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MRS. LILAH D. LINDSEY
Vol. 3, p. 1024-1025
Book has photo of Mr. and Mrs.

One of the greatest living women in Oklahoma, great both for her
character and personality and for the varied works she has
accomplished and in which she is interested, is Mrs. Lilah D. Lindsey
of Tulsa. Mrs. Lindsey is an Indian woman. Her father was a Cherokee
and her mother a Creek, and their names were John and Susan
(MCKELLOP) Denton, both of whom were born in Alabama of Scotch
ancestry, and as children came during the early '30s to the Creek
Nation of Indian Territory. The mother of Mrs. Lindsey was of a
missionary family, and becoming a physician , she practiced all over
the Creek Nation in the early days. Mrs. Lindsey was the youngest in
a family of six children, four of whom died in infancy and one at the
age of twelve years.

It was in the old Tullahassee Mission School of the Creek Nation
that Mrs. Lindsey acquired her first education. Her mother had been
educated in the same school, and the daughter, who from childhood
showed an eagerness for learning and an ambition for accomplishment
beyond the ordinary, sought every opportunity to train her mind. At
that time Indian girls were not allowed to enter schools until the
age of twelve, and one of her early disappointments was when she was
taken at the age of eight to the mission school but was not allowed
to enter. Her first teacher at Tullahassee Mission was Miss Eliza J.
BALDWIN, who is still living, and who more than any other one person
was instrumental in directing the education of Mrs. Lindsey and
encouraging her interest in the broad field of philanthropy which she
has since made her life work. At the age of sixteen Miss Lindsey's
parents both died, and through the influence of friends she went to
Hillsboro, Ohio, having previously attended a seminary at Fulton,
Missouri. At Hillsboro, Ohio, she entered the Highland Institute, and
was graduated with honors in the class of 1883. She was the first
Creek Indian girl to graduate from that institution. While there she
was urged to take a medical course in order that she might practice
among her own people, since she possessed, partly as an inheritance
from her mother, a natural ability for such work, and has always been
an excellent nurse. In her childhood Mrs. Lindsey spoke only the
Indian language, and while in school devoted herself assiduously to
the learning of the English language, and has often been complimented
for the perfect fluency with which she speaks that tongue.

The spring before her graduation from Hillsboro she was appointed by
the Home Mission Board of Schools at New York to teach at the Wealaka
[sic] Mission in Oklahoma, to which point the old Tullahassee Mission
had been transferred. Her natural ability and her love for teaching
soon gave her a high standing as an able educator in the old Indian
Territory. She taught for a time at the Presbyterian Mission in
Wealaka, also at the Coweta Mission, and for about three years at
Tulsa. Thus altogether she spent about ten years in the mission
schools. After her marriage and at the solicitation of her friends
she was induced to accept the position of teacher in the national
schools of Oklahoma, and the State Board of Education, having full
confidence in her ability, did not require an examination, which was
otherwise obligatory upon all teachers.

In 1884 at the Wealaka Mission Miss Denton was married to Col. Lee
W. LINDSEY. Colonel Lindsey was born in Ohio in 1845, served in an
Ohio regiment of cavalry during the Civil war, and after peace was
restored went south and lived for several years in Alabama, and
superintended the quarrying of stone for the building of the first
machine shops at Birmingham. He became a building contractor, and
during the '70s moved to the Creek Nation of Indian Territory.
Colonel Lindsey completed the walls and enclosure of the old council
house of the Creek Nation at Okmulgee. He moved to Tulsa,
establishing his home in that then small village in 1886, and has for
many years been one of the central figures and influential
personalities in the growing metropolis of Northeastern Oklahoma. The
Lindsey home in Tulsa has long been one of the most attractive
residences of that city.

For years Mrs. Lindsey has been one of the active factors in the
Women's Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions of the Southwest, and
her work in this and other organizations has made her name known
throughout the country. An interesting sketch of her activities was
published in 1914 in the Wide West, and some of its paragraphs are
introduced into this article. "In the twenty-eight years that Mrs.
Lindsey has made her home in Tulsa, her interests have been varied,
but she has so systematized her work that she was able to effectually
carry out every plan except the last work undertaken, which was the
establishment and care of a Florence Crittenden Home for Fallen Girls
at Tulsa. She secured the donation of a tract of land for this home,
and it is still her greatest ambition to see such an institution
provided and maintained at Tulsa. Failing health prevented her from
realizing her ambition immediately, though those acquainted with her
persistence and energy know that the work is only deferred and not
abandoned.

"Mrs. Lindsey has been a leader in practically all woman's
organizations of any note in Tulsa. She did individual charity work
on a large scale for years. She visited the sick, personally secured
donations for the needy, and practically did the work of a humane
officer. Five years ago she organized the Humane Society, the work
having grown until she could no longer care for it single handed. Her
interest in charitable work attracted the attention of state
officials. Governor Haskell appointed her as the Oklahoma delegate to
the International Tuberculosis Conference held at Washington, and she
has been sent to numerous state charity associations. Not the least
of her work is the open hearted hospitality that for years made her
home the home of every young man or woman who were strangers in the
city.

"She is an ardent church worker and has the honor of being the
oldest in membership in the First Presbyterian Church in Tulsa. About
thirteen years ago she added W. C. T. U. work to her other duties and
organized a union in her city. From that time until statehood she was
president of the Indian Territory W. C.T.U. and has since been vice-
president of the Oklahoma organization, president of the Tulsa County
and the local union, and for one year edited the official organ of
the Indian Territory W.C.T. U. At the World's Convention of the W.
C.T.U. held in Boston a few years ago, Mrs. Lindsey was introduced to
the assembly of women from all nations as a 'real native of America.'
Mrs. Lindsey organized both the Maccabees and Woman's Relief Corps at
Tulsa. She is a member of the executive board of the latter
organization and one year audited the books in Atlantic City. She has
attended nine national G. A. R. assemblies.

"In her work for her city Mrs. Lindsey has been a searchlight,
seeking out the needs of the city before it felt them. She has ever
been in readiness to supply the need when it came. She gave to Tulsa
its first woman's club, because she organized the Tulsa W.C.T.U., the
National W.C.T.U. being the first woman's club ever organized in
America. She gave to Tulsa and Oklahoma their first police matron.
Realizing what the office might be made to accomplish with girls
taken into court, Mrs. Lindsey found a woman broad enough and womanly
enough with ability to fill the position. When she met with the
council to propose that such an office be created, she had the
preliminaries so well planned that the office was created and the
woman she desired appointed and commissioned to begin work the
following morning. She has also been vice president of the Women's
National Rivers and Harbors Congress.

"One of the things in which she is intimately interested is the
preservation of old Indian landmarks, especially the Creek Capitol
Building at Okmulgee, which she hopes to see made into a museum of
the preservation of Creek relics. As already stated her husband built
the stone wall about this building and set out the trees around it,
and she taught a term of school in one of its rooms, these memories
as well as tribal patriotism endearing the structure to her."

If in the subsequent generations the work and influence of womankind
bear a proper fruit in molding human destiny in a noble form, as now
seems probable, that achievement will be based upon and dependent on
the pioneer labors of such devoted, sincere and effective woman
leaders of the present time-not least among whom is Lilah D. Lindsey
of Oklahoma.

Typed for OKGenWeb by Lee Ann Collins, February 10, 1999.