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. V, Part 56

Author: Thoburn, Joseph B. (Joseph Bradfield), 1866-1941
Publication date: 1916
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 644

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. V > Part 56

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A number of years ago Mr. Bearden took stock in the Wewoka First National Bank, which was the first bank established there, and later opened the State Bank at Bearden, in which he owned most of the stock. At Okemah he acquired an interest in the Farmers & Mer- chants State Bank and after considerable negotiations, buying and selling, he consolidated that bank with the Citizens State Bank, and was its active manager until 1912, when he sold and bought the First National Bank, and for the past three years has been its president. In many ways Mr. Bearden has worked effectively to build up his little home City of Okemah. He is the owner of the Broadway Hotel there, a modern fifty-room hostelry which supplies adequate comforts to the traveling public. He is also owner of a cotton gin at Morris, and has approximately 500 acres of farming land in Okfuskee County. Mr. Bearden has been a lifelong democrat, though his interest in politics has usually extended only to local affairs. He is a Knight Templar Mason, is affiliated with the Woodmen of the World, and is a mem- ber of the Methodist Episcopal Church South.

At Wewoka on March 2, 1895, Mr. Bearden married for his present wife Mrs. Rose Langford Dunn. She was born in Parke County, Indiana, April 18, 1858, and when about seven years of age her parents removed to Moultrie County, Illinois, where she lived until her marriage to James K. Polk Taylor. He died seven years later, leav- ing one child, Quincy Taylor, who is now a resident of Bearden, Oklahoma. Mrs. Bearden married for her sec- ond husband Nathaniel Dunn at Sullivan, Illinois. They

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removed to Caney, Kansas, and from there into the Choc- taw Nation of Indian Territory about 1910 where Mr. Dunn died. There were two children of that union: Roy Dunn of Bearden, and Opie, who has taken his step- father's name and is known as O. P. Bearden, being cashier of the First National Bank of Okemah. Mr. and Mrs. Bearden are the parents of one daughter, Velva, and there was also a twin sister of Velva, Vera, who lived only three months. Mr. Bearden also has one daughter by his second marriage, Emeline, wife of H. L. Strain, of Bearden.

HON. ALPHEUS HENRY BROWN. Few men have been longer and more actively identified with the Osage country than Alpheus Henry Brown, with whose name is asso- ciated the distinction of having served as one of the principal chiefs or governor of the Osage Nation. Governor Brown knows Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas like an open book, having followed cattle herds all over this country in the early days, and is considered a walk- ing encyclopedia of information concerning his own country and its people.

By the accident of birth Alpheus Henry Brown was born in the State of California December 11, 1859, but has spent the greater part of his life in old Indian Territory and Oklahoma. His parents were William Scipio and Mary Jane (Stratton) Brown. His mother was a one-eighth Osage Indian and also partly of French descent, and it was through her that the Brown family established their Osage citizenship.

His father was one of the conspicuous western fron- tiersmen, and at the time of his death at his home in Caney, Kansas, in June, 1905, it was said there was probably not another man in the State of Kansas who had had as varied a career as miner, merchant, stock grower and farmer or had seen more of the world than W. S. Brown, who was best known over this southwestern country as "Osage Brown. " On account of his many prominent associations with the Osage country, it is appropriate that his life should be told somewhat in detail.

Born in Wyandotte County, Ohio, May 11, 1831, he was the son of Judge Henry Brown, a prominent citizen of Ohio. Against the wishes of his father and mother, at the age of seventeen he started West and began his career of adventure. He worked on a farm in Iowa two years, then bought some oxen and took a contract to break prairie on the reservations of the Crow Indians in Minnesota. After three seasons returning to his old home in Ohio, he was soon started again toward the West, this time for the California gold fields. He went around by the Isthmus route, and arriving on the Pacific side almost without money had to get on board a vessel going to San Francisco as a stowaway, and being dis- covered was compelled to work his passage by shoveling coal. Not long after he reached Sacramento, worked as a driver for a time, and then with a party engaged in mining on the Yuba River. This enterprise was cut short by a flood, but he had received as his share of the proceeds gold to the value of $4,000, which he deposited in a Sacramento Bank, which soon afterwards failed. Thereafter he had varied experience, making money in mining, buying cattle and horses in lower California and driving them to the mines, losing his property by the treachery of Indians and white people and other accidents and circumstances, and was again and again reduced to poverty and started out with renewed determination to build up. He also went with a party on a prospecting tour to Australia, and returning had various adventures in South America, crossing the Andes and descending the Amazon River, and returning to the Western Coast, and was finally back in California. In 1856 he bought

an improved farm in Napa County, and the following year married Miss Mary J. Stratton. A few years later . he opened a new ranch on Eel River, but the following winter his land was ruined by landslides and his cattle and horses driven off by Indians or starved by bad weather. His varied adventures and experiences in Cal- ifornia would require too much space for detailed telling, and it will be necessary to pass over several years to 1864, when he sent his family back to Ohio with his sister and her husband. He remained behind to dispose of his property, and then started across the mountains on snow shoes, and arrived in Ohio just in time to be drafted for service in the Union Army. He hired a substitute, and was soon substantially settled as an Ohio farmer. At the end of three years he sold out, moved to Iowa, engaged in woolen manufacturing until a declin- ing market set him back again, but having made con- siderable money in land speculation in 1869 he removed to Missouri and bought two farms in Bates County. He then removed to Baxter Springs in Kansas, and acquired a large herd of cattle in Texas. Unable to find a range for his stock, his wife then suggested a way out of the difficulty. She had been born on the Osage Indian Re- serve, had attended the old school at Osage Mission, and these facts coupled with her small inheritance of Osage blood enabled her to secure a headright in the Osage lands. Mr. Brown then removed his family to the Osage Agency, and they were soon enrolled as members of the tribe. The Cherokees were at that time leaving the Osage lands, and Mr. Brown bought one of their claims, and thus having ample grazing lands he was soon pros- pering in the cattle business. About a year later he took his family out to California, where he bought a ranch, and was planning to make his permanent home there, when his wife was taken ill and died. This be- reavement caused him to change his plans, and he took his children back to Ohio and left them with a deceased brother's widow, whom he subsequently married. In 1875 he moved to Texas, lived in that state four years, and then returned to Kansas and located a ranch on the Big Caney River in the Osage country. There he had. a farm of 450 acres of improved land besides 30,000 acres of fenced pasture, and at times his cattle num- bered as high as 5,000 head. For a time he had his home in Independence, Kansas, but finally removed to Caney, from which point he superintended his ranches in the Osage country, twelve miles southwest of that city. Thereafter he lived at Caney, being identified for many years with the cattle business, until the close of his career at the age of seventy-four. Concerning his char- acter one of the papers at Caney said: "W. S. Brown was an excellent man. He possessed a big heart and a man in need found in him a true friend, so long as he did right. He was a member of the Presbyterian church," and surrounded by his family he passed away in communion with his Maker. His children, all by his first marriage, were: Alpheus H., Charles W., Edward S., Rosa, wife of John Cunningham, and Ernest E.

Of these children all now reside at Caney, Kansas, except Governor Brown. Some of the moves and ex- periences of his early boyhood have already been sug- gested in the sketch of his father. He completed his public school education at the age of fifteen, and after- wards spent two years in school at Lawrence, Kansas. After leaving school he became closely associated with his father in the cattle business, but in the memorable hard winter of the '80s, when the live stock industry all over the country was practically paralyzed, he and his brothers were compelled to shift for themselves. After that he spent about fifteen years of venturesome life in the Rocky Mountains, much of the time engaged in min- ing. He has thus evidently inherited many of the pioneer

HolmKing

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qualities of his father, and has always lived as close to the frontier as the rapid development of modern times would permit. He has twice made the trip from the Middle West to the Pacific Coast by wagon, and endured many hardships in the West. At one time he was out of provisions for four days. He has been more or less closely identified with the Osage country for forty years, and after his marriage settled down permanently in what is now Osage County. Governor Brown has about 700 acres in fine farming land, the old homestead being about twenty miles southeast of Hominy, in which town his family reside.

A democrat in politics, Governor Brown was elected the first county . commissioner after statehood. For about two years he was chief or governor of the Osage Nation, and held that office until he and the other mem- bers of the Osage Council were removed by the secre- tary of interior for refusing to sign the oil leases. The courageous stand taken by Governor Brown at that time reflected highly on his integrity aud his sense and fair- ness and justice to the Indian people, and subsequent developments have proved the correctness of his coursc. Fraternally he is affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.

On August 12, 1901, Mr. Brown married Miss Belle Cowen, who was born in Reno, Kansas, July 2, 1879, but was living in Arkansas at the time of her marriage. Her parents are John and Sarah (Ebright) Cowen, both natives of Pennsylvania. Her father came to Kansas in 1875, and was married in that state in 1877. He dicd at the home of Governor and Mrs. Brown October 8, 1914, at the age of seventy-six, while his widow is still living in the Brown home at Hominy. Mrs. Brown's father homesteaded a claim in Kausas in the early days, and for many years was engaged in the cattle business. Mr. and Mrs. Brown have two children: William Scipio and Frank Richard.

GEORGE E. McKINNIS. Since the Pottawatomie Reser- vation was opened for settlement twenty-five years ago, one of its most active and energetic citizens has been George E. McKinnis. In various directions Mr. McKin- nis has been the real leader of progress in his home City of Shawnee, and if one went over the history of develop- ment in that section of the state very closely, he would find a great many things to credit to the public spirit and disinterested service of this genial business man.

So far as the future is concerned of Shawnee as an educational center, Mr. McKinnis was more than anyone else responsible for securing the location of the Oklahoma State Baptist University at Shawnee. Oftentimes alone in his fight he managed the campaign which brought that institution to the city in 1910, and he is now treasurer of the university. He is one of the charter members of this institution, its first secretary and treasurer, and has been a director of the board of trustees ever since the school was established.

In business circles Mr. McKinnis is known both as a banker and real estate operator. He was born in Wayne County, Missouri, November 23, 1869. His ancestors on the paternal side came originally from Scotland to North Carolina during colonial times. His great-grandfather, Alex McKinnnis, was one of the early settlers, going to North Carolina in 1770, and he served with distinction and honor in the Revolutionary war and the War of 1812. His father, J. A. McKinnis, a farmer and country preacher, was born in Tennessee, May 27, 1832, and had a long and active career. He died December 28, 1915, at Alvin, Texas. J. A. McKinnis was married in Macon County, Tennessee, to Miss Drucilla Donoho, who was born in Tennessee in 1838 and died in Major County, Oklahoma, in 1897. In 1859 the family removed to Vol. V-13

Wayne County, Missouri, but in 1872 weut back to Macon County, Tennessee, and in 1884 J. A. McKinnis established his home among the early settlers of King- man County, Kansas. In 1893 he again moved with the advancing tide of civilization into Western Oklahoma aud established a home in Major County, then Woods County. By profession he was a minister of the Baptist faith and preached the gospel and helped to establish churches in many isolated communities during his active career. He took a homestead in Major County, Okla- homa, where he lived for about eleven years and employed himself mainly as a farmer. For the benefit of the coast climate he moved to Alvin, Texas, in 1908 and remained there until his death, December 28, 1915. In politics he was a republican. During the war between states he served three years in the Federal army. He was wounded in the great battle of Shiloh. In the Chickasaw Bayou, one of the important engagements in the Vicksburg campaign, he was captured, later was exchanged and rejoined his command and continued to serve until he was mustered out.

George E. McKinnis, his next to the youngest son, when an infant, removed with his parents to Macon County, Tennessee. Here he gained his first instruction in the public schools of that state and continued his education in the public schools of Kingman County, Kansas. He took a literary and public-speaking course in Ball's College at Harper, Kansas, having been a student there in 1889-1890. Early in life he gave some promise as a public speaker, and when only eighteen years old was elected lecturer of the Farmers Alliance in Kingman County, Kansas. The early part of his life was mainly devoted to farming aud railroad work, work- ing on the farm during the crop season, and on the railroad the time he could spare from the farm.

September 16, 1890, the opening day for Pottawatomie reserve, he went to Tecumseh, in Pottawatomie County, Oklahoma, and soon afterwards was employed as manager of the McKinnis & Beard Lumber Co. He served iu this capacity until the company closed out its business at that poiut. Along with his ability as a practical man of affairs, Mr. McKinnis has associated service and qualification in various other lines. From his first busi- ness at Tecumseh he became principal of the public schools there, and served until 1895. He was a member of the first school board in Pottawatomie County, then known as County "B." He removed to Shawnee in the fall of 1895 and accepted principalship of the high school. He served two years as principal and one year a's superintendent of the city schools. He did much to forward the cause of public education in the primitive period of about twenty years ago.

From his work as a schoolman Mr. McKinnis engaged in the real estate and loan business, and now for several years has conducted one of the oldest established and most reliable offices in that line in Central Oklahoma.

He was one of the organizers of. the State National Bank of Shawnee, and has been director and vice presi- deut ever since its organization in 1902. At various times he has been associated with other banking interests and is now secretary of the Fidelity Building and Loan Association, which is one of the best institutions of its kind in the Southwest.

Another thing that should be remembered to his credit was his presidency of the Shawnee Commercial Club at the time the Missouri, Kansas and Texas and the Santa Fe railroads were brought into Shawnee. He is still an active and influential member of that organization of business men.

In the social and civic life of Shawnee, Mr. McKinnis has always taken an active and prominent part. He has donated liberally of his means and time to the move-

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ments that stand for the elevation of his community. It was under his administration as chairman of the Park Commissiou of Shawuee that the system of strect im- provement organizations were lauuched, which did much to make Shawnee one of the most beautiful cities in Oklahoma. He was president and manager of the Chau- tauqua Association of Shawnee, 1902-1910-1916.

Politically, Mr. McKinnis is a republican. He has always been cousistent aud regular, aud was elected delegate to the national convention at Chicago, 1916.

He served as postmaster of Shawnee from 1903 to 1907. Under his administration and through his efforts country rural free delivery service was established in Pottawa- tomie County. He was secretary of the first Republican Club iu Pottawatomie County in 1891.

He was reared in the Baptist Church, of which his father was a devoted minister. He has several times been honored by the Baptist state conventions; lie was elected and served three years as its auditor. As a Sunday-school worker Mr. McKinnis' ability is familiarly recognized. He has filled every important office of the interstate denominatioual work except that of secretary. He was its presideut in 1907-1908.

In 1897 Mr. McKinnis was married, at Shawnee, to Miss Mamie Dixon of Paris, Texas. Mrs. McKinnis is known throughout the state as one of Oklahoma's promi- nent club workers. She is now president of the Fifth District. They are the parents of one son, George E., Jr., born July 23, 1901, who is now attending the local high school.

THOMAS H. FLESHER, M. D. Many of the men in the medical profession today are devoting themselves in a large measure to the prevention of disease as well as its cure. In this way their efficiency as benefactors has extended much beyond the scope of the old-fashioned practice when the doctor was related to his patients ouly as an individual and in times of sickness. One of the prominent young physicians and surgeons of Okla- homa, Dr. Thomas H. Flesher has been largely dis- tinguished for his work as a sanitarian at Edmond.

It is undeniable that without proper methods of sanita- tion and the conservation of health through proper safeguards and under the supervision of a scientific director, Edmond could not have gained the popularity it possesses as a college town. During the best period of its development, aud when as many as 1,800 young men and women are spending their summers there in the Central State Normal School, Doctor Flesher has been city superintendent of health, and his recommenda- tions to the city officials and the people forcstalled disease to a wonderful degree. Besides being a success- ful practitioner and a town booster, this is one of the principal things that mark him as one of Edmond's leading citizens.

Dr. Thomas H. Flesher was born in Reedsville, Ohio, February 10, 1876, a son of Francis M. and Mary Frances (Thorn) Flesher. His father was for thirty years a steamboat engineer on the Ohio River, and during the Civil war was in the Government service in that capacity. He removed to Iowa in 1887 and died the following year. The maternal grandparents of Doctor Flesher were from West Virginia and early settlers of Ohio. Doctor Flesher has three brothers and three sisters: M. B. Flesher, a lawyer at Okemah, Oklahoma, and a graduate of the University of Michigan; Dr. W. E. Flesher, a dentist at Frederick. Oklahoma, and in 1915 president of the Okla- homa Dental Society; E. C. Flesher, engaged in the mill- ing business at Edmond; Mrs. W. E. Edie, wife of a Methodist minister at Burr Oak, Iowa; Mrs. W. B. Bryant, wife of a merchant at Edmond; and Mrs. L. A. Bryant, wife of a farmer at Frederick, Oklahoma.

Left fatherless at the age of twelve years, Doctor Flesher was hampered by lack of funds in pursuing his education and much of his training in public schools was delayed by the necessity of work. lie persevered and eventually acquired not only a liberal literary education, but a thorough training for his profession. In 1896 he graduated with a teacher's degree from the Central Normal University at Humeston, Iowa,- and in 1901 received his degree Doctor of Medicine from the Keokuk, Iowa, Medical College and College of Physicians and Surgeons. Doctor Flesher begau his practice of nicdi- cine in Edmond iu 1901.

Besides his service as city superintendent of health, he was president of the Oklahoma County Medical Society in 1913, and at the present time is vice president for Oklahoma of the Southwestern Medical Association, au organization covering five states. He is a member of the Oklahoma State Medical Society and of the American Medical Association, and a life member of the Surgeous' Club of Rochester, Minnesota. Doctor Flesher has done post-graduate work in the Chicago Polyclinic and in the famous hospital clinics at Rochester, Minnesota. He is secretary of the Republican Club at Edmond, and a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Iu Masonry he is affiliated with Edmond Lodge No. 37, Ancient Frce and Accepted Masons, the Scottish Rite Consistory of Guthrie and India Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Okla- homa City. He also belongs to the Modern Woodmen of America and the Yeomen at Edmond.

THOMAS LAFAYETTE MULLINS. The vocation of auctioneering in recent years has become more of a profession than a business, and the individual who would win success in this field must possess qualifications of a peculiar nature. He .must in the first place be a good judge of values, and must be able to give an elaborate and intelligent description of the articles placed in his care. There are no references upon which he may rely, for every thought must be extemporaneous, and he must guide himself accordingly, and it is essential that he be able to intermingle comedy if the occasion de- mands. Among the men in Oklahoma who have made a success of this vocation because of the possession of the qualifications noted, is Thomas Lafayette Mullins, of Walters, ex-sheriff of Cotton County, who, before enter- ing his present line of endeavor, had gained excellent results from his labors in the field of agriculture.

Mr. Mullins belongs to a family which originated in Ireland and probably came to America prior to the War of the Revolution, being pioneer settlers of Kentucky. He was born at Bear Creek, Cedar County, Missouri, April 25, 1872, and is a son of William and Susan (Janes) Mullins, the former born in Kentucky, in 1831, and the latter in Tennessee, in 1839. As a young man, William Mullins removed from Kentucky to Lawrence County, Missouri, where he took up a homestead, subse- quently moved to Bear Creek, Cedar County, and finally to Dade County, in the same state, where he followed farming and stockraising until his death, in 1903, Mrs. Mullins having passed away in 1881, at Bear Creek. During the Civil war Mr. Mullins served as a member of the Home Guards, in the Union army. There were four children in the family: George, a farmer, whose death oc- curred in 1909, at Ash Grove, Green County, Missouri; Thomas Lafayette, of this review; Robert, who is an auctioneer, and resides at Geronimo, Oklahoma; and Louis, who is a farmer and agriculturist and resides at Temple, Oklahoma.

Thomas L. Mullins attended the public schools of Bear Creek and was reared on his father's farm until 1881, in which year his mother died and he went to live at the home of his uncle, R. F. Wetion, on whose farm

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he worked for three years. He then started out on his own account and for five or six years worked out among the agriculturists of Green County, Missouri. In 1890 he went to Marshall County, Kansas, where he continued his labors as a farm hand until 1901, and in that year came to Temple, Oklahoma, and drew a homestead at the opening. This he proved up and resided upon until 1905, when he removed to the Village of Temple, and started his work as an auctioneer. His advent in Walters occurred in 1912, and since that time he has successfully built up a large and profitable business in his chosen line, con- ducting large sales and handling all kinds of property for his clients. While he devotes his attention almost exclusively to this line of work, Mr. Mullins still has extensive farming interests, being the owner of 440 acres of land, on which his tenants do diversified farming and stockraising. Mr. Mullins is a republican and has been an active worker in his party. While a resident of Temple he served as constable and city marshal, and in 1912 became the candidate of his party for the office of sheriff of Cotton County, to which he was elected, and served two years in an entirely capable and satisfactory manner. With his family, he belongs to the Baptist Church. Mr. Mullins' fraternal connections include mem- bership in Temple Lodge No. 210, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and Guthrie Consistory No. 1, of the thirty-second degree in Masonry; Temple Lodge of the Modern Woodmen of America; Walters Lodge of the Royal Neighbors of America, and the Temple lodges of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Fraternal Order of Eagles.

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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: 644

Author: Thoburn, Joseph B. (Joseph Bradfield), 1866-1941
Publication date: 1916
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 644