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Indian Pioneer History Project for Oklahoma

Indian Pioneer History Project for Oklahoma
Date:  July 15, 1937
Name: Alexander, J. F.   
Post Office:  Sulphur, OK   
Interview:  # 4869
Address: Sulphur, OK
Born: September 23, 1870
Place of Birth: Texas
Father: Paul Alexander, born April 5, 1842 in Mississippi
Mother: Elizabeth Coates, born August 2, 1846 in Mississippi
Field Worker:   John F. Daugherty 

My father was Paul Alexander, born April 5, 1842 in Mississippi.  He was a farmer and stockman.

Mother was Elizabeth Coates, born in Mississippi,  August 2, 1846.  There were eight children in our family.  I was born September 23, 1870, in Texas.  I came to the Indian Territory in a covered wagon in 1893.  I crossed Red River at Brown's Ferry near Thackerville, and settled three miles south of Ardmore.  I lived there four years and moved to Troy in Johnston County.  I was the first postmaster at Troy.  The mail came from Tishomingo in a cart every day.

There were some cattle thieves living near Troy.  One night a bunch of the good citizens got on their horses, tied handkerchiefs over their faces and rode to the home of these thieves.  They slipped a rope about the neck of one of these as he slept, and awakened him by punching him in the side with a six-shooter.  They took him out to a tree and hanged him.  Then took him down and asked him where the cattle belonging to a neighbor were located.  He would say  nothing, so they pulled him up again, and this time when they let him down he told them where to find the cattle.  They told him if he didn't move the next day he would be hanged after dark and left him.

As they returned to their homes they met his brother-in-law, who was a partner in the cattle stealing.  They caught him and hung him twice and let him down, but he would tell nothing.  When they returned to the road, the boy's horse was gone.  One of the leaders of this masked bunch took him on his horse as far as his home, then turned his horse over to the boy to ride home.  The next morning the boy returned the horse and they moved that day.

When the Frisco Railroad was built in 1901-02 the bed was made with teams and scrapes.  I furnished the beef for Whip Powell's camp.  They had camps from Scullin to Ravia and I butchered the beef for them all.  It took about eight hundred pounds per day.  I butchered early every morning, and had it all delivered by nine o'clock.  There was no ice to keep it, so they got it fresh each day.

I married Rebecca Cummings in Texas, May 4, 1890.  We have six children.  We have lived in Sulphur about twelve years.

Submitted to OKGenWeb by Brenda Choate  September 2003