C. E. Todd

My mother, father, brother and I left Arkansas in two covered wagons. We
had a team of horses hitched to one wagon and a toke of oxen hitched to the
other. When we left Arkansas, we had made up our minds to hunt for some good
level rich land, where there was a school and a Baptist church. Then we
reached Courtney Flat, Indian Territory, in December, 1888, we found just
what we found just what we were looking for. Courtney Flat is in the
Chickasaw Nation, about a mile from the Red River. The nearest ford was
called the Illinois Bend ford.

John Fowler ran the big general mercantile store, and the post office in
Courtney Flat. The Mail was carried there on horseback from Nocona, Texas.

I taught school in Courtney Flat, in a box schoolhouse. The first
three years that I was there, it was a subscription school, and I had about
forty pupils, who paid me a dollar and a quarter a month each. This school
was very difficult to teach, on account of the books used. Some of the
children used McGuffey's books, while other had books edited by some one
else. This necessitated hearing two different classes of pupils, who were in
the same grade. The pupils didn't have desks, but sat on benches, made of
one by four planks, twelve or fourteen feet long. I had ten or twelve
children attending school who were half Indian, but they all spoke English.
Our school terms were seven months long.

Corn and cotton were the two principal crops raised. Corn made about
fifty bushels an acre, and was sold to the cowmen for fifteen cents a bushel
to winter their cows on. The first two or three years cotton was planted, it
did not fully mature before the fall freeze. What did mature was ginned at
Courtney Flat, hauled to Nocona, Texas, and sold. It brought about seven or
eight cents a pound. The men who hauled the cotton to Nocona, would load
their wagons with supplies for the store at Courtney Flat, as all of the
supplies for this place were freighted from Nocona.

I have been told that Courtney Flat was named for a white man by
the name of Courtney. Mr. Courtney found a Chickasaw Indian boy on the
prairie with a broken leg, took him in, and kept him until he was well. To
show his appreciation, the Indian Boy's father gave Mr. Courtney aright to
the flat that was named after him. All of the farms near Courtney Flat were
fenced with rails. The grass was excellent, and there were many deer, wild
turkey, and wild hogs.

My father and I tried to fatten some of the hogs on corn in a pen,
but they were so wild, they would only eat at night, and they didn't do any
good. In the fall of the year, after the pecans, hickory nuts, and walnuts
had fallen on the ground, the hogs get fat and made good meat.

In 1892, I moved to Iona, which is just a few miles east of
Wynnewood. There was one store, a gin, blacksmith shop, post office, and a
school.

Fate Parks ran the store and post office. I taught the school for
seven years. There were several full blooded Indians there. Mose Chigley, a
fullblood Chickasaw, was well educated, and handled lots of cattle and
horses. Matt Wolf was another Indian and cattleman.

In the winter there were thousands of ducks and geese. The ducks
were easy to kill, but the geese were not, as it was hard to get close
enough to kill them.

When the Caddo, Kiowa, and Comanche Country was opened, I
registered for the drawing at Fort Sill and drew a claim.

Transcribed by Barbara Giddens and Dennis Muncrief, April 2001.

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