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RALSA F. MORLEY
Vol. 3, p.1311

From the standpoint of the scriptural aphorism, "By their works ye
shall know them," it is but consistent to designate the personality
and achievement of Mr. Morley as being distinctively marked by
versatility, by deep appreciation of the try values in the scheme of
human thought and action, by exalted ideals and by productive
usefulness. He is now engaged in the successful practice of law in
the City of Tulsa, judicial center of the county of the same name,
his business acumen as been shown in his progressive enterprise in
connection with the physical development and up-building of his home
city; and he has proved effectively his power as a strong and
resourceful attorney and counselor at law. These brief preliminary
statements justify the claim made above, to the effect that he is a
man of distinctive versatility of talent, and it may further be side
that he is one of specially high intellectual intolerance or bigotry.
A true type of the world's productive workers, his career is pleasing
to review in even the contracted epitome here possible to offer.

A Native of the Badger State and a scion of one of its honored
pioneer families, Mr. Morley was born at Baraboo, the judicial center
of Sauk County, Wisconsin, on the 12th of December, 1874, the second
in order of birth of the three children of Ralsa A. and Rose Mary
(CLARK) Morley, the eldest son being Rolla C. and the youngest Robert
W.

Ralsa A. Morley was born in the State of Kentucky in the year 1831,
and his death occurred in Sauk County, Wisconsin, in 1894, his widow
being still a resident of that state: she was born in Walworth
County, Wisconsin, in 1830, and this date fully indicates that her
parent were early pioneer settlers of that fine commonwealth of the
Union. Ralsa A. Morley acquired his early education in his native
state and was a lad of sixteen years when he accompanied his parents
on their immigration to Wisconsin. In making the long overland trip
to the destination the family transported their limited household
effects and on the journey the father, and son found ample demand
upon their time and patience en route, as a number of cattle and
sheep were by them driven through the entire distance from Kentucky
to Wisconsin Settlement was made in the wilds of Sauk County, in the
central part of the state, and there the parents Thomas and Mary
Morley, passed the residue of there lives, sterling pioneers who
endured the labors and trials incidental to the development of a
pioneer farm, and who proved true and steadfast in all of the
relations of life. Ralsa A. Morley assisted in the reclamation of the
homestead farm, attended the pioneer schools, gained much advancement
in scholarship through self-application at home, and finally read law
and became eligible fir the bar, though he never found it expedient
to engage in active practice. The major part of his active career was
one of close identification with farming, stock-growing of Short Horn
cattle and Percheron horses, and for many years he was engaged in the
buying and shipping of live stock, his purchase of stock being made
principally in Wisconsin and shipment being made to the Chicago
market. During the closing period of his life he resided on his farm
in Sauk County and gave his attention principally to the raising of
live stock. Mr. Morley was one of the honored and influential
citizens of the county that was his home for many years, and for
virtually a period of fifteen years he served as a member of the
board of county commissioners of Sauk County. As an official he was
loyal and progressive and his influence was potent in furthering the
civic and material advancement of his home county. Within the long
period of his service as county commissioner many excellent county
buildings were erected, and he had active supervision of much of the
work, including that of the court house and the county asylum for the
care of the insane. In politics he was an old-line whig until the
organization of the republican party, when he transferred his
allegiance to the latter, the cause of which ever afterward had his
zealous support. He was a consistent and influential member of the
Methodist Church, of which his venerable widow likewise has long been
a devout adherent.

He whose name initiates this article continued his studies in the
public schools of his native county until he had completed the
curriculum of the high school in the City of Baraboo, in which he was
graduated as a member of the class of 1891, and thereafter he was for
three years a student in the great University of Wisconsin, in the
beautiful little City of Madison, the lake ensconced capital of that
state, his studies having been in the literary or academic department
of the university. After leaving Wisconsin Mr. Morley continued his
studies in Lake Forest University, at Lake Forest, a suburb of that
City of Chicago, and in this institution he was graduated as a member
of the degree of Bachelor of Arts. He thereafter completed the
prescribed curriculum in the McCormick Seminary, in Chicago, in which
he was graduated as a member of the class of 1901. With seemingly
insatiable appetite for intellectual pabulum, and realizing that his
contemplated application would prove of great value to him in his
service to humanity, Mr. Morley next entered the law department of
the great University of Chicago, and in the same he was graduated in
1903, with the degree of Bachelor of Laws. He had depended almost
entirely upon his own resources in defraying the expenses of his long
continued scholastic discipline, and this fact made him the more
earnest and appreciative in his efforts, the more enthusiastic in his
determination to make his life one of usefulness to others and
expressive of the high ideals which he has firmly held from his youth
to the present time.

In February, 1905, two years prior to the admission of Oklahoma to
the Union, Mr. Morley came to the territory, which assumed the
dignity of statehood in the following November, 1907, and established
his residence in the ambitious young City of Tulsa. With marked
circumspection and realization of possibilities and demands, he
turned his attention to the securing of real estate in the city and
erecting thereon houses of the better order. He thus erected and sold
a total of fifteen houses, and in this initial venture of his
adoption he not only contributed materially to its up-building but
also realized a merited profit in a financial sense. Mr. Morley now
owns a large amount of real estate in the City of Tulsa and vicinity.
He is at the present time erecting a substantial business block

In May, 1907, Mr. Morley opened his law office in Tulsa and thus
became a "charter member" of the bar of the state, which became a
sovereign commonwealth a few months later. He has since continued in
the successful general practice of his profession, with a substantial
and important clientage, and he is honored not only as a
representative member of the bar of Tulsa County but also as a loyal
and public-spirited citizen and as a man whose ability, high ideals
and civic progressiveness make him a citizen of unequivocal value to
the community and one worthy of the unqualified respect of his fellow
men in all walks of life. Mr. Morley is a democrat in his political
proclivities.

Mr. Morley married Augusta MOORE, in Mattoon, Illinois. In 1905 they
settled in Oklahoma, They have one charming little daughter, Lucile,
who is the idol of their home.

Typed for OKGenWeb by Charmaine Keith, October, 7, 1998.