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 74

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 74

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For a number of years he has taken an active part in republican politics, and it was on the republican ticket that he was chosen to his present office. In 1912 he was appointed clerk of the County Court of Beaver County, an office he held two years. In 1914 he was elected court clerk of the same county. He is a member of the Masonic Order and the Independent Order of Odd Fel- lows.

On August 1, 1900, at Watonga, Oklahoma, Mr. DeGraw married Miss Laura Boston, who was born September 21, 1882, in Jolmson County, Missouri, a daughter of James W. and Eva ( Thistle) Boston, both of them natives of St. Louis. Mr. and Mrs. De Graw are the parents of three children, two sons and one daughter, namely: Correl James, born May 14, 1901, at O'Keene, Okla- homa ; Alva Byron, born September 11, 1904, at O'Keene; and Fern, born July 10, 1910, at Beaver.

GEORGE E. KERR, M. D. Now established in a suc- cessful practice as a physician and surgeon at Chat- tanooga, Doctor Kerr is one of the older physicians of Oklahoma, having begun practice in Grant County fifteen years ago. He was also one of the early settlers of Chattanooga, where he is well known not only for his skill and ability as a doctor but for his varied interests in the life and activities of the town.

A Canadian by birth, Dr. George E. Kerr was born at . Tilbury, Ontario, February 3, 1867. His grandfather, James Kerr, spent his life in County Donegal, Ireland, where his business was that of fisherman. He rose to the rank of colonel in the English army under the great Duke of Wellington in the Napoleonic wars, and at the decisive battle of Waterloo was wounded. The son of this old soldier was George Kerr, who was born in County Donegal, Ireland, in 1803, and died at Tilbury, Canada, in 1886. He came to America when a young man and was a pioneer farmer and stock raiser at Til- bury. In politics he was a conservative. George Kerr married Julia Weldon, a native of County Monaghan, Ireland, whence she came to Tilbury when a young woman. She is now living at Deerfield, Michigan. She became the mother of five children: James, who is a collector of internal revenues at Windsor, Ontario; Elizabeth, whose first husband was Joseph Daniels, a farmer, now deceased, and who is now living with John Witt, a retired farmer at Deerfield; Mary, who married Jerry Vipond, a contractor and builder at Detroit, Michi- gan; the fourth child is a nurse in the Dearborn Hospital at Dearborn, Michigan, and the youngest is Doctor Kerr of Chattanooga.

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HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA

Doctor Kerr with his early education, and he graduated from the Chatham High School with the class of 1885. Four years later, in 1889, he finished the course of the Komoco Seminary at Gault, Canada, and while there matriculated for a course in the Detroit College of Medicine, where he was given an excellent preparation for his chosen calling and was graduated M. D. with the class of 1894. For a year and a half Doctor Kerr had the many benefits gained by service as interne in St. Mary's Hospital, and in 1895 took up active practice at Deerfield, Michigan, where he remained until 1900. Dur- ing the first seven years of his residence in Oklahoma Doctor Kerr was located in Grant County. In August, 1907, he moved to Chattanooga, where he was one of the first physicians and surgeons to locate, and is now well established in his business, having his offices in the Chattanooga State Bank Building. He is a member of the County and State Medical societies and the American Medical Association, and is now serving as deputy health officer.

Doctor Kerr was a member of the school board at Chattanooga up to 1915. He is a republican in politics, is past master of Chattanooga Lodge No. 349, Ancient, Free and Accepted Masons, a member of Chattanooga Chapter of the Eastern Star, of the Modern Woodmen of America, the Woodmen of the World, the Woodmen Circle and the Brotherhood of American Yeomen at Chattanooga and was formerly affiliated with the Inde- pendent Order of Odd Fellows.

In 1904, in Grant County, Oklahoma, Doctor Kerr mar- ried Miss Mary Kearney, who formerly lived in Illinois. Their four children are: Irene and Mabel, both attend- ing the public schools at Chattanooga; George, who died in infancy, and James, the youngest.

W. B. TILTON, M. D. The roll of medical practitioners of Custer County includes the name of Dr. W. B. Tilton, of Clinton, a capable representative of his profession who has been engaged in practice since 1912. He came to Clinton in December, 1913, and since that time has been successful in building up a very satisfying practice in medicine and surgery and in winning the confidence of the people of his adopted field of labor.

Doctor Tilton belongs to a family which has been in America since colonial days, having been founded in Maine by an emigrant from England. He was born at Allendale, Missouri, June 3, 1884, and is a son of John L. and Margaret (McElvain) Tilton. John L. Tilton was born on a farm in Harrison County, Missouri, in 1861, and when a small boy was taken by his parents to the Town of Allendale, where he grew to manhood, secured a public school education, and established himself in business as a merchant. Later he also branched out into banking and became one of the prominent and influential men of Allendale, where he resided until 1896, in that year removing to his present home at Grant City. Here also he is well known in commercial and financial circles, being the proprietor of a store and interested in a bank- ing concern. He is a member of the Baptist Church, is well known in Masonry, in which he has attained the thirty-second degree, and is also an Odd Fellow. At Allendale he was married to Miss Margaret McElvain, who was born in Worth County, Missouri, in 1863, and they have been the parents of four children, as follows : Dr. W. D .; Grace, who is the wife of Rev. W. A. Schullen- berger, pastor of the Christian Church at Mexico, Mis- souri; Calvin, who resides with his parents at Grant City, Missouri; and Hale, who is a student at the Grant City High School.

Early in life W. B. Tilton decided upon a professional career, and with this end in view set about to fully pre- pare himself for his vocation. After attending the pub-

lic schools, he entered the famous William Jewell College, at Liberty, Missouri, from which he was graduated in 1906, with the degree of Bachelor of Arts, and following this he attended the medical department of the University of Chicago for two terms. He was graduated from Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, in 1912, with the degree of Doctor of Medicine, and his first field of practice was the town of Freeport, Illinois, where he spent one year. In 1913 he first came to Oklahoma, as offering a better field for the display of his abilities and learning, and remained at Erick, Beckham County, until December of that year, which time marked his arrival at Clinton. Here he has well appointed offices in the Schaffer Building, equipped with all modern appliances. He is a constant student, a careful prac- titioner and a skilled surgeon, and holds membership in the Custer County Medical Society, the Oklahoma Medical Society and the American Medical Association. His religious connection is with the Baptist Church. Doctor Tilton is unmarried.

JAMES M. MCCOMAS, M. D. Elk City, the metropolis of Beckham County, has beeu fortunate in gaining as one of the leading representatives of the medical pro- fession in this county Dr. James Milton McComas, who has here been engaged in general practice as a physician and surgeon of marked ability and zeal since the spring of 1901, and whose character and achievement have lent dignity and distinction to his profession, the while he stands exponent of loyal and progressive citizenship and maintains lively and helpful interest in community affairs in general.

Doctor McComas is a scion of a sterling family that was founded in Virginia in the colonial era of our national history, and the lineage traces back to staunch Scottish origin. He himself is a native of Kentucky, and his father, Charles Lewis McComas, was born in Greenbrier County, Virginia, in 1795. In the colonial days two brothers of the name immigrated to America from the north of Ireland, one settling in Virginia and the other in Maryland, the Virginian figuring as the ancestor of him whose name introduces this article. Becoming a resident of Kentucky when young, Charles L. McComas was there married, in Morgan County, to Miss Clara Wells, who was born in that county in 1796, and from the old Bluegrass State they finally removed to Indiana, where Mr. McComas became a prosperous farmer. He later removed with his family to Illinois, where his wife died in 1856 and where he himself passed to the life eternal in 1860, both having been zealous and devout members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and he having been for many years staunchly arrayed as an old-line whig in politics. He prepared himself for the legal profession and served for a protracted period in the office of justice of the peace. Of the children the eldest was William Hamilton, who went to California in the early days, the other members of the family having eventually lost all trace of him; Sarah Ann, Frances Araminta, Elizabeth, Louisa, Clinton, and Albert S. are deceased; George met his death in a railroad accident; Charles Carroll resides in the City of Los Angeles, California, where he has long held prestige as a repre- sentative member of the bar and where he formerly served as prosecuting attorney of Los Angeles County ; and Dr. James M., of this review, is the youngest of the number.

Doctor McComas was afforded in his youth the ad- vantages of the common schools of the City of Louisville, Kentucky, and at Danville, that state, he was graduated in Central College as a member of the class of 1867. During this period he was also giving close attention

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HISTORY OF OKLAHOMA

to the study of medicine, under the effective preceptor- ship of leading physicians in his native state, besides which he availed himself of the advantages afforded in the city dispensary of Louisville. He has received the degree of Doctor of Medicine from each the medical department of the University of Pennsylvania, the Ken- tucky School of Medicine, the Kentucky Hospital College in Louisville, and the medical department of the Uni- versity of Louisville, Kentucky. This statement shows his zeal in fortifying himself through the best available post-graduate courses, and his success in the practical work of his exacting profession has been on a parity with his recognized ability and unfaltering devotion to his chosen vocation.

Doctor McComas initiated the practice of his pro- fession at Sturgeon, Boone County, Missouri, later prac- ticed in St. Louis, and from 1888 to 1891 he was a successful practitioner in the City of Los Angeles, Cali- fornia. He then returned to St. Louis, Missouri, where he continued his professional labors until the autumn of 1900, when he came to Oklahoma Territory, his residence at Elk City having continued since April of the following year, where he holds precedence as a pioneer physician and surgeon as well as one of the leaders in the ranks of his profession in this section of the state. His offices are maintained in the Postoffice Building and he has at all times stood exemplar of the most advanced thought and most approved methods in medical and surgical science, with deep appreciation of the responsibilities of his chosen vocation and with insistent determination to uphold right loyally its unwritten ethical code, so that he has always commanded the respect and confidence of his confreres as well as of the public in general. In 1906 the doctor did effective post-graduate work in connection with the clinics at the great Augustana Hospital in the City of Chicago, and he has on several other occasions taken similar post-graduate work in leading institutions in that city and St. Louis. He was one of the foremost in effecting the organization of the Beckham County Medical Society, of which he was elected the first president-an office which he held consecutively until 1915, since which time he has not abated in the least his active zeal in the work of the society. He is identified also with the Oklahoma State Medical Society, the Southwestern Medical Society and the American Medical Association.

Doctor McComas is unwavering in his allegiance to the democratic party and though he has had no desire for public office his civic loyalty caused him to give most effective service during his incumbency of the posi- tion of member of the Elk City Board of Education. He is affiliated with Elk City Lodge No. 182, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons; Elk City Chapter No. 50, Royal Arch Masons; and Elk City Commandery, No. 15, Knights Templar.

Of the two children of the first marriage of Doctor McComas the elder is Arthur Rochford, who was grad- uated in the University of Missouri with the degree of Bachelor of Arts, after which he was graduated in the medical department of St. Louis University, with the degree of Doctor of Medicine. He is now engaged in the successful practice of his profession at Sturgeon, Missouri. The younger son, Judge Edwin Gaillard McComas, is now serving on the bench of the County Court of Beckham County, Oklahoma, and is individually mentioned on other pages of this work.

A. T. BROWN was in that great concourse of people who in Oklahoma are known as Eighty-niners. Не developed a homestead in Canadian County. He was a pioneer of the Kiowa and Comanche Indian country, where other farms were developed. He became sub-

sequently the leading merchant of the town of Bradley. These are the primary facts in the career of Mr. Brown in Oklahoma. He is now senior member of the firm of Brown & Stephens, dealers in general merchandise at Bradley. His success as a merchant is best attested by the fact that the firm has one of the largest stores handling general merchandise among any of the small towns of Oklahoma, and in addition operates three other stores in the same town, carrying flour, feed and furni- ture. The firm's trade is well distributed over a large section of the fertile valley of the Wachita River in one of the most productive and prosperous regions in the state.

A. T. Brown was born in Clermont County, Ohio, in 1875, a son of Adam and Catherine (Garland) Brown. His father is also a native of Ohio, and with his family came to Oklahoma at the time of the first opening in 1889, settling near Yukon in Canadian County, where he located a homestead and gained his title from the United States Government. He assisted in rebuilding the United States Government remount station at Fort Reno, and has done other important construction work in the state. A brother of Adam Brown is W. J. Brown, one of the best known pioncers of the original Oklahoma and an influential capitalist living at Kingfisher. A. T. Brown has four brothers and two sisters: G. S. Brown, who is associated with the National Livestock Commis- sion Company at Oklahoma City; G. E. Brown, a farmer at Wynnewood, Oklahoma; W. O. Brown, a plumber in the employ of the National Stockyards Company at Okla- homa City; G. F. Brown, a farmer near Marlow; Mrs. E. J. Bailey, wife of a farmer near Rush Springs, Oklahoma; and Mrs. Wesley Armstrong, whose husband is a merchant at Marlow.

Mr. A. T. Brown received his public school education in Ohio, Kansas and Oklahoma, and began life for him- self as a farmer in Canadian County. At the opening of the Kiowa and Comanche Indian country in 1901 he settled in Comanche County on a farm twelve miles west of Marlow. There he bought other land and successfully farmed and raised livestock until 1912, at which date he transferred his vocation from farming to mercantile lines. He came into Bradley and soon took the lead as a merchant. He was associated with J. F. Bell until the latter's retirement from business on March 1, 1915.

Mr. Brown was married in 1900 in Ohio to Miss Lorena Ball. Their three sons, Adam F., Loren B. and Truman, are all now attending public schools. Mr. Brown is presi- dent of the board of education at Bradley, and one of that town's most enthusiastic boosters. Besides his business he operates two fine farms in the western part of Grady County. It is interesting to note that his life in Oklahoma began under primitive conditions when Indian tepees were more frequent than houses and red men more numerous than white. Homes were far apart, and it was not unusual for the inhabitants to be fright- ened by rumors of Indian raids. Now he lives in a highly civilized and prosperous community, the result of trans- formations wrought by the last quarter of a century, and has a growing and happy family and is prospering.

CHARLES W. MORRISON, who has been a resident of Hinton, Oklahoma, since 1902, is a Baptist minister by profession and in addition to his work as a preacher he is serving most efficiently as town clerk of Hinton. He also owns and operates a finely improved farm of 160 acres just east of Hinton and he has ever been on the alert to forward all measures and enterprises projected for the good of the general welfare.

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of Tandy Morrison, who came from Scotland to Virginia with his parents when he was a mere child. As a young man Tandy Morrison removed from the Old Dominion commonwealth to Hancock County, Kentucky, where he was successfully engaged in farming until his demise. John A. Morrison, father of the subject of this sketch, was born in Hancock County, Kentucky, in 1835, and he is now living at Horse Branch, Kentucky, where he has followed agricultural pursuits all his life. He is a mem- ber of the Baptist Church and in politics gives his alle- giance to the democratic party. He married, first, Basha Barnett, a native of Kentucky, where she was born in 1837 and where she died in 1860. This union was prolific of four children: Charles W. is the subject of this sketch; Edward M. is a printer and resides at Evansville, Indiana; and Mary C. and Aremus both died young. For his second wife Mr. Morrison married Bettie Stevens, who died in Kentucky and who is sur- vived by one daughter, Ida.

Reverend Morrison was born at Owensboro, Davis County, Kentucky, November 1, 1856, and he was reared to maturity on his father's farm. He attended the public schools of Davis County and studied for the Baptist ministry. In 1884 he left Owensboro and located in Comanche County, Kansas, where he was engaged in agricultural pursuits until 1889. He then came to Okla- homa and was a pioneer Baptist minister in the vicinity of Oklahoma City. In 1892 he removed to Yukon, Oklahoma, preaching in a Baptist Church there for the ensuing eight years. From 1900 to 1902 he preached in Watonga, Blaine County, Oklahoma, and in the latter year he came to Hinton, where he has since maintained his home. He came to this section before the Town of Hinton was started and bought a farm of 160 acres right on the edge of the townsite. This farm is splen- didly improved with modern buildings and cotton, oats and Kaffir corn are raised, in addition to which a specialty is made of livestock. Reverend Morrison is a democrat in politics and since 1907 he has been town clerk of Hinton. He still preaches and in this connection alternates at Greenfield and Laverty.

In Kentucky, in 1876, Reverend Morrison married Miss Annie Phillips, a daughter of J. B. Phillips, a farmer in Hancock County, Kentucky. Reverend and Mrs. Morri- son have two children : Floy E. is assistant cashier in the Hinton State Bank; and Zada Belle is the wife of L. E. Brown, postmaster at Tuttle, Oklahoma.

Reverend Morrison is a man of fine mentality and road human sympathy. He thoroughly enjoys home life and takes great pleasure in the society of his family and friends. He is always courteous, kindly and affable, and those who know him personally accord him the highest esteem. Mr. and Mrs. Morrison's lives have been exemplary in all respects and they have ever supported hose interests which are calculated to uplift and benefit humanity, while their own high moral worth is deserving of the highest commendation.

LAWRENCE NILES HOUSTON. A pioneer attorney and one of the oldest members of the Enid bar, Lawrence Niles Houston has been much in public life, and prob- bly no citizen of Enid has more stanch friends and well vishers. For about eight years Mr. Houston was register if the land office at Guthrie, and in that federal office te satisfied the predictions of his friends who had so nany reasons to appreciate his public ability through his arlier work as city attorney at Enid.

Lawrence N. Houston was born in Manhattan, Kansas, uly 9, 1858. His father, Samuel D. Houston, was prom- nent in the early days of "Bleeding Kansas," and had one to that vexed territory in 1853 from Ohio. Samuel

D. Houston was a cousin of the great Texas statesman, Sam Houston, and represented a family of Scotch-Irish ancestry, originally settled in Pennsylvania and furnish- ing many ministers and lawyers in the different genera- tions. Samuel D. Houston was the first receiver of the land office at Junction City, Kansas, and for seventeen years gave a capable administration to that position. In 1859 he was a member of the Kansas Constitutional Convention, associated with John J. Ingalls, Gen. James G. Blunt, and other prominent Kansans at that time. He made himself a prominent figure in the political life of early Kansas, and was one of the best known resi- dents of Manhattan. At the beginning of the war he abandoned his duties as receiver of the land office in order to enlist at Fort Leavenworth. Lincoln ordered him under arrest and sent him back to his official duties at Junction City under a guard of soldiers. The Presi- dent believed his services were more important in that office than they would be in the army. Later in life he removed to Kingfisher and also lived at Enid for a time, but died at his old home city, Manhattan, at the age of ninety-two. Samuel D. Houston married an Ohio lady, a well educated woman, who in the early days taught school at Weston, Missouri. She was devoted to her home, reared a family of seven children, and was an active church worker.

L. N. Houston grew up in Kansas, attended the State Agricultural College at Manhattan, and at the age of twenty was admitted to the bar and began practice at Concordia. He was county clerk of Cloud County six years and assistant county attorney there for four years. While in that section of Kansas he made a name for him- self both in the law and in politics, and lived there from 1877 to 1893. He had served as census enumerator and in other capacities became well known at Concordia.

Mr. Houston participated in the opening of the Chero- kee strip on September 16, 1893. He came to Enid on a cattle train from Hennessey, and almost at once took up the practice of law, so that he is now one of the oldest attorneys in the city. For four years he was city attorney, a period in which the most important public improvements were inaugurated. An Enid paper recently called attention to the fact that he furnished the legal advice and drew up the contract by which the Frisco Railway got $25,000 of the waterworks funds in return for running the railway to Enid. For this service Mr. Houston received a salary of ten dollars a month, with no extras for clerk's hire or stenographer. The same paper gives an interesting account of how he came to occupy the office of register of the land office at Guthrie. In 1902 the republicans held a county con- vention in which Mr. Houston was chosen chairman of the county central committee. During the four years in that office he filled the court house with republicans, and in 1904 was chosen to manage the republican campaign, with the result that Bird McGuire was elected to con- gress. Congressman McGuire rewarded the services of Mr. Houston by securing his appointment as register of the Guthrie Land Office. President Roosevelt nomi- nated him to that office in 1906, and he served as such until April, 1914. Though with two years more to serve he voluntarily resigned, and returned to his former home in Enid and has resumed the private practice of law. Mr. Houston is interested in the development of oil fields in Eastern Oklahoma, and has made his mark as a lawyer and public spirited citizen. Having lived in Oklahoma for more than twenty years he has sound reasons for his splendid faith in its great future.

In 1880 at Savannah, Missouri, Mr. Houston married Miss Alice Selecman. She was born in Kentucky, but re- ceived most of her education in Missouri, being a gradu- ate of the University of Missouri. Mrs. Houston is active

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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