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Cities, Communities, Towns, and Townships  

Township Grid of Oklahoma County
A note about name changes


Douglas City cont - Douglas City, like many other towns in the Unassigned Lands, exemplified the hopes and dreams of numerous town builders in the early 1890s. Douglas City was to be a black town, developed by black capital and managed by black entrepreneurs. The townside was to contain 160 acres and have large blocks, wide streets and lots 25 feet by 140 feet. A tract of ten acres was reserved for a public school. In 1893 the town had a general store, a cotton gin, a gristmill, a number of residences, and a church. Later a school was built. It was reported that more than two hundred lots had been sold to black families.

The developers believed the town would thrive for two reasons: (1) The townsite was laid out on a survey line of the proposed Midlands Railroad, "an important railroad certain to be built within the next eighteen months from Colleyville, KS, to the McAlester coal fields and forming a part of the Missouri Pacific System." (2) The townsite developers offered to donate twenty acres to the state for the location of the Territorial Normal School for Negroes. The railroad, however, was never built, and the school was located at Langston.

The Douglas community continues to exist in name. The school remained in operation until it was consolidated with Luther. The church has been moved to a different location. The Turner Turnpike now crosses the former townsite. [Source: John W. Morris, Ghost Towns of Oklahoma  (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1965].


Name "changes" are a potential source of confusion.  Garnettville & Luther are a good example.  There were a number of  small Post Offices, like Garnettville, already in place when the railroads came through.  The 40-acres that were purchased and platted as the town of Luther had been part of the more diffuse community of Garnettville and therefore had been served by its Post Office.  After the town was established, the Garnettville office was closed and the Luther office created to serve the area.   In this case, the two offices were apparently less than two miles apart.   For post offices like these, a transfer is probably more accurate than saying the name was changed.

All of the following were such "railroad towns":
Chaddick/Dickson -- C RI & P                    Garnettville/Luther -- St. L - SF
Glaze/Jones -- St. L - SF                         Halifax/Newalla -- A T & SF
Harrah/Sweeney -- C RI & P                      Munger/Spencer -- St. L - SF
Pennington/Sweeney/Harrah -- C RI & P;     Rosedale/Conception -- St. L - SF

C RI & P = Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific ( known locally as the Rock Island)
St. L - SF = St. Louis - San Francisco (known locally as the Frisco)
A T & SF = Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe (known locally as the Santa Fe)
[above information provided by Sharon McAllister] 


Sources: 

  1. George H. Shirk, Oklahoma Place Names (Norman OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1965)

  2. Bureau of the Census: 1950 map showing census county divisions and townships.

  3. Selected portions of map copied from an unidentified source.

  4. Sharon McAllister

  5. Oklahoma, Luther, Deep Fork, & Crutcho township maps.

Facts of Oklahoma

Capital: Oklahoma City 

State Nickname: Sooner State 

State Bird: Scissortail Flycatcher 

State Flower: Mistletoe 

Admitted to the Union: November 16, 1907
 

Governors

November 16, 1907 to January 9, 1911:

Charles N. Haskell

January 9, 1911 to January 11, 1915:

Lee Cruce

January 11, 1915 to January 3, 1919:

Robert L. Williams

January 13, 1919 to January 8, 1923:

James B. A. Robertson

January 8, 1923 to November 19, 1923:

John C. Walton*

* Removed from office

November 19, 1923 to January 10, 1927:

Martin E. Trapp

January 10, 1927 to March 20, 1929:

Henry S. Johnston*

* Removed from office

March 20, 1929 to January 12, 1931:

William J. Holloway

January 12, 1931 to January 14, 1935:

William H. Murray

January 14, 1935 to January 9, 1939:

Ernest W. Marland

January 9, 1939 to January 11, 1943:

Leon C. Phillips

January 11, 1943 to January 13, 1947:

Robert S. Kerr

January 13, 1947 to January 8, 1951:

Roy J. Turner

January 8, 1951 to January 10, 1955:

Johnston Murray

January 10, 1955 to January 12, 1959:

Raymond D. Gary

January 12, 1959 to January 6, 1963:

J. Howard Edmondson*

* Resigned from office

January 14, 1963 to January 9, 1967:

Henry L. Bellmon

January 9, 1967 to January 11, 1971:

Dewey F. Bartlett

January 11, 1971 to January 13, 1975:

David Hall

January 13, 1975 to January 3, 1979:

David L. Boren

January 3, 1979 to January 12, 1987:

George Nigh

January 12, 1987 to January 14, 1991:

Henry L. Bellmon

January 14, 1991 to January 9, 1995:

David Walters

January 9, 1995 to January 13, 2003:

Frank Keating

January 13, 2003 –

Brad Henry

 
Senators - Class II

December 11, 1907 – March 3, 1925

Robert Latham Owen

March 4, 1925 – March 3, 1931

William Bliss Pine

March 4, 1931 – January 3, 1937

Thomas Gore

January 3, 1937 – January 3, 1943

Joshua Bryan Lee

January 3, 1943 – January 3, 1949

Edward Hall Moore

January 3, 1949 – January 1, 1963

Robert S. Kerr * Died in office

January 7, 1963 – November 3, 1964

James Howard Edmondson

November 3, 1964 – January 3, 1973

Fred Roy Harris

January 3, 1973 – January 3, 1979

Dewey Follett Bartlett

January 3, 1979 – November 15, 1994

David Lyle Boren

 
Senators - Class III

December 11, 1907 – March 3, 1921

Thomas Gore

March 4, 1921 – March 3, 1927

John William Harreld

March 4, 1927 – January 3, 1951

Elmer Thomas

January 3, 1951 – January 3, 1969

Almer Stillwell Monroney

January 3, 1969 – January 3, 1981

Henry Bellmon

January 5, 198 – January 3, 2005

Don Nickles

January 3, 2005 –

Tom Coburn

 
State Song
Oklahoma
 

Lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II
Music by Richard Rodgers

Brand new state! Brand new state, gonna treat you great!
Gonna give you barley, carrots and pertaters,
Pasture fer the cattle, Spinach and Temayters!
Flowers on the prarie where the June bugs zoom,
Plen'y of air and plen'y of room,
Plen'y of room to swing a rope!
Plen'y of heart and plen'y of hope.

 

Oklahoma, where the wind comes sweepin' down the plain,
And the wavin' wheat can sure smell sweet
When the wind comes right behind the rain.
Oklahoma, ev'ry night my honey lamb and I
Sit alone and talk and watch a hawk makin' lazy circles in the sky.
We know we belong to the land
And the land we belong to is grand!
And when we say--Yeeow! A-yip-i-o-ee ay!
We're only sayin' You're doin' fine, Oklahoma! Oklahoma--O.K.

 

 
State Population

1910: 1,657,155

1920: 2,028,283

1930: 2,396,040

1940: 2,336,434

1950: 2,233,351

1960: 2,328,284

1970: 2,559,463

1980: 3,025,290

1990: 3,145,585

2000: 3,450,654


State Capitol Building 1927

 

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