Indian Pioneer Papers - Index

Indian Pioneer History Project for Oklahoma
Date: November 15, 1937
Name: Robert Capps
Post Office: Henryetta, Oklahoma
Date of Birth: 1870
Place of Birth: Missori
Father: Pleasant Robertson Capps
Place of Birth:
Information on father:
Mother: Sarah Flowers
Place of birth: Illinois
Information on mother:
Field Worker: Grace Kelley
Interview # 12114 
 
Home Ginning of Cotton
After supper cotton was put on the hearth to get warm so the seeds would come out easily. Then everyone sat and picked the seeds from the cotton by hand. We would get enough cotton "ginned" that night to last all the next day. The next night we would clean cotton again so mother could spin the cotton and knit our stocking. I never wore "store" socks until after mother died. Then we made a gin. Two sticks were put together like a rubber roller wringer. The seed fell out on one side and the lint on the other. We could get enough cotton for a pair of stockings in a little while and it wasn't so tedious. The new ground made from one to two bales of cotton to the acre.

Friendly Neighbors
People were close with strangers going through, especially if there were no women with them but after they settled down like they were going to stay everyone helped each other to get started. They had house-raisings, making rails and fences. Clearing ground. Everyone helped and never thought about charging for the work. If someone was sick everyone went and helped in every way possible from sitting up with the sick, bringing in what was needed; sheets or pillow cases. gowns, rags, or food. I believe there were better friends then, at least they showed their friendship more than they do now.

Horse Hunting on Rock Creek
Bud NORTON, Bill MOUDY, John, Jim and Billie BROOKS, Redford and I decided to get a bunch of wild horses for this reason:
There was an old stallion with a bunch of about fifty or sixty horses. When people started settling on Rock Creek, people would turn their horses out and when this stallion saw one he liked he would round it up, just like a cowboy rounded a cow into a herd, and drive it on with the bunch. He went clear to Sulphur and Heart and every time he changed, he added from one to two to his herd. If you tried to take your mare from him, he would run at you with his mouth wide open like he would tear you to pieces and you would have to dodge to get away from him. He would rear up on his hind legs and paw and fight. We never did get him and we tried all the tricks we know. Finally one of the farmers shot him, after we had trapped his herd.

To catch these wild horses we cut logs and built a big corral across one of their run. Then we cut trees and let them fall with the tops together like a brush fence, making wings from both sides of the gate two or three miles long. They would keep dodging from one tree top to the next. They thought they were going around the tree top to the tops but were really following the course we had set for them. When they saw a gap open they would make a dash for freedom through the gate. Some of us would quickly shut the gate and then the real fun started. They had to be roped and broke to ride after we had cut out the ones the stallion had stolen.

Bud Norton was riding a fast, heavy, well-trained horse when we were driving them in. He rode up behind one and caught its tail and wrapped it around his saddle horn. He and his horse held it until one of the boys could rope it. This one had been determined that he would not go into the corral and Bud was trying to force him into it.

Five or Six Acre Rock
Between Rock Creek and Mill Creek, about three miles in the mountains, there was a gray granite rock with five or six acres in sight. It was flat like the ground but nothing grew on it.

Shipping and Freighting
When Joe ROFF ordered supplies from Texas he got cheaper rates by letting them ship to Washita Switch until Davis started, then to Davis. When he ordered from the north they shipped to Pauls Valley. There were fewer mountains to Pauls Valley so we would rather go there. There were only two or three miles difference. We used four yoke of oxen to a big wagon and trail wagon. I drove a span of mules to another wagon. It usually took two days to make the trip. Sometimes we drove into town to the depot, loaded up and drove three or four miles back and camped for the night. If there was an emergency or the store was entirely out of what we were hauling, and the moon was shinning we drove in that night but we didn't do that as a rule. We never were bothered by robbers and do not think any others were either. I think the freighters who were "robbed" took pay to drop off some of their stuff for the "robbers" to get. Later, the wagon yards fixed a room where the freighters could load up the wagons, put them in this room and lock them up until the next morning when they wanted to pull out for home. I never used them but I know they had them. The Sandys were like Coal Creek. We could go around the heads and cross where they were shallow. If they were up we would have to wait two or three hours until they ran down.

Comanches in 1890
When Comanches came over into the Chickasaw country, peacefully, the men wore breech clots of skins that were laced up on the sides with the same skin for laces. The women had squares of cloth that had been torn off instead of being cut with scissors. This was tied in the back around the waist and was their only clothing. From the waist up was bare.

Restaurants in 1897 and 1900
In 1897, I was married and we had a restaurant in Davis. The country had settled up thicker and an eating house was in demand. Indians, cowmen, and movers were our customers. Regular dinners were twenty-five cents, but the soup, chili, and lunches were more popular. We would get a half a beef leg for about a quarter-for three and four cents a pound- and it would make a five gallon boiler full of soup by adding vegetables. We sold a big bowl of soup or chili for five cents and it was good stuff, too. Then we always had pie, cake and good coffee. Our first restaurant was at Davis and then in 1900 we had one at Oakman.

Lost Child Episode -1904
In 1904 we moved to Dewar and I was digging coal for Jim and John WISE, where the K.O.&G. bridge on Coal Creek is now.

John RAY lived on the edge of Dewar and a widow and her two year old boy were staying there. One day she went somewhere and left the boy (he still wore dresses) with John's wife. He ran off, taking his little dog with him and got lost. There were no houses just wilderness, mountains and timber and big rocks northwest of Dewar. (And in fact that is just about all there is now.) The next morning the little dog came home and we just knew the little fellow had been eaten by the wolves, which were plentiful in there. Later, we learned he slept on a big flat rock that night and about the time the dog came home he went east from the rock and came to the home of an Indian named Mrs. GRAY. He called "Hello" until an Indian boy came out; then asked for breakfast and told them he was lost. He told them that he lived with Uncle John Ray and asked if they knew where he lived. The Indian boy gave him some breakfast and said he would go get a horse to take him home but the little fellow was afraid to let him out of sight. He grabbed a biscuit and followed him.

We were fixing to drag the creek for him as some of the miners thought the mother might have killed her boy. Everyone had hunted for twenty-four hours and supposed if he wasn't in the creek we would have found him.

The Gray boy took him to John Ray's and he shot the signal that the boy was found. We quit our preparations and returned to the house where the little fellow was; his dress was torn off during his wanderings.



Name: Robert Capps (Second Interview)
Investigator: Grace Kelley
Date: November 12, 1937
Interview with: Robert Capps, Dewar, Oklahoma

Interview # 12101

In 1890 two other boys and I walked from Austin, Texas, to Dougherty where my father lived. I was twenty years old. There was a cut-off trail between the Washita and Rock Creek on top of the divide from Berwyn to Dougherty. We waded the creeks. There were just a few settlers and most of them were afraid of us as there were so many rustlers and bad men that they thought we must be either rustlers or bad men or we would not be going through as we were. We had a little money and sometimes they would sell us a little to eat. Some of them would not even let us get a drink of water from their barrels. They had to haul water for fifteen or twenty miles. They were not close with friends and neighbors like that but they had to know you before they showed any friendship. We slept in cotton patches and on the prairie as they would not even rent us a bed.

When we got to Durwood Mr. KING let us stay at his house for two or three days to rest up. There was a trail between Durwood and Dougherty. Dougherty was twenty-five miles north of Durwood.

Durwood was an inland town with two or three stores, blacksmith, grist mill and cotton gin, and with a post office in one of the store.

Dougherty was on the Sante Fe Railroad; four stores, post office, cotton gin and grist mill constituted the town.

Old Store
There was a store, a sixteen by twenty foot box house, four miles north of Red River in a flat country. I would say that it was on the second bench land or ridge land of the Red River, close to Marietta. I do not know who owned it.

Mail Routes
Mr. REDFORD of Dewar carried the mail from Dougherty to Mill Creek on horseback.

Mr. ROFF had the post office and carried the mail from off to Mill Creek. Later the route was changed and went from Roff to Davis, to Stonewall where the railroad was. That was what we called a bus line. Some called it a hack and others called it a coach. Anyway, it was a wobbly thing. The ones who had a branch office had to carry the mail to the railroad themselves or else hire it done.

Roff
I worked for Mr. Joe Roff for seven years. He had a mill and during the week we sawed rawhide lumber from oak logs. I would cut from forty to fifty logs a day and oak is hard to cut. On Saturday we ground meal or corn and charged an eighth part of the meal for grinding it. Sometimes we would grind from Saturday morning to Monday morning without stopping. There were always two of us working, one to run the mill and the other to run the engine. One man would bring a wagon load of corn for a whole community on one Saturday. The next Saturday some other man of that community would come with everyone's corn. In that way only one man would have to make the trip, sometimes they came from a long way and over bad roads besides losing that time in the fields.

Everyone ate a lot of cornbread in those days. I have known folks who lived on cornbread and water until they got their crop in. If they were lucky enough to get hold of some flour it was kept until Sunday when the wife made light bread or biscuits. The children would be anxious for Sunday to come so they could have some biscuit. On Sunday people always had company and wanted the nicest food for the company. People visited more then than now.

The reason Mr. Roff put me to working in the mill was that there were some "toughs" who would bring their corn and not wait their turn as they were supposed to do, but would do their own grinding no matter how much it was and never would bother to pay for it. Mr. Roff was not making anything at all with the mill.

I kept a gun in a box handy, but I never had to use it on anyone. The first time that trick was tried on me I had done a lot of grinding and there was a long line of grinding ahead of me. I had a half bushel of corn in a basket to be ground for a man whose child was bad sick and who wanted to hurry back home. A "tough" came, emptied the corn out of the basket an started filling it with his own, preparing to do me the same way as he had always done Mr. Roff. I kicked the basket a-winding and told him I was doing the grinding now and he would wait his turn like others besides paying the same as they paid. When they saw that I could not be run over I had no more trouble.

Joe Roff was a "galvanized" white man which meant he had an Indian wife. He had a store and post office, the mills, twenty-five hundred cattle and the ranch house.

Editor's Note: "galvanized" was evidently the slang word for nationalized."

I was cutting forty to fifty logs a day when a fellow came with a string of recommendations, telling that he was a good lawyer and could make more profit for the boss who would have to pay him two-fifty a day and a dollar a day for a helper for him. I did not like him from the start for I had never been used to people having written praise of their work. Usually a man would tell what he knew and when asked could show how skillful he was. I had never been to mechanics' school so the boss thought it would be good to hire him and told me to watch and learn as much as possible from him. He worked seven days and sawed seven or eight logs and ruined the saw.

Dave CLATLS bought some new machinery from Dallas and they furnished a man to put the machinery in working order, that is to set it up. He had bought the boss out and I was not working for him. When he got through and lent they started to grind but the line shaft was a half foot out of line. They sent for me to see if I could fix it. Either the line shaft would have to be changed or the engine moved over so I moved the shaft over. I worked for him a long time after that.

Rock Crossing
On the Washita River, three miles north of Berwyn, there was a rock crossing or ford. There were no ferries on the Washita then.

Ferry on Red River
Mr. BINDS had a ferry on Red River but as Mineral Wells was the last big town we came through I could not give a location of the ferry; it was south of the Arbuckle Mountains but that does not help much.

Rancher
Nelse MURRAY, uncle of Bill Murray, had a ranch between Roff and Mill Creek on the head of Little Blue Creek. He had about five or six hundred head of cattle.

Water Mill
Low RANCE or Mr. LAWRENCE had an overshot wheel water mill close to Mill Creek. He was a squaw-man, too. There was a big spring like an artesian well; there was a place as large as a wash tub where it came out of the ground and made a big creek. Mr. Lawrence built a big pond that covered two or three acres and was fed by the spring. As it held so much water it gave the mill more speed. We ground wheat and corn.

Railroad strike in 1899
In 1898 we had a drought so we did not raise much corn and had to buy our meal and flour. In 1899 the railroad had a strike and would not pull or haul anything. When the stores ran out of meal and bread-stuffs we had to go back home without anything and eat roasting ears and potatoes for five or six weeks or until the trains started rolling again.

We had plenty of meat in the woods from the game and you could buy a hundred pound hog for three dollars, anytime.

The soap was made at home; soft soap from the bones, entrails and scraps and hard soap was from the cracklings. The smoke house was always full or sugar, coffee, salt and things like that, which were all that we bought.

Cloth for dresses cost three cents a yard but it took more yards than it does now. The wool and cotton thread and stockings were made at home.

 Submitted to OKGenWeb by Brenda Hickman Dias <bdias@inreach.com> 11-1999.