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 62

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 62

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advantages is indicated by the fact that he became a successful and popular school teacher, besides which he served twenty years as justice of the peace in Barry County, Missouri. He is now a resident of the State of Texas. The parents passed the residue of their lives in Missouri and their remains rest in the cemetery at Pierce City, Lawrence County, that state, where the father died April 25, 1876, at the age of sixty-three years, and where the mother was summoned to eternal rest on the 22nd of June, 1889, at the age of seventy-four years, four months and twenty-three days. The father achieved high repi- tation for his exceptional skill as an artisan in wood and could do the best kind of work along architectural lines of construction as well as in the capacity of cabinet maker. He was also a successful exponent of agricul- tural industry and, as before stated, his children were reared on the farm. James P. Ripley was a Jacksonian democrat up to the time of the Civil war, when he trans- ferred his allegiance to the republican party, as a staunch admirer and supporter of its great standard-bearer, Abraham Lincoln. Both he and his wife were earnest and consistent members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and their lives were marked by righteousness and unfailing tolerance and kindliness. Of their two elder sons, Francis S. and Pleasant H., definite mention has already been made; Susan, the third child, is the widow of John D. Stephenson and maintains her home at Purdy, Barry County, Missouri; John A. is a resident of the State of Colorado; George W., subject of this review, was the next in order of birth; James D. resides at Eureka Springs, Arkansas; and Septimus L. is a resident of Frederick, Tillman County, Oklahoma.

George W. Ripley acquired his early education in sub- scription and public schools in Arkansas and Missouri, and his discipline included that of the high school at Pierce City, Missouri. For fourteen years he was found numbered among the successful teachers in the district or rural schools of Missouri, in Barry and Newton counties. From 1874 to 1881 he lived upon a farm which he had purchased in Barry County and upon which he made excellent improvements. After selling this property he engaged in the drug business in the Village of Purdy, that county, and three years later he sold out and there engaged in the lumber business, his connection with this line of industry continuing four years.

On the 10th of August, 1896, Mr. Ripley came to what is now Creek County, Oklahoma, and established his resi- dence in the embryonic Town of Sapulpa, where he has since maintained his home. When he first knew the town it was represented by three stores, and houses sufficient to lodge its little population of about fifty persons. He has witnessed the development of Sapulpa into a thriving and metropolitan little city of about 14,000 population, and it has been his to do much in furthering the civic and material development and upbuilding of the city. When he established his residence in Sapulpa Mr. Ripley purchased the principal hotel in the ambitious young town. He thus conducted the pioneer Gladstone Hotel about six years, and in the meanwhile he changed its name to the Ripley Hotel, which it still bears, the hotel having been the first stone building erected in the town. He continued to operate the hotel, as a successful and popular boniface, until 1907, since which time he has lived practically retired, in the enjoyment of the rewards of former years of earnest and fruitful endeavor. Mr. Ripley is the owner of a number of excellent improved properties in Sapulpa, and these yield to him a good income.

Mr. Ripley served as city clerk at the time when Sapulpa was formally platted by the town surveyor, and after the establishing of the first public school he was

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elected a director of the school board, as president of which body he served three years, with characteristic loyalty and efficiency. The city had no funds with which to erect and equip a school building, but the school board was fortunate in obtaining the use of a three-story frame building owned by J. H. Land, an Indian, with an agrec- meut to purchase the property for $3,000, the while private citizens agreed to provide stoves, fuel, etc. The board succeeded in having a personal-property assessment made to aid in the purchase of the school property, and all the while the citizens were paying also, and with marked loyalty and liberality, the regular school tax. Two Indian residents protested against the tax on the ground that they were wards of the Govermmneut aud not citizens, but the Federal court made a ruling to the effect that in incorporated towns the Indians must pay their proportionate share of taxes, as members of the civic body receiving the advantages of the town. No further trouble occurred and the new school began operations with a corps of three teachers. The change which the years have wrought is shown by the fact that forty-five teachers are now employed in the carrying forward of the work of the public schools of Sapulpa, with about 3,500 children, and that an annual expenditure of $50,000 is made for the support of the schools. Mr. Ripley served as a member of the first Federal grand jury that was convened at Sapulpa, and within its two days' session thirty-two indictments were found, the jury having been discharged at 6 o'clock P. M. of the second day; and he was foreman of the last grand jury held before state- hood.

Mr. Ripley assisted in the organization and is a charter member of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Sapulpa, and has aided also in the establishing of other church organizations in his home city. He served several years as a member of the official board of the local Methodist Church and in this counection was instrumental in raising a larger sum of money for church work than did any other member of the board of stewards. He is a charter member of Sapulpa Lodge, No. 103, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the original charter of the same having borne the number 66. Mr. Ripley was one of the organ- izers also of the first Sapulpa Lodge, No. 117, of Ancient Free and Accepted Masous, of which he served six years as secretary and of which he is a past master, besides having received the thirty-second degree of the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite of Masonry, and having received all degrees in both bodies of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. His political allegiance is given to the republicau party, and though he has not been imbucd with ambition for public office of political order, his civic loyalty caused him to give most effective service during his four years' incumbency of the position of city assessor.

Mr. Ripley was a delegate from Creek County to the first republican congressional convention held in Indian Territory, and had the distinction of placing in nomina- tion Hon. J. H. N. Cobb, of Sapulpa, this nominating speech having given to him a lasting reputation as an orator of no little ability. On the 4th of July, 1915, Mr. Ripley delivered a most patriotic and interesting address on the character and achievement of Abraham Lincoln, this speech being given in connection with the celebration held in Sapulpa.

On the 29th of December, 1881, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Ripley to Miss Alice Poor, who was called to the life eternal on the 3rd of March, 1899, and who is survived by three children, all residents of Sapulpa: Jesse J., Pearl and Grace. The eldest daugh- ter, Pearl, is the wife of Michael J. Connor, and the youngest daughter remains at the paternal home. On

the 29th of December, 1901, Mr. Ripley contracted a second marriage, when Mrs. Ada Huselton became his wife. No children were born of this union, and Mrs. Ripley, a devoted member of the Methodist Church. passed away on the 22d of September, 1913.

HON. H. TREADWAY. The home interests of this mem- ber of the Fifth Legislature are as a farmer and progres- sive citizen of Harmon County with residence at Hollis. Coming to the Legislature with no instruction from his constituency save that he should exercise conservative business judgment in support of measures affecting their interests and the same judgment in opposing unwise measures, Mr. Treadway's career in the Fifth Assembly was studied and careful, as had been his acts in pre- vious years as a public school official and a thrifty citizen of his community.

Mr. Treadway was born in Southern Illinois in 1871, and is a son of Van and Nancy (Hale) Treadway. His father, a native of North Carolina, was for fifteen years a merchant and for a long time a contractor in Southern Illinois. His paternal ancestry came from France, and a representative of the Treadway name settled in America during the Revolution. Mr. Treadway 's mother was born in Georgia, and was left an orphan when a small child.

The only formal schooling enjoyed by Mr. Treadway was when a small boy in the primary grades of the country schools. However, he has always had an ambi- tion for practical knowledge, and during his life has been a student of current events, public affairs and history. Circumstances forced upon his shoulders heavy responsi- bilities when still a boy, and in solving the successive problems of existence he has acquired a practical educa- tion that has made him a useful and influential citizen. The death of his father left him at the age of sixteen with the care of a younger brother and sister. His sister is now Mrs. E. R. Ensley of Delta, Colorado, and the brother B. O. Treadway, is a farmer and stock man at Hollis. They lived on a farm in Arkansas a few years, and in 1892 located near Dallas, Texas, and later Mr. Treadway bought a farm in Denton County of that state and remained there four years. In 1906 he removed to Greer County, Oklahoma, settling on a farm near Hollis, which after statehood was made the county seat of Harmon County, which was formed from a portion of old Greer County. In that locality Mr. Treadway has been engaged in farming and stock raising. He owns two quarter sections of land, and is a practical exponent of the profitable idea of crop diversification.

Mr. Treadway has always taken an active and many times a leading part in school and church affairs in his community. * During the past ten years he has at different times served as clerk and director of his home school district. His name was sixth on the list of names of men who petitioned for the establishment of a post- office at Hollis. He took a prominent part in the cam- paign for the creation of Harmon County, and made the first speech opening the division campaign. After the creation of the county he was elected a member of the board of county commissioners, a position he filled with credit and with profit to the county for nearly six years. When efforts were made to dissolve the county after its creation, he led the fight in maintaining the organiza- tion intact. Harmon County now has an indebtedness of only $4,000, and far more than that amount in the sink- ing fund, and is one of the most prosperous in the state. Mr. Treadway took stock in the company that estab- lished the first telephone system at Hollis and also stock in the company that built the first railroad there. He is a charter member and a former president of the Farmers Institute of his county. .

He Treadway

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Elected to the Legislature in 1914, Mr. Treadway was made chairman of the committee on Levees, Drains, Ditches and Irrigation, and was also a member of com- mittees on Revenue and Taxation, Prohibition Enforce- ment, Purchase of Coal and Asphalt Lands, and Manu- facturing and Commerce. He introduced a bill reform- ing the state highway system and his bill providing for the taxation of real estate every two years passed the house with only two dissenting votes. His interest was also directed to measures relating to education and agriculture. From his work and influence it may be said that he stood for reforms only such as he believed wise and necessary, and on the whole has been a conservative member, exercising careful business judgment in deciding all issues.

Mr. Treadway was married in 1895 to Miss Maggie Davidson of Dallas, Texas. Their six living children are: Mrs. Carl Hanks, wife of a farmer at Hollis; Everett, Cecil, Gladys, Versie and Harry. Mr. Treadway is a member of the Baptist Church and of the Woodmen of the World.

HENRY E. BANNER. One of the live and widely cir- culated newspapers of Western Oklahoma is the Hastings Herald, of which Henry E. Banner is proprietor and editor. Mr. Banner is a young newspaper man, but old in experience, and has been identified with the town of Hastings for the past eight years. Most of his early experience in journalism was acquired in the State of Texas, which is his native state.

Born in Waxahachie, Texas, October, 10, 1882, Henry E. Banner is a son of Henry E. and Margaret Dixon (Whitworth) Banner. The Banner family came from Ire- land to North Carolina before the Revolution, the emi- grant ancestors having been the great-grandfather of the Hastings editor. Henry Banner, Sr., who was born in Salem, North Carolina, in 1860, became a telegraph operator, removed from North Carolina and was employed in his profession in various places in Louisiana and Texas, and was with the Southern Pacific, Texas Central, and other roads. For a number of years he was a dispatcher at Galveston, in 1881 removed to Waxahachie, and in 1890 to Manor, Texas, which was his home at the time he lost his life in an accident at Mount Pleasant in 1891. He was a member of the Knights of Honor and in politics a democrat. His wife, whose maiden name was Margaret Dixon Whitworth, a native of South Carolina, is still living at Manor. Rebecca, the oldest of their children, is the wife of Dr. F. C. Gragg, a physician and surgeon at Manor, Texas; the second is Henry E., Jr .; Adrian is a locomotive engineer with home at Temple, Texas; and Marie Louise is the wife of Frank Gibson, a professional ball player with home at Fort Worth.

Henry E. Banner attended the public schools in Manor, took a course of one year at Grayson College at White- wright, Texas, but left school in 1900 to enter the news- paper business at Manor as owner and editor of the Manor Free Press. He was identified with that under- taking until 1904, and spent one year on the Houston Post at Houston and one year with the Fort Worth Record. In the fall of 1907 Mr. Banner removed to Hastings, Oklahoma, was employed in the office of the Hastings News a short time, and then leased and operated the paper until 1909. Selling his lease, he spent a year on the News-Democrat at Waurika, but in 1910 returned to Hastings and established the Hastings Herald. The Herald has a circulation in Jefferson and neighboring counties and is recognized both as an excellent news medium and a molder of public opinion. The offices and plant are in the Oklahoma State Bank Building. In politics the Herald is democratic, which is also the politi-

cal faith of its proprietor. While in Texas he attended a state convention of the party from Travis county.

Mr. Banner is a member of the Presbyterian Church, and has held various offices in Oak Camp No. 163, Woodmen of the World, at Hastings, and is affiliated with the Ancient Order of United Workmen at Manor, Texas, and with the W. B. A. at Hastings. In 1908 at Hastings he married Miss Ula Walker, whose father, W. W. Walker, is a blacksmith living at Ardmore, Okla- homa. Three children have been born to their union: Ruth, born March 13, 1909; Harlin, March 6, 1911; and Raymond, November 30, 1912.

WILLIAM G. BLAKE, ' M. D. There are few men who have practiced medicine so long in Eastern Okla- homa as Doctor Blake of Tahlequah, with which city he has been identified as a resident physician since 1883. He is now one of the most honored figures not only in his profession but in the citizenship of Cherokee County. His active career covers fully half a century, since he was a soldier in the war between the states, and has been engaged in medical practice for more than forty years.

Though he has now passed the seventieth milestone on the journey of an active and well spent life, he is still in the full vigor of mind and body, and shows less years than the date of his birth would indicate. He was born at Stockton, Cedar County, Missouri, February 22, 1845, and was the youngest but one of a family of eight chil- dren. His parents were Dr. William G. and Sarah (Pen- ington) Blake. They were both natives of Tennessee, and were of Scotch-Irish stock. They moved to Mis- souri a number of years before Doctor Blake was born, and finally in 1845 located at Stockton, where the father successfully practiced medicine for forty years. He died in 1885 at the ripe old age of eighty-five, after a career of long and varied experience and capable service to his fellow men. He and two of his sons served in the Confederate army during the war, and he held the rank of surgeon in his regiment.

The junior Doctor Blake was likewise a soldier for three and a half years, and at the close of the war held the rank of sergeant-major. He was in Hunter's Regiment. This regiment was engaged in duty chiefly west of the Mississippi, and in a skirmish at Westport, now included within the City of Kansas City, he received a flesh wound in the left arm. In the meantime he had lived at his father's home in Southwest Missouri, had gained an education in the local schools, and as soon as the war was over sought higher educational ad- vantages, attending school for a time at Kentuckytown, Texas. He afterwards taught one of the first free public schools in the State of Arkansas.

Doctor Blake began his professional career in 1872 at Hinesville, Madison County, Arkansas. He lived there and enjoyed a successful practice until his removal to Tahlequah in 1882. From boyhood Doctor Blake has been a student of medicine, a career for which he seems to have been fitted by nature as well as by training. His father was his early preceptor and later in life he en- tered the Missouri Medical College at St. Louis, from which he received his degree in 1880. He has never re- laxed his studious practices, and has shown a progres- sive spirit such as vounger men might admire and take as an example. He has frequently interrupted his practice to take courses at the leading institutions in this country. chiefly at St. Louis, Chicago and New York. He has spent time at the Chicago Policlinic, the Illinois School of Electro-Therapeutics, the Post. Graduate School of Medicine of New York City, and has frequently attended prominent clinics in various hos- pitals. At his office in Tahlequah he possesses a large

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and well selected medical library, and from time to time has invested a large amount of money in office ap- pliances, including equipment for electrical and other treatments and many surgical instruments. In his time he performed much of the arduous service of the pioneer physician, riding over rough roads through all sorts of weather, but in latter years has confined his labors to office work and consultation.

The esteem in which he is held by the local medical profession is well illustrated by the fact that he has served as president of the Cherokee County Society since its organization just after statehood. He is also a mem- ber of the Oklahoma State Medical Society and the American Medical Association, and for eight years was health officer of Cherokee County. He has never sought political preferment, though a stanch democrat in poli- ties, and has kept in the rank and file of citizenship. For thirty-seven years he has been afnliated with the Royal Arch Chapter of Masonry, and during twenty-one years of that time has held the office of high priest in his home chapter.

In 1870 Doctor Blake married Miss Bettie Odell. Mrs. Blake was a woman of many sterling qualities of heart and mind, and as his helpful companion and the sharer of his joys and sorrows traveled with him through life for forty-four years. Her death occurred March 4, 1914. Eight days later Doctor Blake was called upon to mourn the death of his son, Dr. Edwin W. Blake, who had graduated from the Missouri Medical College and was already established as a physician of recognized ability, and for several years had been practicing with his father. Dr. Edwin W. Blake married Zetta E. Thorn- ton, a daughter of Rev. J. T. Thornton of the Methodst Episcopal Church South. Another son of Dr. W. G. Blake, Burriss, died at the age of twenty-one, while his only daughter, Sadie, died at the age of twenty, just at the entrance to a beautiful young womanhood. Doctor Blake has thus been left with only his son's wife, Mrs. E. W. Blake, as his closest relative, though of admiring friends he has a legion in and about Tahlequah and in fact throughout the State of Oklahoma.

WILLIAM C. MCALISTER. When William C. McAlister was elected a member of the State Senate in 1912 from the Twenty-fourth Senatorial District, he brought to that body not legislative experience but a reputation as a thoroughly successful business man and certain definite aims and purposes formulated as a result of his residence in the old Choctaw Nation, and has proved an exceed- ingly valuable member of both the Fourth and Fifth Legislatures.

William C. McAlister was born in Marlboro County, South Carolina, in 1870, a son of Charles A. and Emily McAlister. The family is of Scotch origin, and the ancestry is traced back to a prominent clan in Scotland. Charles A. McAlister was a soldier in the Confederate army, serving with a regiment raised in South Caro- lina, his native state, and acted in the capacity of courier. Senator McAlister has a brother, A. G. McAlis- ter, who has been on the Superior Court bench in Arizona since the admission of that state to the Union, and is a resident of Solomonville. Another brother, C. A. Jr., is secretary of the Mallary and Taylor Iron Works at Macon, Georgia. There are two sisters, one of them married, both living in South Carolina.

Senator McAlister received his fundamental educa- tion in the common schools of his native state. In 1895 he was graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, with the degree Bachelor of Arts. The following year he took a law course in the university and in 1896 was admitted to the bar. He soon saw, however,

that the law would not satisfy his active temperament and instead of taking up practice he began teaching. His first school was in the town of Monroe, North Caro- lina, but a year later he came to Texas and for three years had a position in the city schools of Ennis. Dur- ing the succeeding three years he was superintendent of schools at Texarkana, Arkansas, but abandoned that profession at the end of his last term there. Since 1908 Mr. McAlister has been one of the stirring business men of Hugo, engaged in the contracting business. He has found this a field affording full scope to his energies and has been successful both in the development of engineer- ing ideas and from a financial standpoint. His work has been confined largely to bridge and re-enforced concrete construction, and most of his contracts have been with municipalities and railroads.

Mr. McAlister was married in 1906 to Miss Jewel Hill of Ennis, Texas, daughter of a Texas pioneer. They are the parents of two children: William C. Jr., aged seven; and Carl Hill, aged five. Mr. McAlister is affiliated with the Masonic Order and with several minor orders.

His only political aspiration before he became a candi- date for the State Senate in 1912 was satisfied when he was elected a member of the Board of Education at Hugo, a position he filled for several successive terms. Having been a teacher, he was ambitious that the public schools of Oklahoma be raised to the highest possible standard and it was with definite convictions and ideals along this line that he entered the Fourth Legislature. During that Legislature he was especially alert in educa- tional matters, and advocated a number of bills that were designed to improve conditions and institutions in the state. He was a member of the Committee on Educa- tion. Within his district lies a part of the hunting and fishing region of the Kiamichi Mountains, and that has caused him to take interest in legislation pertaining : to fish and game. In common with other legislators from the old Choctaw Nation region, Senator McAlister has been much concerned on the subject of construction of good roads. Owing to the fact that Indians own a large per cent of the land in that part of the state and that it is not subject to taxation, it has been one of the most serious problems confronting local authorities and the Legislature how to pay for the building of roads. During the Fourth Legislature Senator McAlister was a mem- ber of the sub-committee on education that codified the school laws of Oklahoma.

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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