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ELIPHALET NOTT WRIGHT M. D.
Vol. 3, p. 1170-1171

Much has been written in this publication concerning the work and
the influence of Rev. Allen Wright, formerly governor and principal
chief of the Choctaw Nation, and whose happy suggestion furnished the
beautiful name of the State of Oklahoma. It was during his service on
a commission of the Choctaws engaged in making the treaty of 1866
with the United States Government that Governor Allen Wright
suggested the name which is now applied to the forty-sixth state of
the American Union.

At Olney, Oklahoma, Dr. Eliphalet Nott Wright, a son of Governor
Allen, is now engaged in the practice of medicine. He has been a
member of the medical profession in Indian Territory and Oklahoma for
thirty years. While he has accomplished much professionally, his name
should be placed only second to that of his father in political
influence.

A son of Governor Allen Wright, D. D., and Harriet Newell (MITCHELL)
Wright, Eliphalet Nott Wright was born April 3, 1858, at the present
location of the Armstrong Academy near Caddo, Oklahoma. He acquired
his primary instruction from private tutor and at the age of fourteen
entered Westminster College at Fulton, Missouri. He remained there
two years and at the age of sixteen entered Spencer Academy in the
Choctaw Nation, where he finished his course in June 1878. In
September of that year he entered Union College at Schenectady, New
York, where he graduated with the class of 1882, and then prepared
for his profession in the Albany Medical College, where he was
graduated with an M. D. in 1884.

With this thorough equipment in the schools of his native country
and from some of the best institutions in the East, Doctor Wright
returned to practice in the environment in which he had been reared.
He began practice at Boggy Depot in the Choctaw Nation in October
1884, he secured from the Choctaw Council the exclusive right to
develop oil in the Choctaw Nation. He then organized a company, and
in 1888 drilled in the first well near Atoka, which proved
conclusively that oil exists in and around this location. The
noteworthy feature of this undertaking was that it was the first oil
well drilled west of Ohio, and antedated the oil development in the
present State of Oklahoma by many years.

In 1885 Doctor Wright was employed as chief surgeon to the Missouri
Pacific coal mines at Lehigh, Oklahoma, a position which he filled
until 1894. In the meantime, on April 26, 1888 he married Miss Ida
Bell RICHARDS of St. Louis, Missouri.

Though he has always been devoted to the interests of his
profession, Doctor Wright has been called to performance of public
duty so much that his name is perhaps better known in public life and
leadership than in the profession to which he has been devoted for
more than thirty years.

In 1890 he was appointed by Governor Wilson N. Jones, of the Choctaw
Nation, as national agent, having full charge of the revenues of the
nation arising from the development and exportation of timber, stone
and coal. These revenues amounted to about $300,000 annually, and
were used by the Choctaw government in the maintenance of the
Government and its schools.

Doctor Wright's greatest public service was in connection with the
negotiations between the Choctaw Nation and Dawes Commission. In
1893, soon after the bill passed Congress creating Dawes Commission
with the five civilized tribes, for the purpose of securing allotment
of land in severalty and the breaking up of tribal relations, Doctor
Wright was appointed on a commission of twelve Choctaws to meet with
similar delegates sent from the Cherokees, Chickasaws, Creeks,
Seminoles, Osages, which met at Checota, Oklahoma, to deliberate on
the advisability of treating with the Dawes Commission. This
convention went on record as opposing the making of any treaties.

In 1895 Doctor Wright was elected a member of the Choctaw Council.
He was elected as an advocate of a policy to treat with the Dawes
Commission. Thus he was the first prominent citizen of any of the
five civilized tribes to advocate such a policy. His course was met
by strong and bitter opposition, and as he was the only member of the
council who believed in such a policy it required his strongest
efforts to procure a hearing for the Dawes Commission before that
body.

However, as a result of his constant appeals to his people, who had
every reason to repose utmost confidence in his judgement and
integrity, he succeeded early in 1896 in organizing the Tushkahoma
Party which favored treating with the Dawes Commission. In June of
the same year a convention of the Tushkahoma Party was held in Atoka
and nominated Hon. Green McCurtain for principal chief. The campaign
for this election in August developed a greater political activity
and more bitter animosity than was ever known to exist among the
Choctaw people. Doctor Wright had charge of this campaign, and was
successful in electing his candidate for chief and for members of the
council. At the convening of the council in October, 1896, Doctor
Wright was appointed on a commission of five to treat with the Dawes
Commission.

The significant part of this was that this Choctaw Commission was
the first appointed by any of the Five Civilized Tribes for
negotiations with the Dawes Commission. Out of these negotiations
developed the movement which finally brought about the creation of
the State of Oklahoma, as a result of the union between Indian
Territory and Oklahoma Territory. Thus as Doctor Wright's father had
suggested the name Oklahoma, it was Doctor Wright's able leadership
when the time came for breaking up tribal authority that proved a
strong factor in extending the name Oklahoma over all Indian
Territory and in finally creating a state of that name.

In December, 1896, following the meeting of the council, there was
drawn up the first agreement with the Dawes Commission. However,
Doctor Wright, as a member of the Choctaw delegation, refused to sign
this agreement since it did not carry out the policies intended by
the council and filed a minority report against it. He carried his
opposition before the Interior Department and Congress, in January,
1897, and finally succeeded in defeating it's ratification. On
account of his opposition in this instance, Doctor Wright did not
cooperate in drawing up the Atoka Agreement. There was no
inconsistency in Doctor Wright's action. He heartily believed in the
good results that would follow the cooperation between the civilized
tribes and the Dawes Commission for the purpose of the allotment of
lands in severalty and the breaking up of the tribal relations.
However, he was opposed to certain features of the agreement as
finally reached, and he did not hesitate to carry his opposition to
the limit. A strong following of the Choctaw people upheld his
policies in this course, but about that time he withdrew from
politics and gave his undivided time and attention to his profession
and the development of his own allotment of land.

In 1907 when Choctaw nation was facing grave dangers in the carrying
out of their treaty provisions, Governor McCurtain again called
Doctor Wright to his assistance and appointed him as a regular
standing delegate to Washington to represent the nation before
Congress and the department. The death of Governor McCurtain in 1910
ended all representation of the Choctaws in Washington.

In addition to these activities prior to statehood, Doctor Wright
was so confident of the ultimate union of the two territories into
one state, that in 1904 as president of the Indian Territory Medical
Association, he bent all of his influence into uniting the medical
societies of the two territories into one. Thus he succeeded in
creating the Oklahoma State Medical Association.

Doctor Wright has also found time to take an interest in national
politics. As a republican he was elected chairman of the Territorial
Convention to elect delegates to the National Convention which
nominated President McKinley. Doctor Wright now lives quietly at
Olney, and though somewhat retired from his former active
participation in affairs, he is a stanch and true friend of the
Choctaw people, and one of the most capable representatives of the
old regime still living in the new State of Oklahoma.

Typed for OKGenWeb by: Susan Bradford, 5 Nov 1998.