WILLIAM E. CONNER, president of the Waurika
Realty Company and one of the original settlers of the town site, has
been identified with the late substantial development of the country,
as was his father with the growth of the cattle interests in the
previous generation of pioneers. He came to the town on June 19, 1902,
and for the first four years was engaged as a trader and a dealer along
various lines until 1906, when he promoted the Waurika Realty Company,
with a capital of $100,000. The company obtained the title to half a
section of land adjoining the old town site, has platted two additions
(Conners and the Railroad), and through its efforts many valued'
settlers pave invested and located here. Besides his real estate
interests he enjoys other important connections, being a stockholder in
the Waurika National Bank, and an active member of the Commercial Club.
,
William E. Conner is a native of Bert county,
Nebraska, born on the 23rd of February, 1867, son ofJefferson F. and
Rachel (Luthers) Conner. The paternal grandfather was Andrew Conner, of
Irish stock, who was born at Logansport, Indiana, where he reared a
family. He died before the Civil war. He was a millwright in his early
life, worked in New Orleans, and afterward removed to Indiana.
Jefferson F. Conner studied law, entered
practice, and in the late seventies became quite prominent in the
Greenback movement in Kansas. He was for some time located at Medicine
Lodge, that
state, and was a neighbor and admirer of Jerry Simpson. At
the organization of the People's party in 1892 he also gave that his
earnest support. He was a man of decided natural ability. He is a
resident of Major county, Oklahoma, and pastured his cattle on the
Cherokee Strip long before the great rush of 1889. He has been an
active and strong force in the growth and politics of the new state of
Oklahoma. By his marriage to Rachel
Luthers (whose
parents were natives of Missouri and Nebraska) his children were as
follows: Catherine,
wife of C. E. Gannon,
of Enid, Oklahoma; William
E., of this article; David,
of Comanche county, Oklahoma; Eva,
Mrs. James Gender, of that county, and Cynthia, who married William Beckner, of
Higgins, Texas.
William
E. Conner obtained
only a limited education, and remained identified with his father's
ranching interests until he became of age. He was in the Strip as a
cowboy when the soldiers were patrolling the country and was not
infrequently driven out with his cattle. When old Oklahoma was opened
he started from the southern line of the Strip, and, making twenty
miles in record breaking time, located a claim on the famous Campbell
Creek bottom, which he improved, proved up and sold. After disposing of
his claim he engaged in buying and shipping stock at Kingfisher,
dealing in horses and mules, and at the opening of the town of Waurika
came hither and established himself as one of its working and
substantial factors. Mr. Conner was married in Kingfisher, Oklahoma,
September 21, 1895, to Annie,
daughter of J. K.
Wilcox, who came from Quincy, Illinois. Mrs. Conner was born in
Kansas in 1876, and has become the mother of the following: Hazel, born in
April, 1896; James,
born in April, 1898; and Glen,
born in December, 1899.
William E. Conner is an ardent admirer of the
principles. of Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson and William Jennings
Bryan.
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