Interview #9472
Field Worker: Maurice R. Anderson
Name: Alice Curry
Date: December 17, 1937
Residence: Pauls Valley, OK
Date of Birth: August 4, 1867
Place of Birth: Love Valley, Indian Territory
Father: Phil Robison
Name of Mother: Mary Love
I was born in Love Valley in the Choctaw Nation, in 1867. My
mother was owned by Sobe Love and was brought to the Indian Territory
when only a small girl. My father was owned by a Creek Indian named Day and father's
name was Phil Day until after the close of the Civil War. At that time he
left this Creek Indian and changed his name to Phil Robison.
My father has told me that there was a white man whom he found lying
beside the road late one evening. He took the white man to his master's
house and in a few weeks, this white man who had been shot was well. The white man's name
was Robison so when my father left the Creek Indian and came to Love
Valley, he changed his name to Robison.
It was about one year after the close of the War that my father said he
went to work for Mr. Love who owned my mother. My mother said she had no
place to go after the War so Master Love let her stay with him and help with the
housework. After my father went to work there, he met and married my mother. He worked for
Sobe Love for two years, then he moved across the Red River and began
farming for himself.
I remember when I was about thirteen years old there was store called
Colbert's Station, just across Red River in the Indian Territory from
where we lived. Every year there would be a big picnic held there which would
last sometimes from three to four days. I have heard my father say that this
picnic was put on by the cattlemen and sometimes there would be a thousand
people there. It was for anybody that wanted to come and there would be
free barbecue. There was always a merry-go-round which was pulled by a mule. Besides the
lemonade stands there were two big dance platforms, one for the white people and one for
the colored. The Chickasaws and Choctaws had a place cleared off for their dance ground
and they would have a fire in
the center of the dance ground. All the music they had was a drum of some
kind. My father would help make music for the white people. There would be a United States
Marshal and an Indian Police there. When an Indian got
drunk, the Indian police would take him and handcuff him to a tree and leave
him there until he sobered up and then turn him loose. Sometimes these dances would go on
all night.
While we were living there, my father would come to Pauls Valley every
fall and gather corn and I have heard him say he helped build Smith Paul's
big rock house that stands on the hill at the South side of where Pauls
Valley is now.
In 1900, we moved from Texas to Wynnewood, in the Chickasaw Nation and
rented a farm on the Washita river and farmed for two years, then we
moved on the river southeast of Pauls Valley and leased a farm and lived
there until 1908. At that time the Washita River overflowed and washed
everything we had away: then my father moved into Pauls Valley, and went to work by the
day.
When my father died, he was guessed to have been one hundred and
nineteen years old.
I now live in Pauls Valley where I have lived since 1908.
Submitted by Dennis Muncrief
