he has become a prominent and influential rep- resentative in Southern Oklahoma. He maintains his offices in the Baird Building at Ardmore, and was one of the pioneer operators in the Healdton oil field. He aided in effecting the first leases of land and in the drill- ing of the first well in this now important field. In this enterprise he formed a partnership association with Roy M. Johnson, concerning whom individual menton is made on other pages of this work. In this field he holds six hundred acres of land, and the holdings of the firm of Apple & Franklin, in which his coadjutor is his former law partner, have a valuation of approx- imately half a million dollars. Mr. Franklin was the first president of the Crystal Oil Company and is still a member of its directorate. He is treasurer of the Apple- Franklin Oil Company, president of the Ardmore Oil Producers Association, and president of the Plains Oil & Gas Company. Further and tangible evidences of the success that has attended the well ordered endeavors of Mr. Franklin are those given in his ownership of 1,000 acres of valuable land in Southern Oklahoma and approx- imately $25,000 worth of city property in Ardmore.
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.