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. IV, Part 10

Author: Thoburn, Joseph B. (Joseph Bradfield), 1866-1941
Publication date: 1916
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 656

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. IV > Part 10

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Rev. Samuel H. Raudebaugh is indebted to the schools of Fairfield and Hancock Counties, Ohio, for his early educational discipline, which was supplemented by an effective course in a well ordered normal school in Allen County, that state. As a young man he put his scholastic attainments to practical test and utilization and was for Vol. IV-3

several years a successful and popular teacher in the schools of Putnam County, Ohio.

When the Civil war was precipitated on a divided nation Mr. Raudebaugh waited only for consistent oppor- tunity to tender his aid in defense of the Union, and his military career, marked by many thrilling incidents, shall ever redound to the honor of his name. On the 5th of December, 1862, he enlisted as a private in Company K, Sixty-fifth Ohio Volunteer Infantry, his brother, . Peter O., having become a member of the same company. Mr. Raudebaugh enlisted as a recruit to this regiment, which was at the time attached to the Army of the Cum- berland, under Gen. O. O. Howard. Mr. Raudebaugh lived up to the full tension of the great internecine con- flict and participated with his command in sixteen important battles, besides many skirmishes and other minor engagements. He took part in and was captured at the battle of Stone's River, but by feigning death he contrived to make good his escape. He was in the battle of Missionary Ridge and in all the incidental engage- ments of the Atlanta campaign, from that of Rocky Face Ridge, on the 8th of May, 1864, to the battles of Atlanta and Jonesboro, terminating the summer's cam- paign, on September 4th of that year. At the battle of Franklin, Tennessee, November 30, 1864, he was cap- tured by the enemy, and for four months and one day he was confined in the odious Andersonville Prison, from which he was released on the 31st of March, 1865. With other comrades who had there been confined he then proceeded to the City of Vicksburg, and with many other Union soldiers boarded the ill-fated Mississippi River packet-steamer Sultana, retained as a transport vessel in the Federal service, for the purpose of making his way back to his home state. On the 27th of April, 1865, as history records as one of the most lamentable incidents of the Civil war, this steamer was literally blown into fragments by the explosion of its boilers, the result of the frightful disaster being that 1,457 men, principally Union soldiers, lost their lives. Mr. Raudebaugh was among the few survivors of this memorable disaster, and though he had been fortunate in having escaped other than nominal wounds in the many important battles in which he had taken part, he received severe injuries in the wrecking of the Sultana, the survivors of which great disaster do not exceed 100 in 1915. Mr. Raudebaugh finally arrived at Camp Chase, at Columbus, Ohio, and there he received his honorable discharge on the 20th of May, 1865. His continued interest in his old comrades has been shown by his active and appreciative affiliation with the Grand Army of the Republic, in which he has served as chaplain and held other official positions.

After the close of the war Mr. Raudebaugh purchased a farm in Putnam County, Ohio, where for two years he devoted his attention to agricultural pursuits and to teaching in the district schools during the winter terms. In 1867, after careful study and other earnest prepara- tion, he entered the ministry of the United Brethren Church, of which he had become a member when a mere boy. He pursued a thorough course of ecclesiastical and philosophical reading uuder the auspices of the San- dusky Conference of the United Brethren Church and was then formally ordained a clergyman of this church. He continned his ministerial services in the Sandusky Conference of Ohio, held divers important pastoral charges and was given distinguished conference prefer- ments, and labored with all of zeal and ability in his native state until he was transferred to the conference of the newly organized State of Oklahoma, in 1907. During his first year of service in this new field of labor he held a pastoral charge at Alva, Woods County, and for three years thereafter he had pastoral charge of the United

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Brethren congregation at Dacoma. He resigned his active pastorate in December, 1914, and is now living virtually retired in his pleasant home in Dacoma, though he is still retained on the supernumerary ministerial list of his church and holds himself ready to respond to all calls made upon him for further service. He is well known in Woods County and commands the highest place in popular confidence and esteem. In addition to being . a comrade of the Grand Army of the Republic he is affiliated also with the Masonic fraternity and the Inde- pendent Order of Odd Fellows. Mr. Raudebaugh entered a soldier's claim to a tract of land in Oklahoma prior to the admission of the state to the Union, and he perfected his title to this property in 1891.

Mr. Raudebaugh has been thrice wedded. On the 2d of October, 1862, he married Miss Sarah E. Godfrey, who was born November 29, 1842, and whose death occurred February 14, 1870. Of this union were born four children: Ruth Jane was born November 1, 1866, and died May 4, 1887; Mary Ann was born November 22, 1865, and died on the 4th of the following month; Laura E. was born February 14, 1869, and died on the 14th of the following month; John Henry was born Feb- ruary 5, 1870, and now resides in the City of Toledo, Ohio.

On the 26th of May, 1870, Mr. Raudebaugh wedded Mrs. Caroline W. Baker, who was born July 22, 1834, and who passed to eternal rest on the 4th of February, 1873, the one child of this union being Grace Maria, who was born November 27, 1872, and who is the wife of Elijah Quisno, of Port Clinton, Ohio.

On the 17th of August, 1873, was solemnized the mar- riage of Mr. Raudebaugh to Mrs. Amelia A. Mugg, widow of Wheeler Mugg. Mrs. Raudebaugh has one daughter by her first marriage -- Grace B., who was born May 11, 1869, and who is now the wife of Adam Voll- mer, a representative farmer of Woods County, Okla- homa, their two children being Hallie L. and Graham T.

WALTER J. TURNBULL. The last principal chief of the Choctaw Nation to be elected is the youngest ever hon- ored with that office. Mr. Turnbull was elected at the age of twenty-eight years. The position of principal chief was once the most distinguished office to which an ambitious Choctaw might. aspire. He was elected by a popular vote after an exciting campaign of many days. Green McCurtain, several times chief, was the last gov- ernor elected by a popular vote. At his death the position was filled by the appointment of Victor M. Locke, Jr., of Antlers, who still holds the position. However, since the appointment by President Taft, the Choctaws have met in delegated conventions and chosen as their chief Walter Jonathan Turnbull. Whether he shall ever wear the head- dress of the Choctaw Chieftain is to be decided by Presi- dent Wilson. If he does not he remains the last elected chief.

Now serving as county attorney of Bryan County, with home at Durant, Walter J. Turnbull is one of the well educated and most talented of Oklahoma's Indian citi- zens. He was born ten miles east of Caddo on July 20, 1886. The Turnbull family have for many years been prominently known in the nation of Choctaws.

Walter J. Turnbull began his education in the neigli- borhood schools of his home community, for two years attended the Sacred Heart Mission School near Shawnee, and in 1901 entered the preparatory department of the Durant Presbyterian College, which is now the Oklahoma Presbyterian College for Girls. In 1905 he was gradu- ated from the preparatory school and in the fall of 1906 entered Washington and Lee University at Lexington, Virginia, for a special course. The next year he entered

the law school, and was graduated LL. B. in June, 1909. In December of the same year he was admitted to the bar and began practice at Bokchito, Oklahoma. Since 1910 Mr. Turnbull has been located at Durant, where he was first in partnership with Judge S. H. Kyle. However, in October, 1910, he returned to Caddo and remained there until November, 1911, when he came back to Durant as assistant county attorney under J. T. McIntosh, who is now state senator. In 1912 Mr. Turnbull was elected county attorney of Bryan County and was re-elected in 1914.

While in college he was a member of a college fra- ternity, and is also affiliated with the Masonic Order, the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks and the Wood- men of the World. In religious life he is a member of the Presbyterian Church and politically he is a democrat.

On August 27, 1910, Mr. Turnbull married Miss Lucile McCarty, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. C. M. McCarty of Durant. Mrs. Turnbull was educated in the Texas Pres- byterian College for Girls at Milford, Texas, and in the Central College of Lexington, Missouri. To their mar- riage have been born one son, Walter Jonathan, Jr., born September 20, 1912. Mr. and Mrs. Turnbull are among the leaders in social circles at Durant.

SAMUEL W. HAYES. Prominent among those who have wielded large and beneficent influence in the affairs of the vital young commonwealth of Oklahoma is Judge Samuel Walter Hayes, who was a member of the state constitutional convention, and who retired, in the spring of 1914, from the office of chief justice of the Supreme Court of the state to become a candidate, in the pri- mary election, for representative of Oklahoma in the United States Senate, but who met defeat in the pri- maries, though he received strong and representative sup- port. The judge has resumed the private practice of his profession, in Oklahoma City, and has been a representa- tive member of the bar of Oklahoma from the territorial epoch.

Judge Hayes was born at Huntsville, the judicial center of Madison County, Arkansas, on the 17th of September, 1875, and he is a son of John and Mollie (Cox) Hayes, the former a native of Tennessee and the latter of Missouri. In 1877 the family removed to Texas, where the father continued to be successfully identified with agricultural pursuits until 1912, when he came to Oklahoma, where he and his wife still maintain their residence and where he is now living virtually retired.

The public schools of the Lone Star State afforded to Judge Hayes his early educational discipline, and later he pursued a higher course of study in the historic old Uni- versity of Virginia, at Charlottesville. In 1897, shortly after attaining to his legal majority, Judge Hayes came to Oklahoma Territory, and at Ryan he began the study of law in the office of a representative member of the territorial bar. He made substantial progress in his assimilation of the involved science of jurisprudence and in 1899 he was duly admitted to the bar. He forth- with engaged in the practice of his profession at Ryan, where he formed a partnership with Eugene E. Morris, under the firm name of Morris & Hayes. This effective alliance continued until 1902, when Judge Hayes removed to Chickasha, where he became junior member of the law firm of Welborne & Hayes. There he continued in the successful practice of his profession until 1907, when he was elected a justice of the Supreme Court of the state, which was admitted to the Union in that year. He continued his able services on the Supreme Bench until his resignation, in April, 1914, as previously inti- mated, and from 1913 until his retirement he was chief justice of this important tribunal, in the formulating

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and dispensation of whose functions he played an influen- tial part, his record in this important office now consti- tuting an integral part of the history of Oklahoma juris- prudence. While engaged in practice at Ryan Judge Hayes was elected the first city attorney of that thriv- ing municipality, in 1900. The Judge is identified with the American Bar Association and is also an active and valued member of both the Oklahoma State Bar Associa- tion and the Oklahoma County Bar Association.

Judge Hayes has been one of the influential and resourceful representatives of the democratic party in Oklahoma and has been active in political affairs under both territorial and state government. He was a dele- gate to the state constitutional convention of Oklahoma, in 1906, as representative of the Chickasha district, and he wielded much influence in the deliberations and work of that historic assembly, in which he served as chairman of the legal advisory committee and the committee on schedules, besides being a member of the important judiciary committee and that on Federal relations. In this connection it is probable that his most important service to the new commonwealth was rendered when he was selected, with Walter A. Ledbetter and Charles L. Moore, by the members of the constitutional conven- tion and prominent citizens of the state and who went, in the recess of the convention, to the City of Wash- ington, D. C., where they obtained an interview with President Roosevelt and also United States Attorney General Bonaparte, the latter having not been at the time in favor of granting statehood to Oklahoma. The committee presented its case vigorously both to the President and the attorney general and obtained their opinions as to the provisions that should be made for the constitution of Oklahoma to secure favorable action on the part of the President. The committee then returned to Oklahoma and in the constitutional convention so effectively presented their ideas and those of the officials at Washington that a constitution was framed in such a way that President Roosevelt could consistently do nothing else than issue his proclamation in favor of the admission of Oklahoma to the Union. Since the admis- sion of the state Judge Hayes has been most loyal and zealous in his efforts to forward the interests of the new commonwealth and to make its governmental basis secure and steadfast.

In a fraternal way Judge Hayes is identified with the lodge and chapter bodies of York Rite Masonry and with the Knights. of Pythias. He is a member of the Okla- homa City Country Club and the Oklahoma City Men's Dinner Club, and both he and his wife hold membership in the Methodist Episcopal Church. As a representative of his profession the Judge delivers an annual lecture in the law department of the University of Oklahoma.

On the 8th of October, 1899, Judge Hayes wedded Miss Ida Poole, daughter of Thomas F. and Margaret Poole, of Ryan, this state, and she was summoned to the life eternal on the 24th of March, 1910, being survived by three children,-Kenton B., Ruby and Ida, all of whom remain at the paternal home. In June, 1912, was solemn- ized the marriage of Judge Hayes to Miss Mamie McCol- loch, who was born in the State of Tennessee and who at the time of her marriage was in charge of the depart- ment of English in the Northwestern Normal School of Oklahoma, at Alva. In Oklahoma City the family home is at 924 West Nineteenth Street.

SAMUEL A. BROWN. In view of his early and prom- inent association with the inception of agricultural in- dustry in Oklahoma, there is not a little consistency in the fate that today Mr. Brown controls a substantial business in the handling of real estate in the common- wealth within whose borders he was one of the first to

initiate and successfully develop the agricultural re- sources of the state, this work having been achieved by him more than a quarter of a century ago, and prior to the organization of Oklahoma Territory. It thus becomes evident that he is entitled to full pioneer honors, and it may further be stated that he has been distinctively one of the founders and upbuilders of the vital young com- monwealth in which he has long maintained his home and in which his circle of friends is coincident with that of his acquaintances. He now maintains his home in the fine little Town of Aylesworth, Marshall County, where he is successfully engaged in the real-estate and loan business, as one of the prominent representatives of this line of enterprise in that vigorous county.

An excellent account of the early activities of Mr. Brown after he had come to Oklahoma has been given by one who made close investigation, and from this record are taken, with but slight paraphrase, the follow- ing interesting quotations :

"The year 1888 found agricultural industry in its very infancy in Indian Territory, and for that reason the man that made an appreciable pretension toward de- velopments along this basic line of enterprise was looked upon as exceptionally energetic and progressive, and those pioneers who were thus the forerunners of ma- terial development and advancement in Oklahoma merit special consideration in the history of the state. In this connection it is interesting to note that Samuel A. Brown, now one of the leading business men of Aylesworth, established in 1888 the largest farm in the Chickasaw Nation. It comprised 4,000 acres, and of this extensive tract he placed 2,600 acres under effective cultivation, while upon the estate lived the families of the twenty- six men whom he employed in carrying forward the farming operations. Each man cultivated an average of 100 acres, and each was taught the most advanced meth- ods of growing cotton, corn, wheat and oats. In that particular section of the Chickasaw Nation-the Brown ranch being eleven miles west of the present town of Ardmore-little serious attention had been previously given to agriculture, by reason of the presence of only a comparatively small contingent of white men and be- cause of the lack of an accessible market for products. However, two years before Mr. Brown came to the front in this important field of development, the Santa Fe Rail- road had built its line from north to south through In- dian Territory, and it was not until a year later that the town of Ardmore was platted and its upbuilding initiated. With the coming of the railroad market facilities were provided and the way was opened for successful agriculture.

"For seven years Mr. Brown had been engaged in ranching in the Indian country, and at intervals he was in the employ of Suggs Brothers, whose large ranch, on which is situated the present town of Sugden, was one of the historic places of the Chickasaw Nation. At other times Mr. Brown was employed by W. E. Washington, a pioneer ranchman of Marietta, and Dick McKish, a picturesque and progressive Indian of Ardmore, whose activities in later years had much to do with the develop- ment of this section of the country. Discerning the op- portunities and possibilities for successful exploitation of the agricultural resources of the section with which he had been thus identified, Mr. Brown procured leases of sufficient Indian land to establish a ranch of his own. The first winter after he entered the employ of Suggs Brothers he was sent to Fort Sill to superinteud the filling of a beef contract into which his employers had entered with the United States Government. This contract provided for the sale of beef cattle to the army officials, both for their own use and for supplying the Kiowa and Comanche Indians of that region. Mr. Brown experienced some

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trouble with the Indians, who at the time were making their first experiments in the customs and vocations of civilization, and who burned some of Mr. Brown's prop- erty and threatened to steal his horses and cattle. He formed the acquaintance of Quanah Parker, chief of the Comanches, and other Indians of note in the Comanche and Kiowa tribes.

" In the following year, 1882, Mr. Brown was sent by his firm of employers to Goliad, Texas, where he pur- chased for them and in due time delivered 1,200 head of cattle. In July of that year he was made superin- tendent of the drive of a part of this large herd to Wyoming, and thus he had the privilege of acquiring the trail experience that other pioneer ranchmen had encountered in earlier years. In Wyoming the cattle ranged on the Powder river, near the Bighorn moun- tains.

"After engaging in the farm and ranch business in an independent way Mr. Brown took up also the business of speculating in land, and this enterprise became event- ually equal in importance to his live-stock business. For seventeen years he remained on his pioneer ranch, which became known all over the Chickasaw country, any pio- neer of that section being able to impart knowledge of the history and the unbounded hospitality of the 'Sam Brown Ranch.' On his extensive domain Mr. Brown erected a ten-room house of modern order, and this ranked among the finest in the Chickasaw Nation. The country had previously been sparsely settled by Indians and intermarried white persons, and no progress had been made in the providing of educational facilities. Mr. Brown's colony of tenants embraced a considerable number of children of school age, and it became impera- tive to provide a school house and teacher. Under these conditions he himself bore the most of the expense of erecting the first school house in that locality, the same having been situated on his land. Teaching the rudi- ments of education in those days was an heroic task, for the country was infested with nomadic outlaws and surreptitious peddlars of whiskey, so that any ambitious and faithful instructor of the youth found it well nigh impossible to draw the attention of boys and young men to mental discipline, as they found more to their liking the discussion of the unlawful activities of the frontier malefactors. Neighboring communities contained noth- ing of educational facilities. One of these, to the north of Mr. Brown's ranch, was populated with Chickasaw freedmen, and though they were in the main peaceable they were barred from neighborly intercourse with the white settlers."

The foregoing narrative shows how closely and promi- nently was Mr. Brown concerned with the initial stages of civic and industrial development in what is now one of the advanced and prosperous sections of the great State of Oklahoma, but his beneficent influence and pro- ductive activities have extended much further. Much credit for the material progress of Aylesworth and vicinity is due to him. He sold his property near Ard- more, Carter County, in 1905, shortly after the Town of Aylesworth, Marshall County, was established, and at the latter place he made investment in townsite property. The village then had a population of about fifty persons, while today it is a thriving community of about five hun- dred population, the advancement of the town being the more noteworthy by reason of the fact that it was accomplished during a period marked by short crops and financial depression. During his residence at Ayles- worth Mr. Brown has given his attention not only to the real-estate, loan and insurance business, but has also found much requisition for his services in the practice of law, study and practical application having given him

no little facility and prestige in connection with such professional service.

In 1910, in line with his well conceived ideas of prog. ress, Mr. Brown promoted at Aylesworth the organiza- tion of a rod and gun club, the membership of which has now reached 100, a majority of the members being residents of Durant and Madill, with a representative contingent from Aylesworth. The organization is known as the Madill-Durant Rod and Gun Club, and it owns 100 acres of land on the Washita River, two miles distant from Aylesworth, and embracing twenty-five acres of water that has an average depth of fifteen feet. The ideal domain thus segregated by the club seems to have been designed by nature for the purpose. It is one of those Washita River cutoffs that form inland lakes, the latter being commonly designated in history and in the records of the United States Geological Survey "horseshoe" or "oxbow" bends. The club has erected as a specially fine clubhouse and the lake has been stocked with the best varieties of game fish. Mr. Brown con- tinued to take deep interest in the elub and to avail himself of its splendid facilities, it having been his privilege to serve for a number of years as its vice presi- dent.

The influence of Mr. Brown in the development of the Aylesworth region was again manifest in the establish- ing of a sawmill near the village, this enterprise having been carried forward by a company of Louisiana capi- talists, headed by H. A. Waddell, of Morgan City, that state, who is president and general manager. The com- pany is capitalized for $100,000 and its plant represents an investment of $65,000. This large and thoroughly modern mill has an output capacity of 30,000 feet of lumber per day and the plant is kept almost continuously in operation, so that the enterprise proves of inestimable value to the community in which it is conducted. The company derives its timber from a large tract purchased by it at a distance of 250 miles from the mill, and up the Washita River, by means of which the timber is rafted down to the mill with much facility and at little expense. In 1915 the timber holdings of the company represented a total of sixty million feet, an amount adequate to keep the mill in operation for a period of ten years. This represents one of the most important industries of Marshall County.

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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: 656

Author: Thoburn, Joseph B. (Joseph Bradfield), 1866-1941
Publication date: 1916
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 656