3
10
101
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https://bristoworalhistory.org/files/original/d68015cbec673daa69bf9f5ef01cc580.jpg
16ed27d65dcec60a390ee9d81fe8af41
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Pinehill Histories
Subject
The topic of the resource
History of the Pinehill area north of Bristow
Description
An account of the resource
Several interviews were done by Mary and Bob Mc Carty of people who grew up in the Pinehill area north of Bristow. This collection is the Pinehill subset of the Bristow Oral Histories
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Bristow Historical Society, oral history collection
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Oral history.
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
The person(s) performing the interview
Robert L. "Bob" McCarty
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Loyd Raymond Bruce
OHMS Object
This field contains the OHMS Hyperlink (link to the XML file within the OHMS
Viewer)
https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0008-02_Loyd_Bruce.xml
Interview Keyword
This field adds keywords to the Omeka Oral History item type. Keywords are
included in the OHMS XML, this field in Omeka will allow for full data migration
between OHMS XML and the Omeka Record. This field does not impact the
OHMS / Omeka integration and is optional if you do not need to map the
“keywords” field in the OHMS XML to the corresponding Omeka record.
Pinehill, Bruce, cattle drives, school, Heyburn, crops, landrun, electricity, movies
OHMS Object Text
This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the
contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka
5.4 OHP-0008-02 Loyd Raymond Bruce OHP-0008-02 'Bristow Historical Society - Oral History Archive' Parkhill Community Bristow Historical Society, Inc. Pinehill, Bruce, cattle drives, school, Heyburn, crops, landrun, electricity, movies Loyd Raymond Bruce Robert L. "Bob" McCarty MP3 1:|12(16)|22(1)|34(3)|45(13)|52(10)|65(15)|80(14)|93(9)|120(14)|137(2)|147(7)|164(15)|178(7)|197(5)|222(15)|249(10)|283(15)|305(2)|326(7) 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/interviews/OHP-0008-02 Bruce, Loyd.mp3 Other audio 0 Bruce Family migrates to Pinehill BM: [Inaudible] --in their living room, 10/13/76, ten minutes ‘til 9 o’clock. MM: [Inaudible.] BM: Loyd, to your knowledge in your research that you’ve done on the Bruce family, would you say they were the—some of the first people that came in to the Pinehill community? LB: Yes, according to the information that I have on our family they migrated from Missouri into there just east of Oklahoma City in 1889, 1890 and ’91 during those runs from the Kansas line, and my father made the run in 18—either 1889 or ’90, I haven’t been able to determine for sure, and staked a claim just east of Oklahoma City. He was fifteen years old at that time and had to wait for his older sister who was legal—of legal age—help him make that claim. Then they stayed there for a few years, I’m not sure exactly how many, but they settled in what is now Creek County--it was Indian Territory then—near the Pinehill community, and my grandfather Coleman Bruce and wife Alpha Bruce had come after the claims were staked east of Oklahoma City. They had come, moved their family here and they built a rock house east of the last Pinehill school, down near Polecat Creek bottoms, and raised their family—at least partially raised their family there. So I’m sure that they settled sometime between 1895 and possibly 1898 in that area and it’s my understanding that they were the first white people in that part of the country at that time. Discussion of the Bruce Family migrating to the Pinehill area in the late 1800s. Alpha Bruce ; Bruce ; Coleman Bruce ; Indian Territory ; landrun ; Loyd Raymond Bruce ; Pinehill Landrun ; migration ; pinehill 175 Crops and Cattle BM: To the best of your knowledge, do you have any idea what their first crops were whenever they came in there? LB: I heard them mention corn all the way back, and I heard the crop of maize mentioned being raised, and kaffir corn. Cotton came around sometime but it’s my understanding that it was several years later, possibly after statehood, before cotton became popular in Oklahoma. Discussion of cattle drives and cattle sales. Albert Kelly ; Bristow Depot ; carload ; cattle ; cattle drive ; corn ; cotton ; crops ; kaffir corn ; railhead ; railroad ; statehood ; W.O.Baker cattle drives ; crops ; farming ; railroads 416 School days and fairs BM: Alright, we’ll move on down to the school. To your best memory on the school itself, how many schools were built there, Loyd? LB: I can only recall the last school that was built there. I went from primary to the eighth grade there, however I heard before, I’ve heard it talked in the family that there were a total of three schools and a church associated with one of those schools. I think initially there was a church that—it may have been one building that was used as a church and a school. And this may have happened to more than one of the schools, but I remember that one building served as a school and a church for the neighborhood. Discussion of various activities held at the school pie suppers ; school ; township fair ; voting precinct school 526 Heyburn Lake BM: --to your knowledge, when did the government come in and go to buying up that land along the creeks and bottoms there in that community? LB: This would’ve had to be in ’46—no, correction, about ’47 or ’48 they did the actual purchasing of it. And then I think maybe the construction of the dam and so forth was a year or two later. BM: Do you have any idea how many people was affected by— MM: Displaced. Discussion of Heyburn Lake being built and families displaced displacement ; Heyburn ; lake Heyburn Lake 683 Christmas Programs, Pie Suppers, and Electricity MM: --talk about the Christmas tree, the Christmas programs. What did they [inaudible] LB: Oh yeah, I remember the Christmas programs. It used to be one of our days of enjoyment planning for the Christmas tree because usually the kids got out of school and the neighborhood, one of the neighborhood residents would volunteer a truck and we would go up into the Keystone area and cut a Christmas tree a few weeks in advance of Christmas, and this was a treat in itself to get away from school. Then we would bring it back and take part in decorating the tree and we got away from some of our usual school chores and enjoyed doing these things. Then at the time of the actual Christmas program there were, well—I’m leaving something out, the box suppers that was held, the pie suppers and so forth to raise funds for the Christmas program was also part of this sequence of events, and when the money from that came in then there was candy and nuts and apples and oranges and things that were a treat to us in those days that are common now. They were provided for all of us and in some cases it was for needy people who really appreciated it, and it turned out to be a very successful gathering and festive time at Christmastime. MM: Now what did the boxes and pies sell for at those pie suppers? Discussion of entertainment, school days, and sources of power Christmas program ; electricity ; gasoline lanterns ; kerosene lamps ; movies ; pie suppers ; potbellied stove ; school ; western movie Christmas programs ; electricity ; school life 929 Watermelons, Chickens, and School Memories MM: Did you ever steal any watermelons? LB: (laughs) Gosh, that’s like asking me if I ever lived. MM: Who raised the best watermelons? LB: I would say—well, there was Walter Reed east of us raised real good watermelons. John Mizell (ph) raised real good watermelons. And I think his were the best because we felt he was the meanest. And it took a little more risk to climb over his fence and get his watermelons, so I think they— MM: Did you ever ride your horse with a watermelon underneath your arm? Memories of school days, stealing watermelons, and old girlfriends Alton McCarty ; CHarlene Digby ; chicken ; Fay Myers ; John Mizell ; lunch pail ; Polecat Creek ; Rosalina Vanmeter ; Walter Reed ; watermelon chicken ; school ; watermelon In this 1976 interview, Loyd Raymond Bruce (1920-2006) discusses his family’s early settlement of the Pinehill Community outside Bristow, Oklahoma. He describes early crops and cattle shipments on the railroad, community social programs such as pie suppers, life before electricity, early schools in the community, and the impact of the construction of Heyburn Lake upon the community. BM: [Inaudible] --in their living room, 10/13/76, ten minutes ' ; til 9 o' ; clock. MM: [Inaudible.] BM: Loyd, to your knowledge in your research that you' ; ve done on the Bruce family, would you say they were the--some of the first people that came in to the Pinehill community? LB: Yes, according to the information that I have on our family they migrated from Missouri into there just east of Oklahoma City in 1889, 1890 and ' ; 91 during those runs from the Kansas line, and my father made the run in 18--either 1889 or ' ; 90, I haven' ; t been able to determine for sure, and staked a claim just east of Oklahoma City. He was fifteen years old at that time and had to wait for his older sister who was legal--of legal age--help him make that claim. Then they stayed there for a few years, I' ; m not sure exactly how many, but they settled in what is now Creek County--it was Indian Territory then--near the Pinehill community, and my grandfather Coleman Bruce and wife Alpha Bruce had come after the claims were staked east of Oklahoma City. They had come, moved their family here and they built a rock house east of the last Pinehill school, down near Polecat Creek bottoms, and raised their family--at least partially raised their family there. So I' ; m sure that they settled sometime between 1895 and possibly 1898 in that area and it' ; s my understanding that they were the first white people in that part of the country at that time. BM: Uh, there has been other names mentioned. This George Lindsey, what--what connection was George Lindsey to the Bruces? LB: George Lindsey was my grandfather on my mother' ; s side. He moved in to that area from Kansas, but the year that he moved there I can' ; t recall exactly. I do think it was some few years later than the Bruces settled there. He moved into that area and became associated with the guardianship of some of the Indian children there. He brought his family there and settled about a half a mile west of the first Pinehill school and church in the latter 1890s or it could' ; ve been slightly after 1900. BM: To the best of your knowledge, do you have any idea what their first crops were whenever they came in there? LB: I heard them mention corn all the way back, and I heard the crop of maize mentioned being raised, and kaffir corn. Cotton came around sometime but it' ; s my understanding that it was several years later, possibly after statehood, before cotton became popular in Oklahoma. BM: I have pretty well pinpointed on the cotton, it was about 1909. Albert Kelly, W.O. Baker, in 1913 built a gin there by the ice plant at Bristow where there was already three other gins there at that time. And it has been pretty well traced out that around 1909 is when the first cotton came in--money crop for the sellers and farmers in that area. The cattle situation--I know that they raised cattle in there. Do you know when they--or have you heard where they took their cattle to sell them? LB: Initially I, it' ; s my understanding that the railroad only came as far as Sapulpa in the very early days of marketing cattle, and ran up to Kansas City. And in the earlier years they took their cattle to Sapulpa because the railroad terminated there. A few years later it was extended on to Bristow and on west and the marketing area, or the area where the cattle was raised was closer to the Bristow depot there for loading, and they started taking them to Bristow and initially they sent them to Kansas City from Bristow. Then later when the stockyards in Oklahoma City developed, they shipped them to Oklahoma City. BM: Now, getting over to the railhead they had these big cattle drives, is that right? LB: Yes, that' ; s right. I can remember as a child myself making cattle drives to Bristow. Car--in carload lots, we would take either one or two carloads of cattle to Bristow and get up early in the morning and drive them there and it made it necessary to drive through the residential area in Bristow and there were times when we were guilty of damaging the yards and the flower beds and whatnot and having to stop and pay people for damages for running cattle through their area. It was quite an exciting time for me because I was a child, but it was quite a responsibility for the adults at the time. BM: When you said " ; carload lots," ; how many did they count as a car? LB: As I remember, a carload at that time was ninety head. BM: So then you would take as high as 180 head at a time in to be shipped out? LB: That is true. There was, there was times when the yield from my father' ; s herd was over 200 for that season. I' ; m not sure how it fit in to the carload lots but I remember him selling 230, 240 head per year from the yield from his herd. BM: Alright, we' ; ll move on down to the school. To your best memory on the school itself, how many schools were built there, Loyd? LB: I can only recall the last school that was built there. I went from primary to the eighth grade there, however I heard before, I' ; ve heard it talked in the family that there were a total of three schools and a church associated with one of those schools. I think initially there was a church that--it may have been one building that was used as a church and a school. And this may have happened to more than one of the schools, but I remember that one building served as a school and a church for the neighborhood. BM: What all functions was the school used for? LB: It was used as I said, as an educational purpose. Also a social purpose, they would have pie suppers and this sort of thing where raising money for various functions in the neighborhood. And then it was used for church and I' ; ve heard it mentioned that they had fairs there but I can' ; t recall ever seeing or attending a, I guess it would be a district fair rather than a county fair that they had in the school there. MM: Township fair is what they called it. LB: Township fair. BM: It was also used as a voting precinct, too. LB: Right, that' ; s right, it was. BM: And singing conventions and such as that. LB: Mmm-hmm. MM: We' ; ve never heard anything talked about a Christmas tree. BM: Loyd, to your-- MM: --Christmas program-- BM: --to your knowledge, when did the government come in and go to buying up that land along the creeks and bottoms there in that community? LB: This would' ; ve had to be in ' ; 46--no, correction, about ' ; 47 or ' ; 48 they did the actual purchasing of it. And then I think maybe the construction of the dam and so forth was a year or two later. BM: Do you have any idea how many people was affected by-- MM: Displaced. BM: --displacement of the government coming in and buying this, this land up and erecting this dam? LB: Mmm, that would take some thinking. There were several families, several homes relocated. Several families and offhand I would say upwards of 25 families which might involve two or three hundred people were affected or relocated because of the construction of the lake project there. BM: I know there is a lot of hard feelings on the lake, but how do you feel personally, your personal opinion, about that lake? LB: Well I, I feel like it depends on how you look at it. I think for the public good, the public in general, it has been good because it has offered a flood control project that saved a lot of valuable bottom land below it. It' ; s also offered a recreational and park atmosphere for people who want to go out for recreation on their time off. And looking at it from that point of view I think it' ; s been a success and beneficial to those particular people involved. If you look at it from the point of view of the people who has their history and heritage in that area, I feel that they feel that they' ; ve lost something, that it no longer represents what they remember as the area they grew up in and if it was their intention and goal to live in that area the rest of their life, I can see where they would be highly disappointed. BM: Good enough. (pause) MM: --talk about the Christmas tree, the Christmas programs. What did they [inaudible] LB: Oh yeah, I remember the Christmas programs. It used to be one of our days of enjoyment planning for the Christmas tree because usually the kids got out of school and the neighborhood, one of the neighborhood residents would volunteer a truck and we would go up into the Keystone area and cut a Christmas tree a few weeks in advance of Christmas, and this was a treat in itself to get away from school. Then we would bring it back and take part in decorating the tree and we got away from some of our usual school chores and enjoyed doing these things. Then at the time of the actual Christmas program there were, well--I' ; m leaving something out, the box suppers that was held, the pie suppers and so forth to raise funds for the Christmas program was also part of this sequence of events, and when the money from that came in then there was candy and nuts and apples and oranges and things that were a treat to us in those days that are common now. They were provided for all of us and in some cases it was for needy people who really appreciated it, and it turned out to be a very successful gathering and festive time at Christmastime. MM: Now what did the boxes and pies sell for at those pie suppers? LB: Oh, I can remember pies selling for as little as fifteen cents and then I can also remember some of the people in the area, particularly those who were fortunate enough to have a job with an oil company and a little money to spend, spending as much as twenty dollars for a pie. MM: What' ; s the most you ever gave? LB: Gosh, I would say not more than thirty-five or forty cents, probably. I don' ; t really remember, to tell you the truth. MM: When did they bring electricity in there, that' ; s one that--to the school. That' ; s one thing Bob gonna need to know. BM: When did electricity come in to that part of the country? LB: That would' ; ve been in the latter--that was after World War II, which would' ; ve been in the latter ' ; 40s, ' ; 46 or ' ; 47 as I remember it. We had gas in our home up until that time and the school itself might' ; ve gotten it before. MM: Did they use gas for lighting the school before electricity? LB: No, it was gasoline lanterns and kerosene lamps. Gasoline and kerosene lamps were used prior to that time. MM: What--did they ever put modern heating or did they--what type of heating did they use? LB: They used wood heating, there was a large potbellied stove in the corner with kind of a circulating jacket around it that would circulate the heat through the building. And to my knowledge it wasn' ; t replaced. It might have been in later years. MM: Did they ever put modern bathrooms in it? LB: No. Not to my knowledge. BM: To your knowledge, Loyd, I was told that there was at one time there was a talking movie presented there at Pinehill school. Do you know anything about that? MM: Any movies. BM: Any movies. LB: Yes, I do. I remember a movie, I can' ; t remember whether or not they were talkies or not, but I remember going there to movies, it was quite a treat to go to a movie anywhere at that time and it was a real big time to have a movie out in the schoolhouse. And I remember going to a movie but I can' ; t remember whether it was a talkie or not. MM: What type of movies? LB: They were western movies. Cowboys. MM: You don' ; t remember any of the stars in the movies, or any other things? LB: Offhand I don' ; t. BM: Valerie came up with the, with that first. She was the first one and the only one that I found yet that remember--that said anything about the movies. MM: Did you ever steal any watermelons? LB: (laughs) Gosh, that' ; s like asking me if I ever lived. MM: Who raised the best watermelons? LB: I would say--well, there was Walter Reed east of us raised real good watermelons. John Mizell (ph) raised real good watermelons. And I think his were the best because we felt he was the meanest. And it took a little more risk to climb over his fence and get his watermelons, so I think they-- MM: Did you ever ride your horse with a watermelon underneath your arm? LB: I probably have. I probably-- MM: They say that' ; s quite a feat. LB: (laughs) MM: Did you ever steal any chickens? LB: Yes, I' ; m afraid I' ; m guilty there, too. MM: Who' ; d you steal ' ; em from? LB: I think it was back to John Mizell (ph) again, I mean, he was the one that, that we for some reason we liked to needle him because he was always kind of after the youngsters. We thought he was, but he was really a good old person. MM: What' ; d you do with them after you stole them? LB: We took them down the creek bank of Polecat Creek where we found some clay and rolled ' ; em up in clay and then threw them in the fire and roasted them and-- MM: Did you remove any undesirables prior to, before you roasted them? LB: I don' ; t think we did. (laughs) I really don' ; t. MM: Did you ever play hooky from school. LB: Yes, I' ; ve played hooky from school. MM: When, and why? LB: Well, I played hooky from school one time, I was about the seventh grade and for some reason I didn' ; t make the basketball team and I thought I should have, and our teacher took the basketball team to a neighboring school to play ball and while he was gone, he and two other friends and I, rather-- MM: What two friends? LB: Let' ; s see, what two friends, gosh I can' ; t remember. One of them was--hmm, I can' ; t recall their names, I should know offhand but I can' ; t remember. But we played hooky. MM: What was the results? LB: We played hooky and one of them--let' ; s see, one of them was a Myers boy, one of they was Ray or Fay Myers, I believe. And I was trying to remember, one of them may have been Alton McCarty (ph). BM: You sure it wasn' ; t Coleman [indecipherable] in on that, too? LB: Well, Coleman [indecipherable] may have been in on that, now. I' ; m not sure. MM: Did they ever have any shop-type work at that little school? Never? LB: No. MM: Did they ever--in your time they didn' ; t have the money for it. What did you take in your lunch pail to school? LB: Well, we took what would be considered real wholesome and desirable food now, but then we thought we were kind of underprivileged because we had to take fresh ham and cold biscuits. We didn' ; t have, usually didn' ; t have light bread but we had--we always had fresh ham and we had biscuits for bread and some of the, there were some that were fortunate enough at that time to have light bread and bologna and we thought that was a real treat, but-- MM: Your mother made cake and pie and such-- LB: Right, that' ; s right. Mmm-hmm. MM: Who was your favorite girls while you was in school? We haven' ; t asked this for (inaudible) LB: (laughs) Oh, let' ; s see. Charlene (ph)--her name was Digby (ph) then and she married one of the Vann boys. She was my first girlfriend, and then Rosalina Vanmeter (ph) was also one of my girlfriends. MM: Rosalina' ; s (ph) dead, you know. LB: Yes, she died a couple years ago. MM: You wouldn' ; t care if [indecipherable]. We interviewed Charlene (ph) earlier this year but we didn' ; t have a tape. BM: I think that' ; s about all I can think of, you pretty well covered everything. MM: You never did ride a horse in the schoolhouse did you? LB: No, no. BM: Yeah, he would' ; ve drive on a late model Ford to school. LB: (laughs) MM: I thought he crossed his fingers when he heard that. BM: He drove a late model-- MM: Was you old enough to get in on them-- end of interview audio 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0008-02_Loyd_Bruce.xml OHP-0008-02_Loyd_Bruce.xml
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2100
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Loyd Raymond Bruce
Description
An account of the resource
In this 1976 interview, Loyd Raymond Bruce (1920-2006) discusses his family’s early settlement of the Pinehill Community outside Bristow, Oklahoma. He describes early crops and cattle shipments on the railroad, community social programs such as pie suppers, life before electricity, early schools in the community, and the impact of the construction of Heyburn Lake upon the community.
Identifier
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OHP-0008-02
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1976-10-13
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audio
-
https://bristoworalhistory.org/files/original/cd182bc2aa252ae10fbaeec1ebffdbca.jpg
f412eea3e0c3fcd3fbf5be988a7ed7c3
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Pinehill Histories
Subject
The topic of the resource
History of the Pinehill area north of Bristow
Description
An account of the resource
Several interviews were done by Mary and Bob Mc Carty of people who grew up in the Pinehill area north of Bristow. This collection is the Pinehill subset of the Bristow Oral Histories
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Bristow Historical Society, oral history collection
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Oral history.
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Mary Lee (Fuller) McCarty
OHMS Object
This field contains the OHMS Hyperlink (link to the XML file within the OHMS
Viewer)
https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0008-03_Mary_McCarty.xml
Interview Keyword
This field adds keywords to the Omeka Oral History item type. Keywords are
included in the OHMS XML, this field in Omeka will allow for full data migration
between OHMS XML and the Omeka Record. This field does not impact the
OHMS / Omeka integration and is optional if you do not need to map the
“keywords” field in the OHMS XML to the corresponding Omeka record.
Heyburn
Mary Lee (Fuller) McCarty
Pinehill
OHMS Object Text
This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the
contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka
5.4 OHP-0008-03 Mary Lee (Fuller) McCarty OHP-0008-03 Bristow Historical Society - Oral History Archive Pinehill Community Bristow Historical Society, Inc. Pinehill Communit and School Heyburn Mary Lee (Fuller) McCarty Pinehill Mary Lee (Fuller) McCarty MP3 1:|11(2)|21(5)|33(5)|42(1)|48(14)|58(1)|67(10)|77(11)|87(1)|97(4)|106(3)|113(9)|121(4)|130(7)|136(1)|146(2)|155(6)|162(8)|172(4)|179(1)|186(10)|196(9)|205(4)|214(7) 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/interviews/OHP-0008-03 McCarty, Mary.mp3 Other audio 0 Pinehill History This is Wednesday, November 17, 1976, the time is twelve o’clock noon. I’ve had several people ask how Bob and I got into the Pinehill research and history writing. And I thought that I would tape my reasons at least. In May of 1972 Oma Head (ph) was at decorations at 44 Cemetery when I took my mom McCarty out there and she told me that she and Donnie Johnson were going to have a Pinehill community reunion that August. When I came home I told Bob and he was pleased. In July he contacted Oma (ph) and she said, “Oh, we just talked about it, we haven’t done anything about it,” so Bob got busy and he and I contacted a lot of people. We had 82 people present at the Pinehill reunion on August 20, 1972 at Rocky Point. Everyone had a good time and vowed to hold a reunion each year on the third Sunday in August. We elected Chester Wilson as president and a committee of five to assist the president, with Lenora Darnell as secretary. The committee of five were Mildred Kerley (ph) in Tulsa, Frankie McKinzie (ph) Oklahoma City, Chester Wilson Sapulpa, Neiman Mark (ph) Drumright, and Lenora Darnell and Eva Carson (ph) of Bristow. Discussion of reunions in the Pinehill Community and those who helped organize them. 44 Cemetery ; Chester Wilson ; Clarence Myers ; Della Brake ; Donnie Johnson ; Eunice Perryman ; Eva Carson ; Frankie McKinzie ; Lenora Darnell ; Leo Bruce ; Leo pinehill ; Mildred Kerley ; Neiman Mark ; Oma Head ; Phoebe Perryman ; Pinehill ; Pinehill Road ; Rocky Point ; school ; Shepherd Point Pinehill Community Reunion ; Pinehill School 330 Map of Pinehill During research and getting the county records from J.L. Darnell who was county superintendent when I was doing the research, he told me about a map of Oklahoma that hangs—a four, five foot, I would say, map hangs in the courthouse in Sapulpa. It’s either 1902 or 1903 map of the original Indian allotments. I—the names and the figures and the map fascinated me but I didn’t do any—I looked at it and I’ve looked at it several times since and thought how to copy it. We thought of photography and different ways. The people at the courthouse would not let us take the map off the wall to do anything with it because it’s old and it’s fragile. So I got busy with other things. Trying to obtain a copy of the map of the Pinehill Community Augustine Kelly ; Heyburn Lake ; Indian allotments ; Iva Rossander ; J.L. Darnell ; Kathy Thompson ; map ; Pinehill ; Ranger Station ; Rick Cane ; Shepherd's Point Map of the Pinehill Community 750 The Bruce Family, Crops, and School Taping these people, older people, and getting their personalities in them has been a wonderful thing. And to get the feel of community is interesting also. What we found out is this: In 1885 the Bruces, the first white settlers, came into Pinehill community. In 1896 the W.O. Baker came in—family came in. We really have no dates on the people as they came in after that. In 1897, as far as our history can tell, Leo Bruce was the white, first white child born in the community. They were five of the Bruce brothers that came into the community. And some people says it’s a Bruce history—it’s not. They were just the first there, and a lot of people and the ones that Bob and his family knew best—and that most people knew best. They were workers, they were builders. The thing that kept the community alive was the rich bottomlands and then the oil and gas wells—mostly gas wells, of the oil industry. The people in the oilfields moved so often that we really have no history on persons of the oilfield, but the oil industry was one of the team that kept the community alive. Discussion of the first settlers to the area, the Bruce family and the early school days bootleg school ; Bruce ; cattle ; church ; corn ; cotton ; Creek Indian ; Creek Indian Nation ; Creek Nation ; crops ; Della Brake ; grains ; horses ; Leo Bruce ; maize ; school ; subscription school ; voting precinct ; W.O. Baker Bruce Family ; crops ; farming ; school 1093 Railroad and Heyburn Lake When the government surveyors surveyed the railroad for the line between Tulsa and Oklahoma City, one of the surveys—surveyors, Dr. Fath, surveyed the area for oil and gas. He must’ve been a very remarkable man, and we have—were kindly given some photostatic copies of one of Dr. Fath’s books by George Krumme. He—his records called the area the Bristow Quadrangle. The Pinehill community were—was included in it. The second successful well in the Bristow Quadrangle was drilled close to Wild Horse Prairie in section 17-9 in 1911. ‘Producing well,’ they called it. There had been others drilled but that was the second producing well. It was a gas well and it was drilled at depths of 990 to 1,010 feet. And it produced seven million cubic foot of gas a day. Discussion of railroad and Heyburn Lake Bristow ; Bristow Quadrangle ; Dr. Fath ; gas ; George Krumme ; Heyburn Lake ; Kellyville ; oil ; oilfields ; Olive ; pipeline ; railroad ; Wild Horse Prairie Bristow Quadrangle ; Heyburn Lake ; railroad 1335 Repeat of Introduction This is Wednesday, November 17, 1976. The time is twelve noon. I’ve been asked by several people why Bob and I started the Pinehill research and history and so I thought I would tape it today. In May of 1972 at decoration at 44 Cemetery, Oma Head (ph) told me that she and Bonnie Johnson were going to have a reunion for the Pinehill Community in 1972 in August. Mrs. McCarty appears to be restarting her narrative at this point in the tape and re-reading from her notes. Pinehill Pinehill In this 1976 monologue, Mary Lee (Fuller) McCarty (1929-2007) gives a summary of her efforts, along with her husband Bob, in compiling the history of the Pinehill Community in Creek County, Oklahoma. She also provides a summary of their findings regarding the early Pinehill School, early settlers to the area, and their efforts to memorialize their research in an informational display at Heyburn Lake. This is Wednesday, November 17, 1976, the time is twelve o' ; clock noon. I' ; ve had several people ask how Bob and I got into the Pinehill research and history writing. And I thought that I would tape my reasons at least. In May of 1972 Oma Head (ph) was at decorations at 44 Cemetery when I took my mom McCarty out there and she told me that she and Donnie Johnson were going to have a Pinehill community reunion that August. When I came home I told Bob and he was pleased. In July he contacted Oma (ph) and she said, " ; Oh, we just talked about it, we haven' ; t done anything about it," ; so Bob got busy and he and I contacted a lot of people. We had 82 people present at the Pinehill reunion on August 20, 1972 at Rocky Point. Everyone had a good time and vowed to hold a reunion each year on the third Sunday in August. We elected Chester Wilson as president and a committee of five to assist the president, with Lenora Darnell as secretary. The committee of five were Mildred Kerley (ph) in Tulsa, Frankie McKinzie (ph) Oklahoma City, Chester Wilson Sapulpa, Neiman Mark (ph) Drumright, and Lenora Darnell and Eva Carson (ph) of Bristow. The second annual reunion was held August 19, 1973 at Shepherd Point with 136 present. We said we had a better time. The reunion was growing each year, we held them each year the third Sunday in August, and we intend to keep on holding them. We have new ones that comes each year and some of the older people can' ; t make it and some just don' ; t care for them. Of course, some of them are quite old and illness and death is taking away them each year. I would sit and listen to people talk and different ones would say, Well, the first school was a stockade school, or The first school was a log school, and I found no one who really knew. In 1974 I started taking notes and interviewing people along in October. Leo Bruce is the only one that I found then, or I find now, that remembers the first school. He wasn' ; t to school age when they were building it and he was watching them build it. He said he got chased home from the site many a time from getting in the carpenter' ; s way. It was built about a quarter of a mile east of the section line that we call the Pinehill Road on the Leo Pinehill original Indian allotment. Then Leo Bruce started to school there in the school term of 1903 along with several of the other children. He told us the name of the first teacher and then the second and Clarence Myers remembered a bunch of the early teachers, Bob' ; s mother started to school in the 1907-1908 and Della Brake (ph) was the teacher that year. She remembered and I was taking the notes very well. We' ; ve had different opinions. We know the first school was built on the Leo Pinehill allotment. It burned in 1909. The controversy was the second school and where this schoolhouse was, but it would--if it was the second school we heard about was built a quarter of a mile west of the first on the section line corners, and it was there only three years. In 1912 they moved the school one mile north and about a quarter of a mile west on the Phoebe Perryman allotment and it burned in 1918. Then in the year 1918 the school records show that the final school was built a quarter of a mile east from that school on the corner and it is the Pinehill School on the Eunice Perryman property, and that is the school most people remember and know as the Pinehill School. All of them were the Pinehill School, buildings burned or changed but the school itself remained the Pinehill School. During research and getting the county records from J.L. Darnell who was county superintendent when I was doing the research, he told me about a map of Oklahoma that hangs--a four, five foot, I would say, map hangs in the courthouse in Sapulpa. It' ; s either 1902 or 1903 map of the original Indian allotments. I--the names and the figures and the map fascinated me but I didn' ; t do any--I looked at it and I' ; ve looked at it several times since and thought how to copy it. We thought of photography and different ways. The people at the courthouse would not let us take the map off the wall to do anything with it because it' ; s old and it' ; s fragile. So I got busy with other things. So in this fall of 1976 I went over to the courthouse and stood and copied the allotments off the map, section 17-9 -- township, I might say, 17-9, off from this map because I didn' ; t know very much about maps. I started at the site of the last Pinehill School and just went in a circle around it ' ; til my paper was gone, which was a very foolish way to make a map, I should' ; ve just copied the section of 17-9. I did not get hardly far enough south, so Bob went back and copied them, and somehow in copying and recopying the map was several points incorrect. Kathy Thompson is making a good map for us for the use in the Pinehill stuff. So we just couldn' ; t bear to put an incorrect map out for people to see, so we contacted the map companies in Tulsa to see if we could get a map of the original allotments for that section and they put us in touch with Augustine Kelly. She is the wife of the maker of this original map. We drove to Tulsa. I called her and then I drove to Tulsa and got the copy--twelve-inch square this section. It' ; s made from an obsolete process now and she' ; s very old and ill and when she dies this map will be gone. The newer map makers do not use the process of using these old maps, but I was very fortunate, I bought the copy--twelve-inch square copy of the original map, so Kathy' ; s using it so the map will be entirely correct. My notetaking was very unsatisfactory. I use a brand of shorthand only I can read, so we bought the tape and now we have quite a number of tapes of the people. Oddly enough we found out that people would say things to us for the taking notes that they won' ; t say on the tape. I heard several stories in the tape that some of them, if I thought I would embarrass or hurt the descendants of the original people in the stories that I didn' ; t write down. Some of them I wrote down for Bob and I. And some at the time I wrote down hoping to make a history in booklet form for the people that cared about it. I showed the map to one of the farmers and to Iva Rossander and she said, ' ; Well, what are you going to do with the map when Kathy makes it for you, the teacher makes it for you?' ; I told her, ' ; Well, I' ; m going to frame it and hang it on the wall for Bob.' ; And she said, ' ; Well, it' ; s just a shame to do the map that way, to put it in a private place that way when it would belong to the community of Pinehill and the people.' ; Bob and I next day drove to Oklahoma City and talked to the state parks and recreation division and they told us there that since it was a--the community did join Heyburn Lake, the school district and it was history local and people were still interested in it that they didn' ; t see why that we shouldn' ; t be able to erect an information shelter at the Heyburn Lake to put the map and the condensed history and different articles of history for people to see. We drove--they sent us to the park planning division and we drove to North Lincoln and talked to Rick Cane (ph) there about the map, possibility of putting this information shelter at the lake. They told us if we wanted it at the Y at Shepherd' ; s Point that they would build a shelter for us because of the value to us at least of the articles that were to be put in it, we would prefer it to be put at the Ranger Station and if not there at the picnic shelter on Shepherd' ; s Point at Heyburn Lake. Our plans at this time call for the map, a list of all the people that have ever lived in the community--the township of 17-9, and a key to the map where they can find the area they lived in, or their ancestors, their family lived in. There would also have the plaques that shows all the teachers that ever taught in the school, the main community builders, and the committee that' ; s working on the historical information shelter. Taping these people, older people, and getting their personalities in them has been a wonderful thing. And to get the feel of community is interesting also. What we found out is this: In 1885 the Bruces, the first white settlers, came into Pinehill community. In 1896 the W.O. Baker came in--family came in. We really have no dates on the people as they came in after that. In 1897, as far as our history can tell, Leo Bruce was the white, first white child born in the community. They were five of the Bruce brothers that came into the community. And some people says it' ; s a Bruce history--it' ; s not. They were just the first there, and a lot of people and the ones that Bob and his family knew best--and that most people knew best. They were workers, they were builders. The thing that kept the community alive was the rich bottomlands and then the oil and gas wells--mostly gas wells, of the oil industry. The people in the oilfields moved so often that we really have no history on persons of the oilfield, but the oil industry was one of the team that kept the community alive. The early crops were corn, maize, and the grains. In 1909, cotton came in as the money-making industry. They always raised horses and cattle on the hillsides and in the early years they killed quails and shipped them to Kansas City. There were some game, they used to game, but it was still--needed the money crop of cotton terribly bad. pause in recording --there were many other public buildings in the community at one time for a couple years. Leo Bruce ran a small concession-stand-like store. The school was their schoolhouse, it was their church house, it was their voting precinct, it stood for every--it was used for all community purposes. Their pie suppers, their Christmas trees, the literaries. When I first heard--I' ; d never heard the word until they were talking about it, it fascinated me. They were--people were [indecipherable] and they sang, read poetry, whatever they wanted to do to entertain each other during the winter season. In the early days the school was only three months--November, December, and January, and then later years it was, they had school then during June, July, and August, and then the winter months were lengthened out a little. The early school was a subscription school. The parents each paid so much toward the teacher' ; s salary and they boarded in their homes. The salary was about $17 a month. Della Brake (ph) was the first teacher hired by the state as that. [Indecipherable] looking at the Creek Indian Nations, and they called the schools a bootleg school. It was never registered with the Creek Nation, or Creek Indian Tribe as a school. If it' ; d been done so, the early history would be written history. The way it is, the state has a list of the teachers from 1916 through 1954. No record was kept either in the state or the county offices of the pupils in the school. We did borrow and copy the census books, the school census books that showed all the school age children and young people that lived in the community--but that doesn' ; t necessarily mean they went to the school. Everyone that we' ; ve asked in the state or county offices has been cooperative, they just didn' ; t keep the records. pause in recording When the government surveyors surveyed the railroad for the line between Tulsa and Oklahoma City, one of the surveys--surveyors, Dr. Fath, surveyed the area for oil and gas. He must' ; ve been a very remarkable man, and we have--were kindly given some photostatic copies of one of Dr. Fath' ; s books by George Krumme. He--his records called the area the Bristow Quadrangle. The Pinehill community were--was included in it. The second successful well in the Bristow Quadrangle was drilled close to Wild Horse Prairie in section 17-9 in 1911. ' ; Producing well,' ; they called it. There had been others drilled but that was the second producing well. It was a gas well and it was drilled at depths of 990 to 1,010 feet. And it produced seven million cubic foot of gas a day. It was turned into the big pipeline, eleven-inch line that went from the Glenpool area to Oklahoma City. Oil and gas drilling were prominent in the community from about 1911 on up until recent times--a major part of the community. In 1948 when they bought up the land for Heyburn Lake, they bought--the government bought the bottomlands and it caused a number of families to move out when they bought it. At the same time, the oilfields were dying down, so the community died. The community reached such a low point that it could no longer support the school. Part of the children went to Olive, part to Bristow, and part to Kellyville. I for one watched them build Heyburn Lake and we' ; ve used it for recreational purposes every year since it was built. All the--all the time since it was built. To some of the older families it was such a heartbreak. It tore up their farms, it took out the productive land, and they didn' ; t want the school to go. I can see that very well. pause in recording Incidentally, the first school was a frame school. All the schools were frame schools, as we know them, there were no log schools involved and I had the Krummes to research and as near as they could tell, the Bristow Quadrangle was an area of sixteen square miles, as the term was used in Dr. Fath' ; s book. pause in recording This is Wednesday, November 17, 1976. The time is twelve noon. I' ; ve been asked by several people why Bob and I started the Pinehill research and history and so I thought I would tape it today. In May of 1972 at decoration at 44 Cemetery, Oma Head (ph) told me that she and Bonnie Johnson were going to have a reunion for the Pinehill Community in 1972 in August. So long in July, Bob contacted Oma (ph) and she said, ' ; Oh, they had talked about it but had done nothing about it so Bob and I got busy and contacted various people. We had the reunion August 20, 1972 at Rocky Point. Eight-two people were present. Everyone had a good time and voted to hold the reunions each year the third Sunday in August. We elected Chester Wilson as president and a committee of five to assist the president with Lenora Darnell as secretary. The committee of five were Mildred Kerley (ph) in Tulsa, Frankie McKinzie (ph) Oklahoma City, Chester Wilson Sapulpa, Lehman Mark (ph) Drumright, Lenora Darnell and Eva Patterson (ph) of Bristow. The second annual reunion was held August 19, 1973 at Shepherd' ; s Point. We had 136 present. Chester just wouldn' ; t--did not work at being the president so he just told me, ' ; Well, Bob did the work this year, I didn' ; t, I just accepted the position,' ; so since then Bob has been officially president of the Pinehill Reunion and I have been the--assisting him. Sitting at the reunions, I did not go to Pinehill School so sitting at the reunions listening to other people talk of Bristow-- end of recording 1 audio 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0008-03_Mary_McCarty.xml OHP-0008-03_Mary_McCarty.xml
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Mary Lee (Fuller) McCarty
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An account of the resource
In this 1976 monologue, Mary Lee (Fuller) McCarty (1929-2007) gives a summary of her efforts, along with her husband Bob, in compiling the history of the Pinehill Community in Creek County, Oklahoma. She also provides a summary of their findings regarding the early Pinehill School, early settlers to the area, and their efforts to memorialize their research in an informational display at Heyburn Lake.
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OHP-0008-03
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Pinehill Communit and School
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1976-11-17
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audio
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e63d20283fc90287b998fe93091e12c7
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Pinehill Histories
Subject
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History of the Pinehill area north of Bristow
Description
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Several interviews were done by Mary and Bob Mc Carty of people who grew up in the Pinehill area north of Bristow. This collection is the Pinehill subset of the Bristow Oral Histories
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Bristow Historical Society, oral history collection
Type
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Oral history.
Oral History
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Interviewer
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Robert L. “Bob” McCarty
Interviewee
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Carrie May (Millhouse) Vann
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https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0001-01_Carrie_Vann.xml
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Pinehill
school
fairs
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5.4 OHP-0001-001 Carrie May (Millhouse) Vann OHP-0001-01 Bristow Historical Society - Oral History Archive Pinehill Community Bristow Historical Society, Inc. History of Pinehill Community Pinehill school fairs Carrie May (Millhouse) Vann Robert L. “Bob” McCarty MP3 1:|36(2)|68(7)|103(12)|121(5)|141(15)|181(9)|206(9)|222(4)|242(2)|269(2)|294(3)|307(8)|320(4)|341(2)|371(2)|400(13)|424(16)|461(1)|498(2) 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/interviews/OHP-0001-01 Vann, Carrie.mp3 Other audio 0 Spelling Bees and School CV: Which was the most dangerous—water or fire. BM: Yeah. CV: You know, fire killed [inaudible]. MM: Well I can’t think of what [inaudible] Memories of spelling bees and school in the Pinehill community Charlie Dressler ; Ellis Head ; Floyd Wilson ; Howard Baker ; Mosquiter Creek ; schoolhouse ; singing ; spelling bees ; Virgil School ; Spelling Bees 235 Teachers and getting into trouble BM: Uhh, what about those spankings? (tape interference) CV: Well, in the evenings, y’know, we’d all walk home together on the road ‘til we’d get to Mosquito creek, or sometimes I would go on with a bunch up to the next corner, on the south up there where we lived. BM: Where the other school that—where the first schoolhouse was. CV: Yeah. And--well not hardly that far. And momma, she kept tellin’ me not to do it, to come on home. And one evening I—told me not to do that no more. Next evening I did, I went up there and I got a whoopin’ when I got home. (laughs) Memories of getting into trouble as kids and the first teachers of Pinehill Edith Whiteneck ; Ethel Logan ; school ; teacher school ; teachers 389 Death of Alvin Hicks CV: Yeah, I think that’s the way it was because I know, uh, we didn’t live down there too long ‘til we moved up here on this [indecipherable] and, uh, he was teachin’ school— BM: He was teaching school when— CV: Well when my brother got killed. Alvin. BM: When Alvin got killed, well, he was the teacher there then. That was Alvin Hicks. Okay, then After Alvin Hicks there was who. Carrie Vann speaks on the death of her brother Alvin Hicks. Alvin Hicks ; stalk cutter ; teacher Alvin Hicks ; teacher 533 Families in Pinehill CV: And you haven’t talked to any of the Vanns, or— BM: No, uh, you’re the first, uh, we just got this thing today, got ahold of-- CV: I guess I better let [indecipherable] let them talk. BM: Well you tell what you can and on that part, I’ll come back to that, and, uh—it was after you and Virgil-- A discussion on the families living in the Pinehill community Abner Bruce ; Annie Pinehill ; buggies ; Iva Ware ; Jay Crawford ; John Wilson ; Milk ; Naomi Ballard ; Owen Ware ; Perrymans ; Phoebe ; revival ; Sally Pinehill ; sapulpa ; Sister Mary ; Smith Bruce ; train ; W.O. Baker Pinehill Families 908 Fairs BM: Tell us about this fair situation. VV: Well, I don’t— MM: Uh, Alex—you might start with Alex— VV: Well, really, I don’t know, I think Alex Myers was one of the judges, wasn’t he? Of the milk cows? CV: I don’t remember. VV: Oh yeah, I’m sure he was, uh, you can have these old timers like John or somebody can tell you more about that, but I can’t, ‘cause they—I was just a kid, you know, ‘bout seven years old. Discussion of fairs in Pinehill Alex Myers ; church ; Deep Fork ; fair ; Judges ; Pinehill Fairs 1010 Bruce Family and Playing in the Creek VV: And old Smith Bruce, I heard him talk, you know, he, he might’ve, uh, raised some big ones. All I know, I know he raised a lot of cane down there, I shipped cane for him myself. MM: Now, honey, you don’t put the ashes in her vases-- CV: No, here, right here, that’s what it’s for— VV: Now I just don’t remember anything about the watermelon. CV: Well, you wasn’t born then, when what I’m talkin’ bout— Memories of playing in the creek chicken house ; creek ; Smith Bruce creek ; rooster In this 1976 interview, Carrie May (Millhouse) Vann (1900-1982) discusses the history of the Pinehill Community outside of Bristow, Oklahoma in the early 1900s, including the first teachers at the school and her classmates, her childhood, courting her husband Virgil Vann, social events such literaries, and the childhood death of her brother Alvin. CV: Which was the most dangerous--water or fire. BM: Yeah. CV: You know, fire killed [inaudible]. MM: Well I can' ; t think of what [inaudible] pause in recording BM: People had a lot of fun at ' ; em. CV: Yeah. pause in recording CV: You know, even the grown people would help out in those. You remember the sp--oh, you don' ; t remember the spelling bees, do you? BM: Yeah. CV: And the older folks would spell against one another, and I know my mother won one time. BM: And it' ; s, uh, the last one in. CV: Yeah, and the word was " ; recollect." ; I' ; ll never forget that word, " ; recollect." ; They all missed it but her. (laughs) pause in recording CV: Stuff like colored people. BM: Mmm-hmm. CV: [Indecipherable] but I--I just can' ; t figure out, well, Baker boy, y' ; know, that-- BM: Which one is that? CV: Howard. BM: Howard Baker. CV: Yeah, he went to school there, and then the oth--George, was it? BM: Geo--uh, Matt. CV: Matt. BM: Yeah, that--I think that picture that I was talkin' ; --I think he' ; s in that. MM: Didn' ; t they have some singing at the literaries? CV: Oh, yeah, they had just a--children' ; d say it was-- MM: Singing. CV: Oh, singing? MM: Different adults sang songs? CV: I don' ; t think we did. Only at church, y' ; know, Sunday School, but on the lit-- MM: You had church and Sunday School in the schoolhouse, too. CV: Mmm-hmm. When we moved up this country, did youse live here? In around in here? BM: Aww, see, mom and dad was, was, married here. In 19-and-19, I think. CV: Yeah, yeah I can remember when they got married. MM: Mom went to school out there. CV: Yeah, she did. BM: 19-and-12. CV: But I' ; m talkin' ; ' ; bout her momma and daddy. BM: Aww, no, they came to Oklahoma in 19-and-07. CV: Seven, well that' ; s the year, then, when we moved down here, we moved in about 1912, I think. [Indecipherable] got the schoolhouse and then Charlie Dressler owned the place and dad rented it from him. BM: He lived down on the Charlie Dressler place. CV: Right south of the schoolhouse. BM: Right south of the schoolhouse, that would be down-- CV: It' ; s right close to the little creek. BM: Be Mosquiter Creek. CV: Mosquiter Creek, yeah. On--we lived on the north side. BM: You had it on the north side--you must' ; ve lived in there where Ellis Head lived over there. CV: Well, that' ; s-- BM: You lived there where Ellis-Ellis and Mickey lived there for years. CV: Yeah, yeah, um-hmm, that' ; s the place we lived. And I was trying to think--Mickey and I, you know, [inaudible] Vann that year, and I remember Floyd Wilson, he was just a baby. (laughs) And, I know a [indecipherable], we' ; d pack him around, take care of him. But that--I don' ; t remember ' ; em singing, only just in church. I know they had reading, Da--I can remember--when I say " ; Daddy" ; I mean Virgil, I remember him singin' ; a song about the grasshopper, and he still knows that, it' ; s a reading, rather, you know, and he still knows that good. MM: I asked Virgil if-- pause in recording BM: Back up-- pause in recording BM: Uhh, what about those spankings? (tape interference) CV: Well, in the evenings, y' ; know, we' ; d all walk home together on the road ' ; til we' ; d get to Mosquito creek, or sometimes I would go on with a bunch up to the next corner, on the south up there where we lived. BM: Where the other school that--where the first schoolhouse was. CV: Yeah. And--well not hardly that far. And momma, she kept tellin' ; me not to do it, to come on home. And one evening I--told me not to do that no more. Next evening I did, I went up there and I got a whoopin' ; when I got home. (laughs) BM: You got a paddlin' ; when you got to the house! MM: So did the teacher ever paddle you? CV: No, I [indecipherable] BM: Well what' ; s up with the cotton pickin' ; mess that Virgil got into? CV: Well I don' ; t know, you' ; d have to ask him ' ; bout that. He--I know he was a' ; ridin' ; a horse out on the schoolground-- BM: Yeah- CV: --and, uh, the horse throwed him, and throwed him up against a tree. He hurt his shoulder, and [indecipherable] was tryin' ; to show off. BM: ' ; Tryin' ; to show off? CV: (laughs) Yeah. BM: To the girls? CV: We wasn' ; t sweethearts then, we just-- BM: Just tryin' ; to show off to the girls? CV: Yeah. That' ; s what I expect. (laughs) He' ; ll get me for that. BM: Awww, we don' ; t need to let him know ' ; bout that one. When it comes to that one, why, we just shut ' ; im off. Or let it on forward, turn the volume down where he can' ; t hear. CV: But you know the first school was Miss Whiteneck. BM: The first teacher-- CV: Edith Whiteneck. BM: Edith Whiteneck. Okay, now, then. Edith Whiteneck was the first teacher. CV: For me, I can-- BM: Okay, she was the first teacher, period, the way I understand it. CV: Yeah, I think she-- BM: Alright, uh, what was the teacher' ; s name after Edith Whiteneck? CV: Oh, let me see now, the other day I remembered. (pauses) Ethel. Ethel Logan. BM: Ethel Logan. Was the teacher. Was the teacher after Edith Whiteneck. CV: Yeah. BM: Alright. CV: I think that Edith-- BM: Who was the teacher after her? CV: A man teacher. BM: Man teacher then? After Etta? CV: Yeah, I think that' ; s the way it was because I know, uh, we didn' ; t live down there too long ' ; til we moved up here on this [indecipherable] and, uh, he was teachin' ; school-- BM: He was teaching school when-- CV: Well when my brother got killed. Alvin. BM: When Alvin got killed, well, he was the teacher there then. That was Alvin Hicks. Okay, then After Alvin Hicks there was who. CV: He was, uh, drivin' ; a one of them--cuttin' ; stalks, cotton stalks-- BM: Cuttin' ; stalks with a stalk cutter. CV: Yeah, yeah. Stalk cutter. Henry died when that--and he come home from school and he had wanted to ride on that and he got on that thing and rode by himself about a hundred foot and it went to runnin' ; (tape interference) down onto the ditch, the thing turned over and caught him and he was dead. BM: It had cut him all to pieces. CV: Yes. So, and then, I just, I didn' ; t go to school down there so I didn' ; t really know. I imagine Ivy' ; d remember what-- BM: Oh, uh, we' ; ll check with Ivy on it, too. We' ; ve got, uh, a few to go. CV: It was ' ; fore I was married, just not too long afore I was married, when she got married in sixteen? Nineteen? BM: Nineteen--you got married in 1915. So he was killed in 1915. CV: It was the thirteenth--I mean on the fourteenth or fifteenth, I think I' ; ve got it in the Bible. Ivy might know. BM: Ivy might recollect what day it was--what day it was that he was killed. CV: Yeah. pause in recording CV: --went home, you know children used to go home with children. I was with Esther Wilcox that day. (tape interference) --they sent somebody down to tell me about him. (tape interference) CV: And you haven' ; t talked to any of the Vanns, or-- BM: No, uh, you' ; re the first, uh, we just got this thing today, got ahold of-- CV: I guess I better let [indecipherable] let them talk. BM: Well you tell what you can and on that part, I' ; ll come back to that, and, uh--it was after you and Virgil-- CV: I think it was after we was married, or just before. I think it' ; s after, when they did that. MM: How did they run off and get married? CV: I don' ; t know. MM: Are they the ones that were on the train to Sapulpa and got married? CV: I don' ; t think they went very--couldn' ; t have went very far in them days they just had buggies, you know. MM: Somebody went to--who was it your momma used to tell about-- BM: Uh, I think they were married afore. CV: Uh, let' ; s see, when we first come up to this country, down there, they just got through with a revival. They had the biggest revival they' ; d had. And when--they just called her Sister Mary, the woman done the preaching, but I never did learn her name, they just called her Sister Mary. But that was before [indecipherable] BM: Yeah. CV: Grandma and grandpa did. BM: Grandma and grandpa Dot. CV: You know, uh, Mary Bly (tape interference) CV: --and uh, what else maybe I can-- BM: [Indecipherable.] CV: Oh, yeah, Smith Bruce and them-- BM: Okay, Smith Bruce-- CV: --back over here a little, and-- BM: Yeah. CV: And you folks, and Jay Crawford-- BM: Jay Crawford. CV: Yeah, and his family lived on the black--what they called the black place, a little house there in there where dad--your grandfather let ' ; em use it. And, uh, Milt and Phoebe lived there, I remember them, and uh, Sally Pinehill, I remember I went to her funeral. And, uh, Annie Pinehill, the one with the husband (tape interference). It' ; s just mostly Bruces (tape interference). BM: And what was Grandpa Bruce' ; s name, was that Abner Bruce? [Indecipherable] man Abner? CV: I don' ; t know what his name was, we just always called him Grandpa Bruce, he was always--he loved children. I used to ask him to go home with him for dinner, but I--to tell you the truth, it must' ; ve been [indecipherable] the boy' ; s names back then, mustn' ; t it? Would Phoebe know? BM: I' ; d have to talk to her. CV: They made that [indecipherable]. And Naomi Ballard went to school there. And, uh, Wilson? What was his name? John Wilson? BM: John Wilson. CV: His family, they lived there. And uh, Wares, you remember them? And then W.O. Baker and their kids went to school there. And the Ware kids went there, Owen Ware and Iva Ware. MM: What about the Perrymans, was there any of them? CV: Yes, they lived there too. MM: Yeah. CV: The Perrymans lived there. MM: Mmm-hmm. CV: And what was those kids' ; names, I can' ; t think of them-- MM: That would' ; ve been-- CV: Or Parkham, if it' ; s close enough. You know, half the [indecipherable] from down at the cemetery' ; s, it' ; s down on Pinehill, you know, in that creek, Pinehill Creek. And, uh, he died, Pinehill, Grandpa Pinehill died for, when we went to his funeral. And, uh, they put in there his lunch, in a shoebox, they fixed him a lunch, and they put his saddle and then--I don' ; t know whether it was a gun or a bow and arrow. MM: It might' ; ve been a bow and arrow. CV: I don' ; t know whether they used guns then or not, the Indians. And, let me see now. Yeah, they just packed him down there and the rest of them walked down Pinehill ' ; cause it wasn' ; t very far there. BM: I was sayin' ; to her, over in, uh, the road there that [indecipherable]. CV: Yeah. BM: Over there in the creek. CV: Yeah. [Indecipherable.] BM: Yeah. CV: Somebody told me here awhile back somebody' ; d been digging in the graves over there, I don' ; t know if that' ; s right. BM: Yeah. That' ; s what I heard. CV: That' ; s the reason, don' ; t you think? BM: Ahh, I imagine so. MM: [Indecipherable.] CV: [Indecipherable.] pause in recording BM: Tell us about this fair situation. VV: Well, I don' ; t-- MM: Uh, Alex--you might start with Alex-- VV: Well, really, I don' ; t know, I think Alex Myers was one of the judges, wasn' ; t he? Of the milk cows? CV: I don' ; t remember. VV: Oh yeah, I' ; m sure he was, uh, you can have these old timers like John or somebody can tell you more about that, but I can' ; t, ' ; cause they--I was just a kid, you know, ' ; bout seven years old. pause in recording BM: You' ; re on. You' ; re on, buddy. You' ; re on. VV: I can' ; t talk into one of them little old things. BM: No, you were talkin' ; a while ago, you were tellin' ; me all about it, and you--now you, now what about this, uh, prize that you won. VV: Well, I took, uh, I went out in dad' ; s field and got some sudan, you know, and took it up there and won first prize there at the fair. Well they bring their work horses, you know, their cows, everything, they grew everything. MM: ' ; Bout what year did it--what years did that? VV: Well must' ; ve been ' ; 28, ' ; 29, or ' ; 30, in there you know, well, we moved to Pinehill what was ' ; 33 when we moved down there was. They, we -- there to, I mean to-- CV: ' ; 30-- VV: I mean to Deep Fork. CV: It was ' ; 30 when we moved to Pinehill. VV: ' ; 30? So it must' ; ve been ' ; 28 and ' ; 29 when I went to school down there. And they even used to have fair, uh, a fair up here at this church up here, you know, uh, Liberty, okay? They had a fair there, they had one at all these little places around here, they had their own little fair. I can remember, I don' ; t remember takin' ; anything up there but I remember going up there to the fair. That' ; s when the old church sat on back west up on the hill there, you know? And I was a kid goin' ; up there. pause in recording VV: And old Smith Bruce, I heard him talk, you know, he, he might' ; ve, uh, raised some big ones. All I know, I know he raised a lot of cane down there, I shipped cane for him myself. MM: Now, honey, you don' ; t put the ashes in her vases-- CV: No, here, right here, that' ; s what it' ; s for-- VV: Now I just don' ; t remember anything about the watermelon. CV: Well, you wasn' ; t born then, when what I' ; m talkin' ; bout-- pause in recording BM: Alright, now then. VV: --and we' ; d pull it back up on the one leg and kids would get on there and ride it-- CV: --I had some things, I had a basket of the things [indecipherable] and ride it down the creek-- MM: Why was it put there?-- CV: They built it, the boys-- VV: It was up in a great big old elm tree, see-- MM: Oh you built it yourself? VV: Yeah, put a pulley on there and a seat, you know, and we' ; d pull it up there and climb up the tree and get on and ride down the creek, you know, and we had it tied to another tree and you stopped, it was just something to play with, you know. pause in recording VV: And somebody came there and broke some [indecipherable] off and took off, and that was it--we lived back over there by Smith-- CV: Well, we lived down on the corner-- VV: But he found out who it was, I think, but he just let ' ; em go, said they was hungry. CV: Way over Bruce' ; s place, well not way over Bruce, the little Pinehill' ; s place-- VV: That' ; s where your chicken house was, far away, them birds CV: (laughing) VV: Over up on that Pinehill place. pause in recording VV: Well where' ; d you live at? CV: Uh, dad lived up on what call--used to call Pike' ; s Peak, that big hill where you turn, you go down to-- VV: Way up on there on that cave? MM: Yeah, uh, dad lived up there. VV: You know, where they played ball? BM: Yeah. VV: Where it turned west? On the south side of the road just--I was up there here, I was telling Carrie it' ; s still up there, no sir, they had a mother that lived in an old cellar there-- CV: No, we lived in a tent. MM: Albert Cree (ph)-- CV: Dad had the-- MM: Albert Cree' ; s (ph) rooster' ; s who he' ; s tellin' ; -- CV: Yeah. (laughs) MM: What' ; d they do with it? CV: Oh, they--he got after ' ; em with his gun and they had to turn it loose. (laughs) Dad still tells that. VV: I don' ; t remember that. pause in recording CV: [Indecipherable] and that really got him, he said you know' ; d I didn' ; t [indecipherable]. VV: Who was that? CV: [Indecipherable] Bruce VV: Oh. CV: [Indecipherable.] end of interview audio 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0001-01_Carrie_Vann.xml OHP-0001-01_Carrie_Vann.xml
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Carrie May (Millhouse) Vann
Description
An account of the resource
In this 1976 interview, Carrie May (Millhouse) Vann (1900-1982) discusses the history of the Pinehill Community outside of Bristow, Oklahoma in the early 1900s, including the first teachers at the school and her classmates, her childhood, courting her husband Virgil Vann, social events such literaries, and the childhood death of her brother Alvin.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
OHP-0001-01
Subject
The topic of the resource
History of Pinehill Community
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1976-10
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
audio
-
https://bristoworalhistory.org/files/original/4b92ebb88101dcdab3da0735fa52211a.jpg
1db4ce2efc85366ed6a04d0158ec1394
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Pinehill Histories
Subject
The topic of the resource
History of the Pinehill area north of Bristow
Description
An account of the resource
Several interviews were done by Mary and Bob Mc Carty of people who grew up in the Pinehill area north of Bristow. This collection is the Pinehill subset of the Bristow Oral Histories
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Bristow Historical Society, oral history collection
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Oral history.
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Elsa Ray Self
OHMS Object
This field contains the OHMS Hyperlink (link to the XML file within the OHMS
Viewer)
https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0001-01_Elsa_Self.xml
Interview Keyword
This field adds keywords to the Omeka Oral History item type. Keywords are
included in the OHMS XML, this field in Omeka will allow for full data migration
between OHMS XML and the Omeka Record. This field does not impact the
OHMS / Omeka integration and is optional if you do not need to map the
“keywords” field in the OHMS XML to the corresponding Omeka record.
church
school
teachers
roads
OHMS Object Text
This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the
contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka
5.4 Unknown Date OHP-0001-002 Elsa Ray Self OHP-0001-02 Bristow Historical Society - Oral History Archive Pinehill Community Bristow Historical Society, Inc. Pinehill Community church school teachers roads Elsa Ray Self MP3 1:|19(8)|45(8)|64(6)|79(3)|98(9)|118(4)|147(2)|173(3) 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/interviews/OHP-0001-02 Self, Elsa.mp3 Other audio 0 School Teachers BM: --recording everything you say. MM: It is—oh just stop it just for a minute to, and get start- stop it just for a minute BM: Alright, just— pause in recording ES: The first building was, uh, one mile south of the last building and a quarter mile east. Then the third building—the second building was, uh, a quarter of a mile west of the last building there. The last building was in the corner right here— Memories of teachers and school in the Pinehill Community Bob Lucas ; church ; Edith Whiteneck ; Etta Logan ; Mark Schockley ; school ; teachers school ; teachers 161 Oil, Fairs, and Church BM: Yeah. Now on the history situation, Elsa, is there anything in particular that you can think of that we ought to put down here in this history, that history on that thing? Like these, this oilfield stuff through here--something on that order there, is there any history on that that you can think of that we might ought to put in, in that. ES: No, I think not. This oil development started in here in the early twenties. I’ve got eleven wells on my place here, and the first one was drilled in 1923. And there was a few up in the north of there, north of here toward Pinehill, but I don’t know how close. Discussion on oil wells, churches, and fairs Charles Thomas ; church ; fairs ; literaries ; Mr. Rufus ; oil ; Pinehill ; statehood drilling ; fairs ; oil ; school 353 Land Development and a Hilarious Interruption BM: On developing this thing out this far in this country through here in 19--when you came back through here, who was some of the more prominent people that helped, was helping in on that at that time? ES: On what? BM: On helping get these roads and things built through here? In the community, helping get these roads built and— Discussion of land and road development and a hilarious interruption. Bruce ; Indians ; Molt Bruce ; Perrymans ; Pinehill ; roads ; Stubblesfields ; Velma Vann development ; roads In this 1976 interview, Elsa Ray Self (1901-1984) discusses the first pre-statehood buildings constructed in the Pinehill Community outside of Bristow, Oklahoma, the first teachers at the Pinehill School, the identities of some of the first families to settle in the area, and early drilling activity in the region. BM: --recording everything you say. MM: It is--oh just stop it just for a minute to, and get start- stop it just for a minute BM: Alright, just-- pause in recording ES: The first building was, uh, one mile south of the last building and a quarter mile east. Then the third building--the second building was, uh, a quarter of a mile west of the last building there. The last building was in the corner right here-- BM: Right. ES: Now then, they had a little church house a mile south of that, uh, old building, of the fir--the last building, and it was just a church house that stayed there a year, a few years. (pauses) Now, the people who lived here I' ; ve known many of them. BM: Uh, now, here' ; s a question, Elsa do you remember the first, the first teacher that taught-- ES: No. No, I haven' ; t lived here all my life, so-- MM: Which is the first teacher you remember? BM: Which, which is the first teacher that you remembered? ES: Well it might' ; ve been Bob Lucas. BM: Bob Lucas. Well, see I have one back before Bob Lucas, that was, uh, Mark Shockley. ES: Mark Shockley, yes, I remember Mark-- MM: [Inaudible] BM: Then there' ; s one, uh, one before him, there was a lady before him by the name of Edith Whiteneck and another by Eddie, uh, what is that name? You got it wrote down there, that was after Edith Whiteneck-- MM: Hicks. BM: Hicks, yeah, what was that Hicks' ; last--first name. MM: Etta, uh Edith Whiteneck, Etta Logan, and then something Hicks. ES: Well that' ; s before I came here. I didn' ; t come here until, didn' ; t move here until 1922. BM: 1922 ES: I owned this place since 19-and-02. BM: Well that, that' ; s what I know. ES: I owned this, well, I owned this place since 19-and-02 and I could tell you people who lived here, well, but these uh school buildings here I just know about them. BM: Yeah. Now on the history situation, Elsa, is there anything in particular that you can think of that we ought to put down here in this history, that history on that thing? Like these, this oilfield stuff through here--something on that order there, is there any history on that that you can think of that we might ought to put in, in that. ES: No, I think not. This oil development started in here in the early twenties. I' ; ve got eleven wells on my place here, and the first one was drilled in 1923. And there was a few up in the north of there, north of here toward Pinehill, but I don' ; t know how close. UW: Well that number one was the first oil well that went---ever drilled in here. ES: No it wasn' ; t. UW: At that time. ES: It wasn' ; t. BM: Is there anything that you can think of that-- ES: Now, I went to church in this first building right up here, way down here back before statehood. I remember going there to church before statehood. My father was a minister and he went there and preached once in a while. But then when that building burned they moved it north and northwest. MM: What about the literaries? BM: Do you remember anything on those old time literaries that they had? ES: No. UW: They was over by the time he was back. MM: What about the fairs? BM: Do you know anything about fair that was held? Fairs that was held? ES: No. MM: At Pinehill School itself. ES: No. MM: Starting about middle of 1928, ' ; 29 out there. At the school itself, a fair. UW: Do you know when, uh, that was during Mrs. Rufus' ; time, I was substituting there for her and, uh, they was having a literary going-on there then because I was in a play that was there. BM: Okay--so you' ; re helping out here too. ES: I did a little substitute work there for Charles Thomas. BM: Yeah, I knew that. ES: But not much. BM: On developing this thing out this far in this country through here in 19--when you came back through here, who was some of the more prominent people that helped, was helping in on that at that time? ES: On what? BM: On helping get these roads and things built through here? In the community, helping get these roads built and-- ES: Well, I' ; d say the Bruces, Bruce families-- tape hilariously interrupted KID1: (excitedly) --and the top comes off, and it' ; s got little benches, and everything! Don' ; t we, mama! KID2: Mama! DAD: What the hell goin' ; on here! Somebody been playin' ; with this damn thing again? MOM: [Indecipherable.] No, what ya did, turned on them on or somethin' ; , did you wind it back? DAD: Yeah. MOM: I gotta do it again? DAD: Nope. tape continues ES: And then there was Vann, Velma (ph) Vann was here, he lived here on my place. Stubblefields lived here from 1902 to 1912, they must' ; ve had quite a bit to do with it. BM: Well see, that-- ES: Stubblefield. BM: Stubblefield. MM: What years did the Vanns lived on this place? ES: Well, they lived here, I' ; d say, uh, 1912 to about ' ; 17, 1917. They lived here five, six years. MM: If you' ; d ever let me in it, you wouldn' ; t have got me out, this is a nice, my idea of an ideal place to live. ES: Pinehill? MM: No, this place right here. ES: Oh. (laughs) Well-- MM: What about the [inaudible] BM: Alright, let' ; s kind of-- MM: --' ; cause they still, they still own the property there across from where the school was, they was the Perrymans and the Bruces and-- ES: Yeah, they were Indians. Yeah, they was an Indian lived east of that there and she was, he was Molt Bruce' ; s wife' ; s brother but I forget his name, terrible with his name. BM: Noble? ES: I' ; m not certain whether it was Noble, or-- MM: Well they say one of the Perrymans owned this-- ES: Yeah. Yeah, I wouldn' ; t know who-- end of interview audio 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0001-01_Elsa_Self.xml OHP-0001-01_Elsa_Self.xml
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Elsa Ray Self
Description
An account of the resource
In this 1976 interview, Elsa Ray Self (1901-1984) discusses the first pre-statehood buildings constructed in the Pinehill Community outside of Bristow, Oklahoma, the first teachers at the Pinehill School, the identities of some of the first families to settle in the area, and early drilling activity in the region.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
OHP-0001-02
Subject
The topic of the resource
Pinehill Community
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
audio
-
https://bristoworalhistory.org/files/original/f1c97a66f7b2b847344cb950308b73c7.jpg
99ca05401f4ba42b4810f193651248a2
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Pinehill Histories
Subject
The topic of the resource
History of the Pinehill area north of Bristow
Description
An account of the resource
Several interviews were done by Mary and Bob Mc Carty of people who grew up in the Pinehill area north of Bristow. This collection is the Pinehill subset of the Bristow Oral Histories
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Bristow Historical Society, oral history collection
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Oral history.
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
The person(s) performing the interview
Robert L. “Bob” McCarty
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Virgil Rufus Vann
Carrie May (Millhouse) Vann
OHMS Object
This field contains the OHMS Hyperlink (link to the XML file within the OHMS
Viewer)
https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0001-03_Virgil_Vann.xml
Interview Keyword
This field adds keywords to the Omeka Oral History item type. Keywords are
included in the OHMS XML, this field in Omeka will allow for full data migration
between OHMS XML and the Omeka Record. This field does not impact the
OHMS / Omeka integration and is optional if you do not need to map the
“keywords” field in the OHMS XML to the corresponding Omeka record.
Pinehill
school
teachers
OHMS Object Text
This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the
contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka
5.4 OHP-0001-003 Virgil Rufus Vann OHP-0001-03 Bristow Historical Society - Oral History Archive Pinehill Community Bristow Historical Society, Inc. Pinehill Community and School Pinehill school teachers Virgil Rufus Vann Carrie May (Millhouse) Vann Robert L. “Bob” McCarty MP3 1:|32(11)|64(5)|80(3)|103(11)|120(8)|137(9)|154(11)|167(6)|180(4)|194(2)|206(11)|215(10)|232(12)|243(6)|275(14)|284(16)|295(13)|304(14)|314(7)|326(10)|360(10)|374(12)|383(5)|402(11)|420(13)|437(10)|461(14) 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/interviews/OHP-0001-03 Vann, Virgil.mp3 Other audio 0 School teachers and classmates in Pinehill BM: --seventy-six, five p.m. MM: Alright, now— BM: Your first— MM: Just a minute, back up, see if it’s recording right quick. BM: Your first teacher was, the first teacher that you went to was who? VV: [Indecipherable] the best I can remember, it might’ve been someone else before that, but-- BM: You don’t know what year it was she told him, huh? Discussion of school days, classmates, and community events in the Pinehill Community Carl Carson ; Charlie Line ; church ; community ; Dewey Carson ; Earl Phillips ; Elsa Self ; Etta Logan ; Howard Baker ; Indians ; Laurie Vaughn ; Leo Pinehill ; literaries ; Mary Vaughn ; Matt Baker ; pie suppers ; Pinehill School ; school ; teacher ; Walt Biggs classmates ; pie suppers ; pinehill ; school 390 Pitch Game and a poem about a Grasshopper BM: What did you do after the literaries? VV: Sometimes we’d have a pitch game. (laughs) BM: Pitch game? VV: Yeah. The boys would. And then we all got scared one night and we saw the community got tired of it, they got that—they didn’t like it a bit in the world, the board didn’t like it, ‘cause we was havin’ a pitch game. We didn’t mean nothin’ by it, just passin’ the time off. I remember one night we’d just got started, you know, and somebody rattled the door, it’s under the law, they’d already warned us. And “Stop that thing!” And somebody rattled and took ahold of the knob and pulled out on the door, tried to break it in. And we had a lock, you know, but they began to shake it and we all broke out of there. Somebody, I remember, someone, they went out, they kicked a big old chair right in the door and we finally just leaped over that chair, hit the ground, and I remember, it kinda knocked the breath out of me when I went over. (chuckling) It gave us such a scare that that ended the pitch game. We never did try that anymore. That was orneriness. And, oh, I don’t know what made us do that, but we didn’t mean nothin’ by it, you know, just havin’ fun. Memories of a pitch games and a poem from school Art Bolin ; Bob Biggs ; Charlie Line ; Frank newman ; Les Stubblefield ; pitch game ; Ralph Newman pitch game 593 Stealing a Rooster MM: What about Albert Cree’s (ph) rooster? VV: Ohhh (laughs) I’m gonna have to tell that again? BM: Yep! We didn’t get it down a while ago. School boys stealing a rooster Albert Cree ; Bob Biggs ; Charlie Vine ; Earl Phillips ; Hog Barnes ; Lester Wilson ; rooster ; stealing rooster 774 Schoolhouse burned down and moving BM: You said a while ago somethin’ about the schoolhouse burnin’, you said that you knew the reasons why that Ella Bruce (ph) and Willie Wilson (ph) didn’t teach anymore. What was that reason? VV: Well, Bob, the best I remember that I don’t know what time of the year, but I don’t know, it seems like they had their election along in March, don’t the school election? Pretty much. But anyway they had the school election there and they had—one of the parties was trying to put the other one out and put some more people in, you know, on the school board. Well, all of the community come out and those that didn’t, why, they’d have the hacks and they’d have buggies and somebody would go after ‘em and bring ‘em in and get ‘em to vote. And so that night, why, after the election, why the schoolhouse burned down. And they wasn’t no more school that year. Memories of the schoolhouse burning down and moving Big Deep Fork ; cotton ; crop ; Ella Bruce ; fire ; Newby ; Pinehill ; school ; schoolhouse ; Willie Wilson school 1136 Oil wells and the Vann children BM: Another question, Virg. Do you remember, or do you remember hearing them say, when the first oil well was drilled in this community? VV: Yeah, I think I do. Pretty sure I do. It was about a mile south of the W.O. Baker place. Glen Freeland and his brother was in the drillin’ business at time. Glen is still livin’. That’s where the first oil well was drilled, I think. I think he’s still livin’ but it ain’t certain for me. BM: Well would Glen Freeland still be around the Bristow area? VV: Yeah. I think he is. He got some wells back over there. The first oil well being drilled and the names of the Vann children covered wagons ; Donald Christopher Vann ; Eliza Elizabeth Grimes ; Glen Freeland ; oil well ; W.O. Baker children ; oil 1394 Courtship and showing off for girls BM: Alright, you and Carrie’s courtship, how did that go? When you were courtin’ Carrie, when you was courtin’ Carrie, how did that take place? VV: How’d it take place? BM: Yeah. VV: Well I got stuck on her. (laughs) I just got kind of stuck on her and we went together, was goin’ together. She wasn’t but fifteen when we married and we didn’t go together—how long we go together, mom? Discussion of courtship with Carrie, showing off, and watermelon stealing courtship ; horses ; Louis Masterson ; Molton Percy ; Owen Ware ; schoolhouse ; watermelon courtship ; horses In this 1976 interview, Virgil Rufus Vann (1895–1983) and his wife Carrie May (Millhouse) Vann (1900-1982) discuss their early-1900s childhoods in the Pinehill Community outside Bristow, Oklahoma, including the first teachers at the school, classmates, their courtship, community social events such as literaries, the loss of the first Pinehill school by fire, and Virgil’s boyish antics such as playing “pitch,” stealing watermelons, and the theft of a rooster. BM: --seventy-six, five p.m. MM: Alright, now-- BM: Your first-- MM: Just a minute, back up, see if it' ; s recording right quick. BM: Your first teacher was, the first teacher that you went to was who? VV: [Indecipherable] the best I can remember, it might' ; ve been someone else before that, but-- BM: You don' ; t know what year it was she told him, huh? CV: So she was teaching-- BM: So what year did you start school? VV: I think it was 1910, I' ; m pretty sure it was. BM: Alright, then she had to have been the teacher there in 1910. VV: Is that the way you got it wrote? BM: No, that' ; s not the way I got it, but-- MM: Well, she could' ; ve taught more than one-- VV: Well, now, I wouldn' ; t be positive on that, I just wouldn' ; t be sure. CV: Five years later we moved up there and she was teaching then. VV: She was? CV: So she might not be teaching VV: She must' ; ve--somebody else must' ; ve--you don' ; t know what year Etta Logan-- BM: Yeah, that was before that. VV: Before ' ; 10? BM: Yeah. VV: It was. I know I went to school with her, didn' ; t I? CV: I did. BM: No, Etta Logan was after Ella. CV: Yeah. MM: We may have that in some of that papers BM: Naw, I ain' ; t got any of that with me. VV: [Indecipherable.] BM: That damn thing, got it runnin' ; now? MM: Yeah, it is. CV: Didn' ; t you say [indecipherable] BM: When you first moved in here to go to Pinehill School where did you live at that time, Virgil? VV: Over on the Elsa Self place BM: You lived on the Elsa Self place. VV: Yeah. BM: Do you remember offhand the kids that went to school with you at that time? VV: Well there was Howard Baker (ph) and Matt Baker (ph) and Charlie Line (ph) and Laurie (ph) and Mary Vaughn (ph) and there was boys, Earl Phillips (ph), I think, [indecipherable] Phillips, Carl and Dewey Carson (ph) I believe, anyway I wouldn' ; t be sure. CV: Well, the Indians-- BM: The Indian kids-- VV: Leo Pinehill, I believe he went to school there, Walt Biggs (ph), and the Wilton (ph) boys, Esco (ph) and Lester (ph) I believe. What year was it that Alvin got killed, do you remember? CV: I think we figured that out. BM: Fifteen. CV: Ware. The Ware (ph) boys. VV: Huh? BM: The Ware (ph) kids. VV: Yeah. Yeah that' ; s right. Oh there' ; s probably some more but I honestly it' ; s out of my mind. BM: Okay, did you--what all activities was the school used for? VV: Well, community purposes, pie suppers and literaries and kangaroo courts, why nearly anything that people in the community-- CV: Church. VV: --wanted to use it for, why it was open. It was open to the public, you know. BM: Every kind of activities for the community, community purposes. VV: Yeah, that' ; s right. And church purposes, you know, they had church there, pretty regular all the time. BM: Now when you first went to go to school there, do you remember these old literaries? VV: Yeah, I remember very well. They' ; d have programs, you know, people would sing songs and different things. Anything that people, any kind of gathering that they wanted, why they was open to the public, you know. MM: Kangaroo courts? VV: Huh? BM: Kangaroo courts, uh, was that, uh, kangaroo courts, was that held as a, one of these literaries or was that-- VV: Well it just seemed to me like they would have literaries, what you mean by " ; literaries" ; is they just had songs, you know, and things like that and to entertain the people, you know. BM: Now this kangaroo court that you was talkin' ; about a while ago, uh, was that officially or was that a, held as a dialogue at these get-togethers on Friday night? VV: No, during literaries they didn' ; t have no dialogues in their programs, you know. They had school programs. They only had dialogues, you know, on the last day of school they' ; d have a program, you know. They' ; d have dialogues and speeches and [indecipherable]. MM: What did you do after the literaries? BM: What did you do after the literaries? VV: Sometimes we' ; d have a pitch game. (laughs) BM: Pitch game? VV: Yeah. The boys would. And then we all got scared one night and we saw the community got tired of it, they got that--they didn' ; t like it a bit in the world, the board didn' ; t like it, ' ; cause we was havin' ; a pitch game. We didn' ; t mean nothin' ; by it, just passin' ; the time off. I remember one night we' ; d just got started, you know, and somebody rattled the door, it' ; s under the law, they' ; d already warned us. And " ; Stop that thing!" ; And somebody rattled and took ahold of the knob and pulled out on the door, tried to break it in. And we had a lock, you know, but they began to shake it and we all broke out of there. Somebody, I remember, someone, they went out, they kicked a big old chair right in the door and we finally just leaped over that chair, hit the ground, and I remember, it kinda knocked the breath out of me when I went over. (chuckling) It gave us such a scare that that ended the pitch game. We never did try that anymore. That was orneriness. And, oh, I don' ; t know what made us do that, but we didn' ; t mean nothin' ; by it, you know, just havin' ; fun. BM: Who all was playing pitch? VV: Oh, there was Les Stubblefield (ph), Charlie Line (ph) and Bob Biggs (ph) and Frank Newman (ph), Ralph Newman (ph), and [indecipherable] Phillips, I think, and Art Bolin (ph)--aw, there was a whole host of us that played. But that ended up the pitch game that night. BM: Now, Carrie said something ' ; bout you had some of these school get-togethers, you said a little poem. What was this little poem about? VV: Oh, it was ' ; bout a little old grasshopper. BM: Would you care to repeat it? VV: Well, it goes like this: There was a little silly grasshopper/ He was always on the jump/ He never looked ahead/ He often got a bump/ His mother said to him one day/ While they were in the stubble/ You don' ; t watch before you leap/ You' ; ll get yourself in trouble/ The silly little grasshopper/ He despised his wise old mother/ And he said I know what to do/ And he decided not to bother/ He hurried on across the field/ And all at once he took a great big old jump and he landed in the brook/ He struggled hard to reach the bank/ But he finally decided he couldn' ; t do it/ He give up/ And all at once an old trout came out/ And tore him all to pieces. And that' ; s a warning, you know, for young people, to take warning from their mother. BM: That' ; s right. MM: What about Albert Cree' ; s (ph) rooster? VV: Ohhh (laughs) I' ; m gonna have to tell that again? BM: Yep! We didn' ; t get it down a while ago. VV: Well, we and us boys--they' ; s a whole bunch of us, oh there must' ; ve been eight or ten of us, we was always tryin' ; to play some prank, you know, on someone, and well Albert Cree (ph), he had an old fine rooster. And he thought a lot of ' ; im, but we decided we' ; d steal that old rooster that night and [indecipherable] was his brother-in-law, wasn' ; t it? He went out and borrowed his gun so that he couldn' ; t use that on us, and on ' ; bout little before we' ; s bedtime we slipped out to the henhouse and one of ' ; em, I forget--he grabbed that old rooster. He began to make his call and finally Albert came to the door and he had his dog about him, too. " ; Get him out! Get it!" ; and old dog just stand there and barkin' ; and barkin.' ; And we' ; d make that old rooster squall as loud as we could. Finally we decided we' ; d take him home and roast ' ; im. We started across the blind side, across an open field there and we, rather than walk through the brush we decided we' ; d walk around the edge of the field. We got over there a certain place and Albert, he cut across the field, you know, he didn' ; t go like we did. But he cut across and he run right into him. And he said, " ; Boy, give him up," ; he said, " ; I come after him." ; And well, he didn' ; t do it, he just hand the old rooster over and Albert went back to the house with the old rooster on his arm. And we didn' ; t bother old Albert no more, that--and with that ended up the rooster roast that night! BM: Who all was in on that rooster roast that night? VV: Huh? BM: Who all was in on that rooster roast? VV: Oh, Hog Barnes (ph), Charlie Vine (ph), Lester Wilson (ph) and Bob Biggs (ph) I believe, and Earl Phillips (ph)--all them, there' ; s a whole bunch of ' ; em. We just out having a good time, you know. And we--we didn' ; t get to roast that old rooster. The way we' ; d do it, we' ; d roll that--roast of ' ; em--roll them old roosters in mud, you know, then we' ; d put them on the pole iron and bake ' ; em. And, well, then we' ; d eat ' ; em. Not salted or nothin' ; . We didn' ; t like ' ; em very well, but we' ; d had a big time, you know. BM: You said a while ago somethin' ; about the schoolhouse burnin' ; , you said that you knew the reasons why that Ella Bruce (ph) and Willie Wilson (ph) didn' ; t teach anymore. What was that reason? VV: Well, Bob, the best I remember that I don' ; t know what time of the year, but I don' ; t know, it seems like they had their election along in March, don' ; t the school election? Pretty much. But anyway they had the school election there and they had--one of the parties was trying to put the other one out and put some more people in, you know, on the school board. Well, all of the community come out and those that didn' ; t, why, they' ; d have the hacks and they' ; d have buggies and somebody would go after ' ; em and bring ' ; em in and get ' ; em to vote. And so that night, why, after the election, why the schoolhouse burned down. And they wasn' ; t no more school that year. BM: Wasn' ; t any more school that year? VV: No. MM: How many schoolhouses-- VV: Finally that fall they built a new schoolhouse down up on the hill where the last one was. I don' ; t know if anybody remember it--do you remember that, where that was at? BM: How many schools do you remember being in the Pinehill District? VV: Three. BM: Three. VV: Three. Three different buildings. BM: Three different buildings. VV: Yeah. BM: Virgil, when you and Carrie came back from Arizona where did you move to? VV: We moved on the old Biggs' ; (ph), well, he owns it now. But dad had bought that place-- CV: Ella Grayson' ; s (ph) place. VV: Well it was up on the hill from dad' ; s house, on the Patty Grisham (ph) place, square-top house. And that' ; s where we lived for--I forget what year it was, we come back in nineteen eight-- CV: Well we lived in an old log house on your dad' ; s place first. VV: Well we moved from there on the [indecipherable] place. No, we moved from down in the field in the longhouse up to the square top house. Ella Grayson' ; s (ph). Then we lived there some years ' ; til 1929. We moved up on John Hader' ; s (ph) place. And we lived there two years and we moved there to Pinehill. And we lived there two years, we moved down on Big Deep Fork. We lived there two years and we moved from there over to Newby, a while east of Newby. That was in ' ; 35. We lived there one year and we moved back over on Kelly' ; s (ph) place south of Bristow five miles. Then we lived there one year and made a crop. We made one bale of cotton that year and we got stalled out. That was the hardest year I ever spent in my whole life, I guess. end side A of tape ; begin side B at 00:00 VV: --and we went from there to forty-four. We been there--that was in ' ; 36. That was a dry year. Were no crops to speak of at all. We left there in August, we went to New Mexico and picked cotton down in the valley that fall, and we left there and went to California. And we stayed there for one year I believe, and we come back to Oklahoma. And that' ; s the year dad had bought the old Phelps (ph)--not--I forgot where it was he bought that from. CV: Old Jake Corns (ph) was livin' ; on it. VV: Yeah, but I forget who it, who we bought it from. But we moved down in the little log house down in the field, and an old dug well in there. And we lived there a while, ' ; til nineteen-and-twenty-nine, we moved up on the Hader (ph) place, John Hader (ph) place. About two miles south of the sub (ph) station. And we lived there two years, two years--that' ; s right. We moved from there on the Leo Pinehill place a mile south of the old Pinehill schoolhouse. We lived there two years and we went to Big Deep Fork. We lived there two years, am I right? Oh, I' ; m all mixed up, ain' ; t I? CV: [Indecipherable.] BM: Another question, Virg. Do you remember, or do you remember hearing them say, when the first oil well was drilled in this community? VV: Yeah, I think I do. Pretty sure I do. It was about a mile south of the W.O. Baker place. Glen Freeland and his brother was in the drillin' ; business at time. Glen is still livin' ; . That' ; s where the first oil well was drilled, I think. I think he' ; s still livin' ; but it ain' ; t certain for me. BM: Well would Glen Freeland still be around the Bristow area? VV: Yeah. I think he is. He got some wells back over there. BM: Would you repeat all of the Vann kids' ; names? Your dad, your mother--dad and mother-- VV: Yeah, they was fourteen of us children. BM: Okay, start with your mother and dad. VV: That' ; s with brothers and sisters. BM: Start with your mother and dad' ; s names, Virg. VV: Dad' ; s name was Donald Christopher. BM: Donald Christopher Vann. VV: Yeah, and my mother' ; s name was Eliza Elizabeth. BM: What was her name before they were married? VV: Mother' ; s name was Grimes. BM: Grimes, okay. VV: Dad' ; s name was Vann. (laughs) BM: Alright, then-- VV: He married when he was seventeen years old, dad did. BM: The children' ; s names was what? VV: Huh? BM: What was all the kids' ; names? VV: Well, Vernie (ph) was the oldest, then I' ; m next. Pearl is next, then, um--- CV: Grace? VV: Grace, and Eamon (ph). That was the oldest ones that--then dad had a younger family after that of about four or five. Gertrude and Meehan (ph) and Louis (ph) and Cletis (ph). Four. Yeah. MM: How old was you when Cletis (ph) was born? VV: Huh? BM: How old was you when Cletis (ph) was born? VV: Cletis (ph) was born after I was married, I was married 1915. Cletis (ph) was born and he' ; s the youngest, he' ; s the baby, and he was born while we was in Arizona. And also, he was born a very--born the day that Maude (ph) died. See, Maude' ; d married Hog Varner (ph). And they went--when we went to Arizona, why they was five of us in the--five covered wagons. Six? Five or six. And we got out in Arizona, they lived there a while and Maudie (ph) died. CV: Not in Arizona. VV: And mother couldn' ; t even go to the funeral. They brought Maude (ph) back and buried her, but mother couldn' ; t go to the funeral because Cletis (ph) was born that day. BM: Alright, you and Carrie' ; s courtship, how did that go? When you were courtin' ; Carrie, when you was courtin' ; Carrie, how did that take place? VV: How' ; d it take place? BM: Yeah. VV: Well I got stuck on her. (laughs) I just got kind of stuck on her and we went together, was goin' ; together. She wasn' ; t but fifteen when we married and we didn' ; t go together--how long we go together, mom? BM: Did you ever pull any--show off to the girls at the school? VV: Did I what? BM: Did you ever show off to the girls at school? VV: Well, yeah, I tried to. (laughs) BM: What did you do showin' ; off? VV: Well I' ; d get down there and ride horses, you know, buckin' ; horses. I remember one time Owen Ware had a little horse and he was a buckin' ; little horse, and I told him I' ; d ride him behind the saddle. And the more I got on that little ole' ; horse and he run out and throwed me up in the tree and I fell down. Fell and knocked me unconscious, and I remember Carrie comin' ; out--I don' ; t remember but she said afterward, she come up there to help me, pick me up. (laughs) Yeah-- BM: So that was the start, that was really the courtship? VV: (laughs) Yeah. BM: When you was a lad growin' ; up, did you ever go watermelon stealing. VV: Oh, yeah, that sounds very common. BM: Who in your opinion, who raised the best watermelon? VV: Well, I just don' ; t remember, Bob, they was all good melons. BM: But you don' ; t--anyone in particular? VV: No, no, I don' ; t, I just don' ; t. But I remember we would, when we' ; d go get a watermelon, we' ; d just get a watermelon, we wouldn' ; t cut the--cut the green ones and mess the pipes all up, we was very respectable along that line. We wanted the people, you know, not to think hard of us and we' ; s just pretty good boys. BM: Okay--- VV: But we did play pitch once in a while. BM: I got a report that one time that you rode your horse into the schoolhouse, is that right? VV: In the what? BM: Into the schoolhouse. VV: No, no, I wouldn' ; t do nothin' ; like that, I don' ; t think I ever did. I believe I did ride him up on the porch, didn' ; t I? CV: I don' ; t know. BM: You rode him up on the porch, you never did get him on inside the schoolhouse? VV: Naw (laughs) no, I-- BM: Do you remember any of the other boys riding them in there? VV: No, no I don' ; t remember anybody. They could' ; ve but I don' ; t remember. BM: How long have you known Louis Masterson (ph)? VV: Well, let' ; s see, can' ; t remember, Bob. I didn' ; t go to school with him, I' ; m pretty sure. But he moved, they moved in the community in later years, I think, best I remember, and he married Molton Percy' ; s (ph) little girl, Virgie (ph). BM: I believe that' ; s about everything, Virg. end of interview audio 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0001-03_Virgil_Vann.xml OHP-0001-03_Virgil_Vann.xml
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Virgil Rufus Vann
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In this 1976 interview, Virgil Rufus Vann (1895–1983) and his wife Carrie May (Millhouse) Vann (1900-1982) discuss their early-1900s childhoods in the Pinehill Community outside Bristow, Oklahoma, including the first teachers at the school, classmates, their courtship, community social events such as literaries, the loss of the first Pinehill school by fire, and Virgil’s boyish antics such as playing “pitch,” stealing watermelons, and the theft of a rooster.
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OHP-0001-03
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Pinehill Community and School
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1976-10
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audio
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d9d42df37aca8d38bc0a17e0614f44ee
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Early Drilling Near Bristow
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Oral Histories of Drilling in the early 1900s
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Oral accounts of drilling for oil and natural gas near Bristow in the early 1900s
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Bristow Historical Society, oral history collection
Type
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Oral History
Oral History
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Interviewer
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Robert L. “Bob” McCarty
Interviewee
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Oliver "Tracy" Kelly
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https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0002-02_Oliver_Kelly.xml
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banks
oil
cotton
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5.4 OHP-0002-02 Oliver " ; Tracy" ; Kelly OHP-0002-02 Bristow Historical Society - Oral History Archive Oil Drilling - The Early Years Bristow Historical Society, Inc. First Banks and Cotton gins in Bristow banks oil cotton Oliver " ; Tracy" ; Kelly Robert L. “Bob” McCarty MP3 1:|13(3)|28(11)|52(5)|66(5)|75(3)|84(4)|94(4) 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/interviews/OHP-0002-02 Kelly, Tracy.mp3 Other audio 0 Cotton Gins in Bristow BM: October 13, 1976, 10:45. pause in tape BM: To your knowledge, when was the first gin built in this part of the county? TK: Bob, I don’t know about the first gin, but I do know of my father, Albert Kelly, and W.O. Baker were partners, and their gin was established in Bristow right down by the railroad track where the old ice plant, and the Farmer’s Custom Gin started in 1913. And they were gin and cotton, they had all set up—gin and cotton in the fall of 1913. And they—some very interesting stories about how they, getting that equipment in from the old Loomis Gin people, into Bristow and getting it set up. And I’m sure they wouldn’t have started the gin unless there was a substantial amount of cotton in the area to support a gin facility. So if I were estimating, I would say that cotton came into the Bristow community in the nineteen-nines and nineteen-ten and –eleven, around in there. That’s the best of my—you know, that’s to, about as good a target date as I would, could get. Cotton gins in Bristow Albert Kelly ; Bud Long ; cotton ; cotton gin ; Farmer's Custom Gin ; Joe Abraham ; Loomis Gin ; Mills Friarson ; W.O. Baker cotton gin 148 Banking and Oil Drilling BM: What year did your father go into the banking business? TK: 1932. BM: 1932? TK: Back during the lean days of the banking world. He was invited in to the American National Bank stock ownership because of desperate need at that time to shore up their capital positions, because banks were having a very difficult time in those days. Discussion of the early bank in Bristow as well as agriculture and oil agriculture ; American National Bank ; banking ; banks ; Community State Bank ; Fath ; FDIC ; First State Bank ; Frisco ; oil ; rail ; stock agriculture ; banking ; oil drilling In this brief 1976 interview, Oliver “Tracy” Kelly (1926-2012) discusses the first banks and cotton gins in Bristow, Oklahoma, as well as the nature of the industry in the area at that time, which was primarily agriculture and oil. BM: October 13, 1976, 10:45. pause in tape BM: To your knowledge, when was the first gin built in this part of the county? TK: Bob, I don' ; t know about the first gin, but I do know of my father, Albert Kelly, and W.O. Baker were partners, and their gin was established in Bristow right down by the railroad track where the old ice plant, and the Farmer' ; s Custom Gin started in 1913. And they were gin and cotton, they had all set up--gin and cotton in the fall of 1913. And they--some very interesting stories about how they, getting that equipment in from the old Loomis Gin people, into Bristow and getting it set up. And I' ; m sure they wouldn' ; t have started the gin unless there was a substantial amount of cotton in the area to support a gin facility. So if I were estimating, I would say that cotton came into the Bristow community in the nineteen-nines and nineteen-ten and --eleven, around in there. That' ; s the best of my--you know, that' ; s to, about as good a target date as I would, could get. BM: What year, Tracy--you stated the other night that there was five banks in Bristow at one time. TK: Yeah, and before we get off of the cotton gin, there were five cotton gins in Bristow at one time. BM: There were five-- TK: --operating at the same time, that' ; s when cotton was king, back in the late teens and twenties. BM: Do you know the names of all of them? TK: The banks or the cotton gins? BM: The cotton gins. TK: No, but I can, I think I can do a little research and come up with some of them. Joe Abraham had a gin, Albert Kelly had a gin, Mills Friarson (ph) had a gin, there was--Bud Long (ph) had a gin, and anyway, there was-- BM: That' ; s four. TK: That' ; s four of them. BM: What year did your father go into the banking business? TK: 1932. BM: 1932? TK: Back during the lean days of the banking world. He was invited in to the American National Bank stock ownership because of desperate need at that time to shore up their capital positions, because banks were having a very difficult time in those days. BM: How many banks back in the --nine, -tens, up until this Heritage (ph) came in, how many banks were there in the city of Bristow? TK: Well, at one time I think, Bob, there were five banks and that was before they had to do a lot of--that was before the days of FDIC and federal insurance and that sort of thing. BM: Offhand, do you know the names of those banks? TK: No, I could--again, I could research them and find out, there was--I, off the top of my head I can' ; t tell you the names of them. I know that there was a First National and there was a First State and there was a Community State and there was American National, but BM: In your opinion, would you say that the banks that were in the Bristow area was a major factor in the development of that--this community? TK: I would attribute part of the inertia in the development in this area, certainly, but more importantly than that, in my judgment, was the fine agriculture and ultimately the oil production. Agriculture and oil is really what put Bristow on the map and thank goodness it had some good arteries of transportation, it had a rail--the main line of the Frisco was through here. But the natural resources of agriculture and oil really were the reason for Bristow being the quality of town that it was. BM: Do you remember hearing say--it had been brought to my attention that there was a geographical survey made of this country by the United States whenever they laid out the railroad. Do you think possibly that this survey was the cause of oil being established? TK: Bob, the U.S. Geodatic Survey, the engineers, when they came through this country, they performed certain geological findings that were bound to have attracted the early day oilman because there was a man by the name of Fath, and there is still talking around the oilpatch about the ' ; Fath highs.' ; These were the geological high structures that were even identified by the Fath engineering and geological surveys back in the early days. It' ; s been amazingly accurate, some of those geological pronouncements that were back there at the turn of the century. BM: At one time was there a Bristow geographical survey company that surveyed out of Bristow? TK: To my knowledge, Bob, I' ; d have to defer that to someone else. To my knowledge I don' ; t know of any, but I' ; m kind of a johnny-come-lately in that score. There are other old oilpatchers around here that would probably have a better feel for that than I. I don' ; t know. end of interview 1 audio 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0002-02_Oliver_Kelly.xml OHP-0002-02_Oliver_Kelly.xml
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Title
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Oliver "Tracy" Kelly
Description
An account of the resource
In this brief 1976 interview, Oliver “Tracy” Kelly (1926-2012) discusses the first banks and cotton gins in Bristow, Oklahoma, as well as the nature of the industry in the area at that time, which was primarily agriculture and oil.
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OHP-0002-02
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First Banks and Cotton gins in Bristow
Date
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1976-10-13
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audio
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https://bristoworalhistory.org/files/original/cd1168c93325d2d2c2919056bd1767b1.jpg
36d19139284163f00d3fc3ff007e1319
Dublin Core
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Title
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Early Drilling Near Bristow
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral Histories of Drilling in the early 1900s
Description
An account of the resource
Oral accounts of drilling for oil and natural gas near Bristow in the early 1900s
Source
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Bristow Historical Society, oral history collection
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Oral History
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
The person(s) performing the interview
Robert L. “Bob” McCarty
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Ralph R. "Brick" Kirchner
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Viewer)
https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0002-03_Ralph_Kirchner.xml
Interview Keyword
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between OHMS XML and the Omeka Record. This field does not impact the
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“keywords” field in the OHMS XML to the corresponding Omeka record.
oil
geology
OHMS Object Text
This field contains the OHMS Index and / or Transcript and is what makes the
contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka
5.4 OHP-0002-03 Ralph R. " ; Brick" ; Kirchner OHP-0002-03 Bristow Historical Society - Oral History Archive Oil Drilling - The Early Years Bristow Historical Society, Inc. oil oil geology Ralph R. " ; Brick" ; Kirchner Robert L. “Bob” McCarty MP3 1:|12(2)|22(2)|47(7)|73(1) 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/interviews/OHP-0002-03 Kirchner, R.R..mp3 Other audio 0 Bristow Quadrangle BM: …some of the information that we need. Now then, Mr. Kirchner, on the survey company, what was the name of that survey company that surveyed this community? BK: It was done by Dr. Fath and is called The Bristow Quadrangle and it was made by the U.S.G.S. That’s the United States Geological Survey. BM: And to your knowledge, what year was that done? Discussion of the United States Geological Survey and the Bristow Quadrangle Bristow Quadrangle ; Dr. Fath ; drilling ; George Krumme ; oil ; United States Geological Survey ; Virgil Vann ; W.O. Baker Bristow Quadrangle ; oil drilling 175 Bristow Dutcher fields and Claude Freeman BM: --and who— BK: It was Claude Freeland and some relative of theirs that drilled the first well that I recall in seventeen-nine, they’re the ones that opened the pool in 16-9, they opened the Bristow Dutcher fields. MM: Where was that? The Bristow Dutcher fields? Discussion of the Bristow Dutcher fields and Claude Freeman Bristow ; Bristow Dutcher fields ; Claude Freeman ; drilling ; well Bristow ; oil drilling In this brief 1976 interview, Ralph R. “Brick” Kirchner (RK) (1893-1990) discusses a 1925 United States Geological Survey geological report covering the “Bristow Quadrangle” oilfield area. BM: --some of the information that we need. Now then, Mr. Kirchner, on the survey company, what was the name of that survey company that surveyed this community? BK: It was done by Dr. Fath and is called The Bristow Quadrangle and it was made by the U.S.G.S. That' ; s the United States Geological Survey. BM: And to your knowledge, what year was that done? BK: Oh, let me see, I don' ; t know but it was the first one that had been done in its entirety of the geology and topography of the area and it gives all of the wells that were drilled at that time and the history of them. I would say it was around 1913 or ' ; 14. BM: To your knowledge, I was told--to your knowledge, do you know of the well that was drilled in here on the Violet Williams (ph) or this Jesse Mosquito (ph) say in about 1911? BK: No, I do not, but if that well was drilled there, it would be--there would be a write-up of it in The Bristow Quadrangle. BM: That information was given to me by Virgil Vann, he said the first well to knowledge was drilled a mile south of the W.O. Baker place, which the W.O. Baker place would' ; ve been the Big Mosquito. BK: Yeah, I drilled on the Baker place. BM: You drilled here on the Big Mosquito-- BK: I drilled on the Mosquito. BM: And he said--Virgil Vann told me that well was drilled in about 1911. BK: Mm. BM: But you would say, just personally yourself, without the records, you would say roughly that the first well, that would be roughly the first well that was drilled. BK: That' ; s what I think, but that would be disclosed in that--in the write-up on 17-9 and the Bristow Quadrangle, which you can get from George--Mr. George Krumme. BM: Okay. pause in recording BM: --and who-- BK: It was Claude Freeland and some relative of theirs that drilled the first well that I recall in seventeen-nine, they' ; re the ones that opened the pool in 16-9, they opened the Bristow Dutcher fields. MM: Where was that? The Bristow Dutcher fields? BM: Where was that located? BK: That' ; s on out east of town here in 16-9, east of Bristow. BM: The opened up the one in 16-9 and you' ; re sure that they' ; re the one--reasonably sure that they were the one that drilled the first one in 17-9. BK: Yes, sir, I am. I am. BM: I had talked to Carl Glen (ph) on the phone, I talked to him and he hasn' ; t been much help as yet on it. BK: Well, he' ; s just recovering from eye surgery and he hadn' ; t completely recovered yet. BM: So his thinking isn' ; t-- BK: That' ; s right. BM: --isn' ; t too strong. And at a later date probably his thinking will be better and he will be able to remember a lot of these things that he was in on there with Claude, why he will remember about that. BK: That' ; s right. end of interview 1 audio 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0002-03_Ralph_Kirchner.xml OHP-0002-03_Ralph_Kirchner.xml
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Dublin Core
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Title
A name given to the resource
Ralph R. "Brick" Kirchner
Description
An account of the resource
In this brief 1976 interview, Ralph R. “Brick” Kirchner (RK) (1893-1990) discusses a 1925 United States Geological Survey geological report covering the “Bristow Quadrangle” oilfield area.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
OHP-0002-03
Subject
The topic of the resource
oil
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1976-10
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
audio
-
https://bristoworalhistory.org/files/original/7aa2d912ecbddfac8736b6e44e59e344.pdf
dbe251e18f79be313ad5fb177260c279
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Video Histories
Subject
The topic of the resource
Video with transcript
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
The person(s) performing the interview
George Krumme
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Promotional movie
OHMS Object
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Viewer)
https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0001-V_Geo_Krumme_How_Oklahoma_Millionaires_Are_Made.xml
Interview Keyword
This field adds keywords to the Omeka Oral History item type. Keywords are
included in the OHMS XML, this field in Omeka will allow for full data migration
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OHMS / Omeka integration and is optional if you do not need to map the
“keywords” field in the OHMS XML to the corresponding Omeka record.
Krumme Oil Company
Cushing-Webb Oil Company
Cushing Oil Field
Tom Slick
OHMS Object Text
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contents of the OHMS object searchable in Omeka
5.4 OHP-0001-v How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made - George Krumme 38:44 Bristow Historical Society, Inc. How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made Krumme Oil Company Cushing-Webb Oil Company Cushing Oil Field Tom Slick Promotional movie George Krumme m4v OHP-0001-V Krumme How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made.m4v 1:|19(1)|60(8)|75(11)|94(2)|117(3)|136(2)|157(9)|174(4)|188(1)|214(12)|233(6)|259(10)|279(9)|302(1)|317(1)|333(6)|344(1)|367(11)|386(11)|398(15)|433(1)|459(4)|482(1)|496(2)|513(8)|526(8)|546(2)|560(9)|573(13)|587(13)|613(5)|631(1)|642(6)|678(5)|700(13)|715(1)|734(9)|755(3) 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/interviews/OHP-0001-V Krumme How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made.m4v Other video English 0 How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made “How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made” Narrated by George Krumme GK: My name is George Krumme. I’m a partner in Krumme Oil Company of Bristow, Oklahoma. In the early 1980’s, J. B. Red, a Stillwater oil man, contacted my brother and me with a proposition. A friend of his, Sam Myers, had saved a four-reel, silent moving picture made for his father’s company many decades earlier. Background to preserving the movie " ; How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made" ; , filmed in 1917-1918 Cushing Field ; Cushing Oil Field ; Cushing-Webb Oil Company ; J. B. Red ; Krumme Oil Company ; manually operated camera ; Oilton ; Oklahoma State University ; Sam Myers background ; Cushing Oil Field ; Cushing-Webb Oil Company ; Oilton https://www.tulsahistory.org/halloffame/george-krumme/ George Krumme 87 A WEEK'S TRIP IN THE GREAT CUSHING OIL FIELD IN OKLAHOMA FOUR REELS REEL ONE THE LARGEST HIGH GRADE OIL FIELD IN THE WORLD OIL FIELD TOWNS OILTON 15 YEARS AGO The caption says Oilton 15 years ago, but it should say Oilton today and Oilton 15 years ago, because the first scenes are of downtown Oilton during the boom. Oilton was not even founded until 1915, three years after the discovery well was drilled. Scenes of 1917-1918 Oklahoma, both small town Oilton, near where the discovery well was to be drilled, and a country home. 101 Ranch ; Creek County ; Cushing Field ; Five Civilized Tribes ; Montgomery Ward ; Oilton ; Pawnee County Authentic scenes of early Oklahoma ; log houses ; Scenes of Oilton 36.085046, -96.586629 15 Oilton, Oklahoma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller_Brothers_101_Ranch Miller Brothers 101 Ranch https://www.britannica.com/topic/Five-Civilized-Tribes The Five Civilized Tribes 228 BUSY OILTON TO-DAY AND WHAT MAKES IT Cushing Field was discovered in 1912. It was named for Cushing even though the town is 10 or 12 miles west of the field. At the time, it was the closest town. Drumright was founded near the discovery well during the following year, and Oilton was founded a couple of years later. The Cushing Field discovery well and a brief introduction to Tom Slick. C. B. Shaffer ; Cushing ; Cushing Field ; Drumright ; Drumright (Okla.) ; King of the Wildcatters ; Oilton ; Slick, Tom, 1883-1930 ; Tom Slick ; Wheeler farm Cushing Oil Field discovery well ; Tom Slick " ; King of the Wildcatters" ; https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/57951944/thomas-baker-slick Tom Slick 284 DRUMRIGHT FOUR YEARS OLD POPULATION 15000 At the first strong showing of oil and gas, Slick had the driller fill the hole with mud and water and invert a wash tub over the casing with a heavy drilling tool on top. He then cut the telephone line to the Wheeler home Tom Slick discovery well as the beginning of the Cushing Oil Field Cushing ; Drumright ; landman ; Tom Slick ; Wheeler home first strong showing of oil and gas ; livery teams and notaries in Cuishing ; Wheeler home https://www.dictionary.com/browse/landman Landman 321 BUILDING A DERRICK Drilling with cable tools was fairly well standardized in the early days of the industry. All of the original drilling in the Cushing Field was done with what was called a standard rig, using steam power. Building an oil derrick in 1917 - 1918 boiler ; rig irons ; rotary drilling ; standard rig ; steam engine ; wire lines building a derrick ; oil derricks in 1917 - 1918 363 DRILLING Drilling was done using the walking beam, but the tools had to be below floor level before it could be used. So to start the well, a spudding line was run from the crank to a sliding shoe which was hooked over the drilling line just above the bull wheels. Drilling using a waling beam is described. sliding shoe ; spudder ; spudding line ; walking beam drilling using the walking beam ; spudder replaced the standard rig ; starting a well with a spudding line https://ethw.org/Walking_Beams Walking Beams 401 UNLOADING CASING AT THE RAILROAD If the well turned out to be a producer, the steam engine was replaced with a big single cylinder engine, and the rig and derrick were kept to pump and service the well. If the derrick was blown down, the rig was kept in operation but was referred to as a bob tailed rig. Scene of unloading casing from a railroad car using mules and a wagon. bob tailed rig ; gin poles ; single cylinder engine ; unloading casing unloading casing ; unloading casing from railroad cars ; using mules to unload casing 460 LOADING CASING AT THE CIMARRON RIVER NEAR OILTON As you can see, the casing being loaded here is too large to be production casing. Big casing was used in drilling the well. Drilling at the Cushing Field was difficult because there were numerous shallow sand formations that produced water. Casing being loaded from the banks of the Cimarron River to a wagon on the bridge over the river. Narration includes the completion of the discovery well. Bartlesville producing sand ; Cushing Field ; Oswego limestone ; production casing ; uralitic phase ; Wheeler farm ; Wheeler sand discovery well completed ; drilling at the Cushing field ; loading casing to be used in drilling https://www.dictionary.com/browse/uralite Uralite 551 HAULING CASING TO THE WELL Teamsters prefer horses instead of mules for hauling in the oil fields. Draft horses were bigger and stronger. Farmers, and the US Army in World War I, preferred mules because they were heartier, but they were also more stubborn. Casing is being hauled to the drilling site. The narration includes a comparison of the Cushing Field peak daily production in 1915 to the entire state of Oklahoma average daily production in 2002. Bartlesville sand ; Cushing Field ; draft horses ; mules Cushing Field peak production ; hauling casing using wagons and mules ; Oklahoma average barrels per day ; test well drilled to Bartlesville sand 597 MOVING HOTEL BETWEEN MEALS Ironically, some of the biggest Bartlesville wells were not in the Bartlesville sand at all. The Cushing structure is bald-headed. Scene of horses pulling a wagon with a hotel across a wooden bridge. Some biggest Bartlesville wells were not in the Bartlesville sand. bald-headed ; Bartlesville sand ; Mississippi lime ; Simpson sands ; Wilcox sand Bartlesville wells ; Horses moving a hotel across a bridge 618 PREPARING THE EATS NOON Between Drumright and Oilton, in an area of a few square miles, even the Bartlesville is missing and the drill goes directly from the Redfork into productive Arbuckle limestone. Some Arbuckle wells made five or six thousand barrels a day. Arbuckle limestone ; Bartlesville sand ; Drumright ; Oilton ; Redfork ; Sinclair worker ; United States Geological Survey ; USGS Survey drilling into Arbuckle limestone ; missing Bartlesville sand ; Workers washing and eating https://pubs.usgs.gov/bul/0658/report.pdf USGS Bulletin Geologic Structure in the Cushing Oil and Gas Field, Oklahoma 1917 681 A WEEK’S TRIP IN THE GREAT CUSHING OIL FIELD IN OKLAHOMA FOUR REELS REEL TWO CASING CREW AT WORK In a standard rig, the big bull wheels which held the drilling cable blocked the face of the derrick so the casing wrap was placed opposite the crank, and the casing was wagoned in from the walking beam side using a front wagon and a back wagon. This pipe looks like seven-inch casing so it may be the final inside production string. Crew working to attach more casing pipe segments, including using front and back wagons and a " ; never slip" ; which is a device used to hold the upper part of a drill string. bull ropes ; bull wheel ; bull wheels ; casing pole ; casing wrap ; d-thread casing ; half-wheel ; never-slip ; round-thread casing ; seven-inch casing ; tug pulley casing string ; drilling terms ; screwing pipe together ; standard rig casing 771 HAULING STORAGE TANK TO THE TANK FARM Back to the subject of the Arbuckle limestone, one Arbuckle well north of Drumright still makes about a hundred and fifteen barrels a day along with ungodly amounts of water. New wells are still occasionally drilled to the Arbuckle. Short scene showing a tractor pulling a string of wagons, and commentary on the Arbuckle limestone production as of the time of the narration (2003). Arbuckle limestone production ; hauling storage tanks 791 SHOOTING THE WELL THE SHOOTER ARRIVES Liquid nitroglycerin is highly unstable and very dangerous to handle. Shooting continued to be the most popular way to stimulate a well until the development of sand fracking around 1950. Shooting a well with nitroglycerin and with sand fracking. jelled water ; napalm ; Nitroglycerin ; nitroglycerin ; sand fracking contemporary fracking with jelled water ; early sand fracking proportions with napalm ; preparing to shoot the well 823 SOUNDING FOR DEPTH Stanolind Oil Company got a patent on the sand fracking process and it collected royalties on every job. Workers estimating the depth of the well and talk of the Stanolind Oil Company patent on sand fracking. Amoco ; sand fracking ; Standard Oil of Indiana ; Stanolind ; Stanolind Oil Company ; the house that frack built ; Tulsa estimating well depth ; sand fracking patent 841 PREPARING THE CHARGE I’m sorry to say I don’t know what the washing in the bucket is accomplishing. By the time we started in the business a blasting gel had been developed and it was much safer than nitroglycerin. The shooter preps the tubes for the nitroglycerin, and description of using a " ; go devil" ; to set off the shot. A " ; go devil" ; is a dart dropped into an oil well to explode the dynamite or nitroglycerin go devil ; Zero Hour Bomb Company blasting gel safer than nitroglycerin ; setting off the shot 897 POURING NITRO-CLYCERINE INTO TUBE AND LOWERING IN THE WELL When sand fracking put the well shooting trade out of business, the Zero Hour Bomb Company shortened its name to Zebco and began manufacturing fishing reels. The shooter adds nitroglycerin into the tube and the well is shot, resulting in a gusher. gusher ; sand fracking ; Zebco ; Zero Hour Bomb Company a gusher ; Pouring nitroglycerin into the tube ; Zebco making fishing reels 948 LAYING PIPE LINE TO THE TANK FARM The Cushing Field has produced about a half billion barrels of oil. Early flush production overloaded the hastily constructed pipelines. It broke the price of oil and kept it low for several years. But Tom Slick and others found a solution. A crew screws together pipe joints for a pipe line. The narrator relates the Tom Slick solution for storing oil during times of low prices. Bristow ; building a pipeline ; Cushing Field ; Frisco Railroad ; latongs ; Oil storage tanks ; oil tanks ; pipe-jack ; pipeline ; Tom Slick oil storage tanks ; screwing together pipe jointss 1026 THETANK FARM Like Tom Slick, others built tank farms, and at one time about 23 million barrels of oil was stored at or near the Cushing Field, which is part of the reason why Cushing became “the pipeline crossroads of the world.” About 30 million barrels of oil storage capacity is currently located in the vicinity of Cushing. Short scene of a tank farm. Cushing ; Cushing Field ; the pipeline capital of the world ; Tom Slick Tank farms for storing oil 1051 A FEW SCENES AMONG THE OIL WELLS ADJOINING OILTON OIL WELLS IN THE CIMARRON RIVER The Cimarron River between Drumright and Oilton ran through one of the richest parts of the field. Ownership of the mineral rights under the river bed up to the line of highest water was claimed by both the federal government and the state of Oklahoma, but their claims were disputed by the owners of the adjoining Indian allotments. Oil wells are shown along the Cimarron River, and even on raised land in the middle of the river. The federal, state, and Indian governments all claimed ownership. Cimarron River ; Drumright ; Indian allotments ; mneral rights ; Oilton ; river bed ; river bed leases Oil wells built along the Cimarron River ; river bed mineral rights 1104 A SCENE FROM THE CUSHING-WEBB OIL CO'S SUB-DIVISION The Santa Fe built a railroad line from Cushing into Oilton with a spur to Drumright, and the Oil Belt Terminal Railroad tied into the Short Line from Jennings to Oilton. Both lines carried passengers, but their main goal was to deliver supplies and take out crude oil. Scenes of oil derricks, tanks, and plains of the Cushing-Webb sub-division. Bernard Jones introduces Tom Slick and Bernice Frates. Bernard B. Jones ; Bernard Jones ; Bernice Frates ; Bristow ; Cusing ; Depew ; Drumright ; Frates ; J.A. Frates ; Jennings ; Joseph A. Frates ; Joseph Frates ; Oil Belt Terminal Railroad ; Oilton ; Okmulgee ; Santa Fe ; Santa Fe Railroad ; Shamrock ; Short Line ; Tom Slick Bristow to Okmulgee railroad ; oil derricks ; oil tanks ; Santa Fe railroad ; Tom Slick marries Bernice Frates 1207 HAULING FLOW TANK TO THE WELL (Sound of horses) flow tank 1221 A WEEK’S TRIP IN THE GREAT CUSHING OIL FIELD IN OKLAHOMA FOUR REELS REEL THREE LAYING OIL PIPE LINE FROM THIS FIELD TO THE GULF OF MEXICO Numerous pipelines were built to carry away the flood of crude oil. The Texas Company and Magnolia both laid a line all the way to the Gulf of Mexico. Note that this scene was posed. Men in suits don’t just stand around very often, and this prehistoric Ditch Witch is rotating but not moving forward. Pipelines were built to transport oil. The McMan Oil Company built a pipeline to Healdton to tie into the Magnolia gathering system. Magnolia had a pipeline to the Gulf of Mexico. Arbuckle ; Cushing ; Ditch Witch ; Gulf of Mexico ; Healdton ; Healdton (Okla.) ; James Chapman ; Magnolia ; McMan Oil Company ; Robert McFarland ; Texas Company Magnolia gathering system ; pipeline built by McMan to Healdton ; The McMan Oil Company 1292 OIL FIELD CATASTROPHES INSURANCE COMPANIES ARE THE LOSERS TANKS STRUCK BY LIGHTENING OIL FIRE ON TIGER CREEK During the flush production days, lots of Cushing oil was stored in big earthen pits, and there were several spectacular fires set by lightening. Lightening also set tanks afire. Sometimes a 55 thousand barrel would catch fire and burn at the top of the tank. Oil fires are shown in earthen pits, tanks, and the Tiger Creek. Companies used a cannon to blow a hole in the bottom of a tank for the oil to drain which could then be recovered. cannon ; Cushing ; Drumright Oil Field Museum ; earthen pits ; oil tank first ; struck by lightening blowing a hole in the tank ; draining a tank on fire ; earthen pit fires ; oil pit fires ; oil tank fires set by lightening 1349 RESULT OF A 00000 GASOLINE EXPLOSION FIVE MILES OF CUSHING-WEBB OIL CO’S SUB-DIVISION Notice that these tanks are riveted tanks. Pressure vessels had to be riveted because electric arc welding had not yet been perfected. Most of the oil field tanks in those days were bolted tanks, and all the stock tanks and big storage tanks were bolted. Tanks that were damaged in a huge gasoline plant explosion are shown. The narrator talks about the Chapman and McFarland ties to Tulsa, the Glenn Pool, and the sale of McMan Oil Company to Magnolia. Glenn Pool ; Holdenville ; Holdenville Oil and Gas ; James Chapman ; Phillip Chapman ; riveted tanks ; Robert McFarland ; Sapulpa ; Tulsa ; weldd tanks Remains after a huge gasoline explosion 1462 JUNK CREW SAVING WHAT'S LEFT The Chapman’s and McFarland were already well-off, but they really made their money when they drilled leases they took in the Cushing Field. At times the McMan was the major producer in the field. A crew is seen loading scrap left after the gasoline explosion. Chapman and McFarland were very successful in the Cushing Field. Horace Bernard ; James Chapman ; McMan ; mCmAN ; Mrs. James Chapman ; Pawhuska ; pAWHUSKA ; Robert McFarland ; Tall Grass Prairie Preserve ; tALL gRASS pRAIRIE pRESERVE Chapman family charitable foundation ; crew loading scrap ; horse drawn wagons carrying scrap metal https://www.nps.gov/tapr/index.htm Tall Grass Prairie Preserve 1548 GASOLINE PLANTS & ; REFINERIES NEAR OILTON The one non-family owner of the McMan was E. T. Harwell, who owned one-sixth of the stock so he became quite rich. He built a mansion at 22nd Street and Riverside which his widow gave to the Arts and Humanities Council of Tulsa and today Harwelden is the council’s home. A gasoline plant and refinery near Oilton is shown, with tanks, and pipelines. E. T. Harwell is introduced. Casing-head gas, or drip gasoline, is discussed. Wooden tanks are described, as is oil and gas waste and the attempts to recover oil waste. anticline ; Arts and Humanities Council of Tulsa ; casing-head gas ; circulating tank ; Cushing Field ; dam ; drip gasoline ; E. T. Harwell ; East Texas pool ; Harwelden ; Magnolia ; McMan ; natural gas ; Prudhoe Bay ; Prudhoe Bay (Alaska) ; railroad tank cars ; redwood ; Riverside ; Riverside Drive ; skimming crafts ; stratigraphic traps ; tank cars ; Tiger Creek ; transportation facilities shortage ; Tulsa ; wooden tanks anticlinal traps and stratigraphic traps ; collecting drip gasoline ; collecting wasted oil with skimming crafts ; Cushing Field production compared to East Texas and Prudhoe Bay ; drip gasoline available for pumpers ; McMan oil storage tanks ; oil and gas waste ; skimmer on Tiger Creek ; water tanks made of redwood https://www.facebook.com/Harwelden Harwelden 1814 A WEEK’S TRIP IN THE GREAT CUSHING OIL FIELD IN OKLAHOMA FOUR REELS REEL FOUR As I related earlier, Joseph Frates promoted a town site in the edge of a new oil pool on the route of his new railroad from Bristow to Okmulgee. Since Tom Slick had put up most of the money, Frates chose him to be the president of the railroad, and he also named the town after Slick. A tank farm is shown in the movie. The narrator continues the story of the railroad being built from Bristow to Okmulgee and the connection to Tom Slick Bristow ; Joseph Frates ; Okmulgee ; Slick ; Tom Slick Bristow to Okmulgee railroad ; scenes of a tank farm ; Slick, Oklahoma 1874 FILLING TANK CARS WITH GASOLINE Soon after the Cushing Field was discovered, Tom Slick’s best friend, Charles F. Urschel, married Tom’s sister Mary, and took over the management of Slick’s business affairs. When Slick died at the age of forty-six in 1930, Urschel became trustee of the estate. The movie shows tank railroad tank cars being loaded with gasoline. The narrator relates the story of Tom Slick's death, Mary Slick Urschel's death, Charles Urschel marrying Bernice Frates Slick, and of Charles Urschel's kidnapping. Bernice Frates Slick ; Charles F. Urschel ; Charles Urschel ; Dallas ; Depression ; FBI ; George " ; Machine Gun" ; Kelly ; Mary Slick ; Oklahoma City ; Urschel kidnapping ; Urschel, Charles F., 1890-1970 Charles Urschel kidnapping ; Railroad tank cars being filled with gasoline ; Tom Slick, Bernice Frates Slick, Charles Urschel, and Mary Slick Urschel https://oklahoman.com/article/4626874/july-22-1933-machine-gun-kelly-kidnaps-wealthy-oilman Charles Urschel kidnapping 1984 MR. O.A. BREWER DIRECTOR OF STANDARD OIL OF WYOMING AND A LOT OWNER IN THE CUSHING WEBB OIL CO’S SUB-DIVISION MR. PAUL A. WINTERSTEEN OUR SECRETARY MR. S.M. MYERS OUR TREASURER OUR CHIEF ENGINEER INTERIOR OF OUR OFFICE CUSHING-WEBB OIL CO’S OFFICE LETTERS OF RECOMMEDATION BETTER BUY A LOT AND GET ONE OF Along with the film itself, we got a copy of some remarks made by Sam Meyers who had saved his father’s movie all those decades. Included was a message that probably was part of a flyer or brochure for the benefit of the people who had watched the film. Here’s the pitch: The final segment shows some of the Cushing-Webb officers, engineer, offices, letters of recommendation from local Stillwater entities, and a stock certificate. Cimarron River ; Cushing ; Cushing Oil Field ; Cushing-Webb ; Cushing-Webb Oil Company ; Drumright ; How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made ; Jennings ; Mr. O.A. Brewer ; Mr. Paul A. Wintersteen ; O.A. Brewer ; Oilton ; Paul A. Wintersteen ; S. M. Meyers ; Sam Meyers ; Tulsa ; Yale area map showing drilling site ; capturing the pitch on film ; Cushing-Webb office ; Cushing-Webb officers ; letters of recommendation ; lot numbers ; the pitch to invest in the discovery well A promotional video of the Cushing Oil Field filmed in 1917 or 1918 to promote the sale of interests for a new well to be drilled by the Cushing-Webb Oil Company. Commentary added by George Krumme in 2003. " ; How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made" ; Narrated by George Krumme GK: My name is George Krumme. I' ; m a partner in Krumme Oil Company of Bristow, Oklahoma. In the early 1980' ; s, J. B. Red, a Stillwater oil man, contacted my brother and me with a proposition. A friend of his, Sam Myers, had saved a four-reel, silent moving picture made for his father' ; s company many decades earlier. J. B. had just seen the picture and said to himself " ; This movie ought to be preserved, but the old celluloid film will not last indefinitely." ; So he talked to someone at Oklahoma State University and their audio-visual center agreed to copy the 35 millimeter film onto new 16 millimeter film, and make several copies, if some group would subsidize the costs. As I remember it, we paid a third of the cost and in return got a copy of the film. The movie covers the Cushing Oil Field, and it was made in 1917 or 18 when the field was five or six years old. Sam Myers father was a principal in the Cushing-Webb Oil Company of Stillwater which planned to drill a well near the Cushing Field northwest of Oilton. The company made the film to promote the sale of interests in the well. Mr. Myers hired a professional photographer from Oklahoma City who used an early style, manually operated camera. The well was drilled by the way, and it was a dry hole. With that as the background, let' ; s start the action. A WEEK' ; S TRIP IN THE GREAT CUSHING OIL FIELD IN OKLAHOMA FOUR REELS REEL ONE THE LARGEST HIGH GRADE OIL FIELD IN THE WORLD OIL FIELD TOWNS. OILTON 15 YEARS AGO (Background music) The caption says Oilton 15 years ago, but it should say Oilton today and Oilton 15 years ago, because the first scenes are of downtown Oilton during the boom. Oilton was not even founded until 1915, three years after the discovery well was drilled. (Native Americans riding though camp) The Cushing Field and the proposed wildcat well were both located in Creek County in the Creek Nation, but the Indians shown in this movie are certainly not Creek Indians. The Creeks were one of the Five Civilized Tribes, originally from Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia, and teepees, feathered headdresses, and buffalo were not part of their world. These Indians are clearly plains Indians. Oilton is only a few miles from Pawnee County, so these may well have been Pawnee Indians, or perhaps they were Indians who performed at the old 101 Ranch who were hired as extras to add some exotic color to the film. Either way, these are honest Indians and not Hollywood Indians. The white man tied to the stake and the white woman pleading for his life may have been employees of the Cushing-Webb Company, who as a bonus were allowed to appear in the movies. (Piano music playing) Somehow I don' ; t think there were any wild bison in Oklahoma in 1917, and I doubt very much if this particular animal was killed by a spear or a bow and arrow. Authentic scenes of early day Oklahoma add color to the film. By 1917 the most common draft animal should have been the mule, and oxen should have been rare. Log houses chinked with mud would have been unusual, too. The film was made near the end of horse and buggy days when electricity was available only in towns, running water in country homes was unheard of, and outdoor privies were regularly stocked with Montgomery Ward catalogs. BUSY OILTON TO-DAY AND WHAT MAKES IT Cushing Field was discovered in 1912. It was named for Cushing even though the town is 10 or 12 miles west of the field. At the time, it was the closest town. Drumright was founded near the discovery well during the following year, and Oilton was founded a couple of years later. (Background chatter) The discovery well was drilled by the legendary Tom Slick, later called " ; King of the Wildcatters." ; Slick was not yet 30 but he had already built a reputation. Unfortunately, it was a reputation for drilling dry holes, because during the previous seven or eight years he had drilled or participated in about 10 dusters without a single hit. At the time it was said that he was " ; broke as flat as a pancake" ; . He could toss up a dollar and it would change into ten cents before it hit the floor. Even though he still had some backers, he had to go to Chicago to persuade an old employer, C. B. Shaffer, to lend him eight thousand dollars to drill the well, and he had to borrow a hundred dollars in order to pay for the trip. DRUMRIGHT FOUR YEARS OLD POPULATION 15000 At the first strong showing of oil and gas, Slick had the driller fill the hole with mud and water and invert a wash tub over the casing with a heavy drilling tool on top. He then cut the telephone line to the Wheeler home and high tailed it to Cushing where he hired every livery team and every notary in Cushing in order to delay his competitions' ; landmen. Meanwhile, Slick and his associates began taking oil and gas leases. Even though they did obtain many, so did others, and many a fortune was made in the field during the next few years. BUILDING A DERRICK (Sawing and rig building sounds) Drilling with cable tools was fairly well standardized in the early days of the industry. All of the original drilling in the Cushing Field was done with what was called a standard rig, using steam power. In those days, rotary drilling was generally confined to the soft rocks of the Gulf Coast and California because the early rotary bits did a poor job of drilling in hard rocks. To build a standard rig, rig irons and lumber were hauled in and everything was assembled on the location. A boiler, a steam engine, and lots of casing completed the setup leaving only the wire lines and the tools which were furnished by the drilling contractor. DRILLING Drilling was done using the walking beam, but the tools had to be below floor level before it could be used. So to start the well, a spudding line was run from the crank to a sliding shoe which was hooked over the drilling line just above the bull wheels. As the crank turned, the sliding shoe pulled and then slackened the line, which raised and lowered the tools. The same principle operates a spudder, which was the cable tool machine that replaced the standard rig. A spud, by the way, was originally a spade used for digging roots, which is why starting to drill is called spudding, and why potatoes are called spuds UNLOADING CASING AT THE RAILROAD If the well turned out to be a producer, the steam engine was replaced with a big single cylinder engine, and the rig and derrick were kept to pump and service the well. If the derrick was blown down, the rig was kept in operation but was referred to as a bob tailed rig. This is a primitive but practical way to unload casing. When our company first started in the oil business in the late forties, we bought a few railroad cars of casing. We did not own a truck with tall enough gin poles, so we unloaded the casing exactly the same way as they' ; re doing here, except that we used a truck or a pickup instead of a team of mules. LOADING CASING AT THE CIMARRON RIVER NEAR OILTON As you can see, the casing being loaded here is too large to be production casing. Big casing was used in drilling the well. Drilling at the Cushing Field was difficult because there were numerous shallow sand formations that produced water. Drilling in a hole full of water is very slow. To dry up the hole, the drillers installed a string of big casing, and then as more water sands were reached successively smaller strings were run. Four or five strings of pipe were generally run to reach the Bartlesville producing sand in the Cushing Field. This represented quite an investment and most often the bigger strings would be stripped out either at the completion of the well or sometime later, leaving only the inside one or two strings. None of the casing was cemented, that technological improvement occurred in the 1920s. The discovery well in the Cushing Field was completed at about 2200 feet, in an uralitic phase of the Oswego limestone. The pay zone was promptly named the Wheeler sand because it was found on the Wheeler farm. HAULING CASING TO THE WELL (Sounds of wagons being pulled) Teamsters prefer horses instead of mules for hauling in the oil fields. Draft horses were bigger and stronger. Farmers, and the US Army in World War I, preferred mules because they were heartier, but they were also more stubborn. A year or so after the discovery well was drilled, a test drilled deeper to the Bartlesville sand found a far better pay sand and in another year or so production peaked at 300 thousand barrels a day from about three thousand wells. For comparison, the total oil production for the entire state of Oklahoma in 2002 averaged about 180 thousand barrels a day, only a little more than half the peak production of the Cushing Field in 1915. MOVING HOTEL BETWEEN MEALS (Horses walking across wooden bridge) Ironically, some of the biggest Bartlesville wells were not in the Bartlesville sand at all. The Cushing structure is bald-headed. Over most of the structure the Mississippi lime is missing, and the Bartlesville lies directly on the ore division, Wilcox, and other Simpson sands. PREPARING THE ' ; EATS' ; NOON (Sounds of chickens, washing, talking while eating) Between Drumright and Oilton, in an area of a few square miles, even the Bartlesville is missing and the drill goes directly from the Redfork into productive Arbuckle limestone. Some Arbuckle wells made five or six thousand barrels a day. It was a long time before operators realized that the pay zone was not only not Bartlesville sand, it wasn' ; t even sand. An old Sinclair hand once told me that one reason they didn' ; t realize it was limestone was that the flow of gas and oil was so strong they never saw the cuttings. A Drumright oil man told me that they first recognized that it was not sand production when their separators and receiving tanks filled up with chunks of limestone that the heavy flow of oil and gas had carried from the formation into the tanks. A United States Geological Survey bulletin printed as late as 1917 doesn' ; t even list the Arbuckle as one of the productive formations. A WEEK' ; S TRIP IN THE GREAT CUSHING OIL FIELD IN OKLAHOMA FOUR REELS REEL TWO CASING CREW AT WORK In a standard rig, the big bull wheels which held the drilling cable blocked the face of the derrick so the casing wrap was placed opposite the crank, and the casing was wagoned in from the walking beam side using a front wagon and a back wagon. This pipe looks like seven-inch casing so it may be the final inside production string. When the picture comes to the rig floor, you can see the driller turn the throttle control wheel and in the background you can see two ropes in the form of a figure eight. These are the bull ropes which carried power from the band wheel to the bull wheels, somewhat like a long, fat, round v-belt. The principle reason for the figure eight was to give the rope greater friction on the bull wheels and on the tug pulley which was bolted to the band wheel. Early rigs used the bull wheels to run casing. Later standard rigs used a separate chain driven reel much smaller so naturally it was called a half-wheel. You can see the half-wheel behind the driller. And yet they are running casing using the bull wheels, why I cannot say. To screw the pipe together the crew is using a " ; never slip" ; , a rope, a casing pole, and six men. Our company used to drill with cable tools but we used only four men. But then we were running round thread casing rather than the older style D-thread casing. HAULING STORAGE TANK TO THE TANK FARM Back to the subject of the Arbuckle limestone, one Arbuckle well north of Drumright still makes about a hundred and fifteen barrels a day along with ungodly amounts of water. New wells are still occasionally drilled to the Arbuckle. SHOOTING THE WELL THE SHOOTER ARRIVES Liquid nitroglycerin is highly unstable and very dangerous to handle. Shooting continued to be the most popular way to stimulate a well until the development of sand fracking around 1950. The first sand fracking jobs were done using napalm, that is, jellied gasoline. The early standard frack job was a thousand pounds of sand and a thousand gallons of jell. Now a days jelled water is used and the job might be a hundred times as big. SOUNDING FOR DEPTH Stanolind Oil Company got a patent on the sand fracking process and it collected royalties on every job. Stanolind soon constructed a large research lab in the corn fields at the edge of Tulsa at 41st Street and Yale. It was very appropriately called " ; the house that frack built." ; PREPARING THE CHARGE I' ; m sorry to say I don' ; t know what the washing in the bucket is accomplishing. By the time we started in the business a blasting gel had been developed and it was much safer than nitroglycerin. In the early days a shot was set off by dropping a short piece of pipe called a " ; go -devil" ; to hit a firing cap at the top of the torpedo. By the time we were in the business, the shot was set off with a time bomb made in Tulsa by the Zero Hour Bomb Company. POURING NITRO-GLYCERINE INTO TUBE AND LOWERING IN THE WELL When sand fracking put the well shooting trade out of business, the Zero Hour Bomb Company shortened its name to Zebco and began manufacturing fishing reels. Before the development of the time bomb, there was no way to tamp the shot. That is, to confine it in some way. So when the shot went off, it would blow whatever was in the hole out. This made some impressive photographs possible, and it was a good time to have company officials or investors around to watch. (Sound of a gusher) LAYING PIPE LINE TO THE TANK FARM The Cushing Field has produced about a half billion barrels of oil. Early flush production overloaded the hastily constructed pipelines. It broke the price of oil and kept it low for several years. But Tom Slick and others found a solution. Slick erected twelve giant tanks on the Frisco Railroad at Bristow and built a twenty-mile pipeline to carry his oil into storage until the price went up. Note the use of a pipe-jack to hold the line pipe in line while the crew is screwing the joints together using latongs. Where two crews worked together they timed their actions in synchrony with the strokes of a worker who hammered the pipe near the collar. The hammering not only synchronized the working of the tongs, it also caused a vibration of the pipe that made it easier to screw the joints together. Regardless of his personal traits, the hammer man was called a pecker. THE TANK FARM Like Tom Slick, others built tank farms, and at one time about 23 million barrels of oil was stored at or near the Cushing Field, which is part of the reason why Cushing became " ; the pipeline crossroads of the world." ; About 30 million barrels of oil storage capacity is currently located in the vicinity of Cushing. A FEW SCENES AMONG THE OIL WELLS ADJOINING OILTON OIL WELLS IN THE CIMARRON RIVER The Cimarron River between Drumright and Oilton ran through one of the richest parts of the field. Ownership of the mineral rights under the river bed up to the line of highest water was claimed by both the federal government and the state of Oklahoma, but their claims were disputed by the owners of the adjoining Indian allotments. The state of Oklahoma sold river bed leases and many wells were drilled along the banks of the Cimarron. A decade and a half later, the court decided in favor of the Indians. Some wells were even drilled in the middle of the river on tiny islands built for that purpose. Most of the time there were few problems, because the Cimarron was wide but shallow. " ; A mile wide and a foot deep" ; as they say on the high plains. In flood times it was a different matter. A SCENE FROM THE CUSHING-WEBB OIL CO' ; S SUB-DIVISION The Santa Fe built a railroad line from Cushing into Oilton with a spur to Drumright, and the Oil Belt Terminal Railroad tied into the Short Line from Jennings to Oilton. Both lines carried passengers, but their main goal was to deliver supplies and take out crude oil. As the field was extended southward, a railroad entrepreneur named Joseph A. Frates built a similar spur from Depew to Shamrock which eventually connected to the Santa Fe at Drumright. But Joseph Frates had another tie to the history of the Cushing Field. Frates had a 25-year old daughter. He also had a friend who was a banker in Bristow. The banker was none other than Bernard B. Jones, one of Tom Slick' ; s principal associates. Jones introduced Bernice Frates to his bachelor friend, and within a few months Tom Slick and Bernice Frates were married. So J. A. Frates, who liked to build railroads, had a wealthy son-in-law. For years afterwards, Slick furnished the capital for railroad and real estate ventures promoted and managed by his new father-in-law. One of these ventures was the construction of a railroad from Bristow to Okmulgee about 1920. The principle attraction for that particular route was a recently discovered oil pool about ten miles east of Bristow. The railroad skirted the edge of the pool and Frates plans included a railroad stop and a town site to service the new pool. I' ; ll tell more about that later. HAULING FLOW TANK TO THE WELL (Sound of horses) A WEEK' ; S TRIP IN THE GREAT CUSHING OIL FIELD IN OKLAHOMA FOUR REELS REEL THREE LAYING OIL PIPE LINE FROM THIS FIELD TO THE GULF OF MEXICO Numerous pipelines were built to carry away the flood of crude oil. The Texas Company and Magnolia both laid a line all the way to the Gulf of Mexico. Note that this scene was posed. Men in suits don' ; t just stand around very often, and this prehistoric Ditch Witch is rotating but not moving forward. The best Arbuckle production at Cushing was owned by the McMan Oil Company whose principal owners were Robert McFarland and James Chapman and his father. The McMan built a 130 mile, eight inch line all the way to the Healdton area to tie into Magnolia' ; s gathering system there. The McMan maintained that the pipeline was a private line, not subject to the common carrier rules and with a capacity of 22,000 barrels a day it handled only McMan' ; s own crude production. An experienced crew could lay even a big pipeline very fast. Today most pipelines are welded rather than screwed together. OIL FIELD CATASTROPHES INSURANCE COMPANIES ARE THE LOSERS TANKS STRUCK BY LIGHTENING (Sound of fire burning) During the flush production days, lots of Cushing oil was stored in big earthen pits, and there were several spectacular fires set by lightening. Lightening also set tanks afire. Sometimes a 55 thousand barrel would catch fire and burn at the top of the tank. The companies learned that if they could drain the tank into the moat surrounding the tank, they could pump the oil out of the moat and save lots of oil. So the companies set a cannon, just like the old civil war cannons, to fire at the base of the burning tank so they could generate a hole big enough to drain the tank and pump away the oil. The Drumright Oil Field Museum still has a cannon on display. RESULT OF A 00000 GASOLINE EXPLOSION FIVE MILES OF CUSHING-WEBB OIL CO' ; S SUB-DIVISION Notice that these tanks are riveted tanks. Pressure vessels had to be riveted because electric arc welding had not yet been perfected. Most of the oil field tanks in those days were bolted tanks, and all the stock tanks and big storage tanks were bolted. Electric arc welding was developed during World War I and welded tanks gradually became the standard. Even so, leases drilled in the forties in our area were still being outfitted with bolted tanks. Chapman and McFarland' ; s ties to Magnolia were quite strong. In 1917 the McMan sold all of its production to Magnolia at the unheard of price of 39 million dollars, which was a lot of money in 1917 dollars. The sale included other properties besides the Cushing production. It was the biggest sale in the industry up to that time, and it stayed a record breaker for more than 30 years. To those of you not familiar with Tulsa, the names Chapman and McFarland were important here. Originally ranchers from Holdenville, Phillip Chapman had married Robert McFarland' ; s sister so their son James Chapman was McFarland' ; s nephew. Before the Glenn Pool was discovered in nineteen-five, McFarland had bought a forty-acre tract near Sapulpa. Instead of leasing their land, they decided to drill it themselves. They formed Holdenville Oil and Gas, found prolific oil, and became well-to-do. James Chapman soon married McFarland' ; s daughter, his first cousin, so it was a rather closely interconnected business relationship. Both families eventually moved to Tulsa and were very active in business and civic affairs. JUNK CREW SAVING WHAT' ; S LEFT (Horses walking on bridge) The Chapman' ; s and McFarland were already well-off, but they really made their money when they drilled leases they took in the Cushing Field. At times the McMan was the major producer in the field. Now-a-days charitable foundations created by members of the Chapman family distribute about 50 million dollars every year, much of it to non-profit organizations in the Tulsa area. The Tall Grass Prairie Preserve north of Pawhuska was originally the property of James Chapman and Horace Barnard. Barnard was Robert McFarland' ; s brother-in-law, and therefore Mrs. James Chapman' ; s uncle. He had also been an associate in the family' ; s oil business. (Sounds of horse' ; s whinny, ' ; git up' ; , and loading large pieces of scrap) GASOLINE PLANTS & ; REFINERIES NEAR OILTON The one non-family owner of the McMan was E. T. Harwell, who owned one-sixth of the stock so he became quite rich. He built a mansion at 22nd Street and Riverside which his widow gave to the Arts and Humanities Council of Tulsa and today Harwelden is the council' ; s home. At least a dozen gasoline plants operated in the Cushing Field to recover as much gasoline as possible from the casing-head gas. Most of the gas was quite rich and lots of gasoline could be recovered. In fact, drips had to be installed in the gas lines near the producing wells to catch the liquids that would gather in the lines. Drip gasoline burned quite readily in the simpler automobiles of the day, and many a pumper had a plentiful supply of tax-free gasoline to power his Model-T. Modern cars will not run on drip gasoline. Wooden tanks were common in the early oil fields. Virtually all the water tanks were made of wood - redwood, because its straight grain and resistance to decay makes redwood ideal for a water tank. The big engines and compressors of the gas plants required lots of cooling capacity, but even the smaller single cylinder engines of the pumping wells required a modest wooden circulating tank. Gasoline plants recovered liquids that would have otherwise been wasted. But lots of oil and gas was wasted in the Cushing Field anyhow. Much of the natural gas was vented, and one gas well making an estimated 50 million cubic feet a day burned wild for several weeks. In addition, much Cushing crude oil was lost into various gullies and creeks and finely into the Cimarron River. Two men built a dam and a trap to catch oil floating on Tiger Creek and collected about 6,000 barrels of oil over a very short period of time. Other entrepreneurs copied their example, and skimming crafts became common. Grease skimming crafts were even constructed across the Cimarron River. The last skimmer on Drumright' ; s Tiger Creek was finely abandoned in the early thirties when the field was about 20 years old. One old timer said he had seen oil run down Tiger Creek two or three feet deep. The shortage of pipeline and railroad transportation facilities made other waste inevitable. In the great fire of 1914, almost one million barrels of oil was converted to smoke. Evaporation and seepage from oil stored in open pits were continual losses. The McMan alone had 60 thousand barrels of crude in two giant pits at one time, and even after they had erected and filled thirty-seven 55 thousand barrel tanks, they still had about three thousand barrels of oil in an open pit. Occasionally you will see in the background a locomotive pulling tank cars. Magnolia alone had about a thousand tank cars, each holding two hundred barrels to transport oil or gasoline. A barrel of crude oil contains 42 gallons. The Cushing Field is on a distinct anticline that shows on the surface. An anticline is an elongated dome of rocks, originally deposited as horizontal layers and it is a common kind of trap for oil or gas. Many of the oil pools discovered in the earliest days of the industry have been stratigraphic traps not located on an anticline. And therefore the theory that oil collected in domes and anticlines have been challenged by competing theories. The Cushing Field was one of the largest fields discovered up to that time, and it was clearly an anticlinal trap. It has been frequently credited with being the first real confirmation of the anticlinal theory of oil accumulation. After the Cushing Field was discovered, oil companies established geological departments and blanketed prospective areas with surveying crews mapping the outcrops and looking for surface anticlines. The Cushing Field, as important as it was with a half-billion barrel cumulative recovery, barely ranks as a giant field. It does not compete with other giant and super giant fields of the world, or even of the United States. For example, the East Texas pool, the largest in the contiguous United States, has produced more than five billion barrels of oil, and the Prudhoe Bay field in Alaska will ultimately produce 12 or 13 billion barrels. In the year 2000, the Cushing Field proper was still producing about 24 hundred barrels a day. A WEEK' ; S TRIP IN THE GREAT CUSHING OIL FIELD IN OKLAHOMA FOUR REELS REEL FOUR (Birds) As I related earlier, Joseph Frates promoted a town site in the edge of a new oil pool on the route of his new railroad from Bristow to Okmulgee. Since Tom Slick had put up most of the money, Frates chose him to be the president of the railroad, and he also named the town after Slick. Contrary to the assumptions of many people, Slick had nothing to do with the discovery or the development of the Slick pool, which was named for the town, rather than the other way around. The railroad was never built all the way to Okmulgee. Automobiles, trucks, and pipelines took away the need for a railroad and soon spelled its end. As for the Slick town site, it boomed to about five thousand, and gradually dwindled to about a hundred and fifty inhabitants today. FILLING TANK CARS WITH GASOLINE Soon after the Cushing Field was discovered, Tom Slick' ; s best friend, Charles F. Urschel, married Tom' ; s sister Mary, and took over the management of Slick' ; s business affairs. When Slick died at the age of forty-six in 1930, Urschel became trustee of the estate. Mary Slick Urschel died the next year, but Urschel did not remain a widower long. In 1932 he married Tom' ; s widow, Bernice Frates Slick, and so united in a new way the Slick and Urschel families and fortunes. Keeping it all in the family seems to be an oil field tradition. Needless to say, Urschel and his wife were quite well off. The next year, on July 22nd, 1933, George " ; Machine Gun" ; Kelly and a confederate broke up a bridge game at Charles Urschel' ; s home in Oklahoma City, kidnapped him, and held him for a quarter of a million dollars ransom. A quarter of a million dollars is a respectable figure even these days, but it represented a lot more in 1933 dollars in the middle of the depression. After the ransom was paid, Urschel gave every clue he could remember to the FBI, including his observation that a plane flew over the hideout at the same time every afternoon during his nine-day captivity, except on Tuesday. There weren' ; t many scheduled flights in 1933 and the police found that an afternoon flight westward out of Dallas had been cancelled on that very Tuesday. With this and other clues, they located the farm house where he had been held. The two kidnappers were subsequently caught and given life sentences. MR. O.A. BREWER DIRECTOR OF STANDARD OIL OF WYOMING AND A LOT OWNER IN THE CUSHING WEBB OIL CO' ; S SUB-DIVISION Along with the film itself, we got a copy of some remarks made by Sam Meyers who had saved his father' ; s movie all those decades. Included was a message that probably was part of a flyer or brochure for the benefit of the people who had watched the film. Here' ; s the pitch: MR. PAUL A. WINTERSTEEN OUR SECRETARY " ; When you saw our canvas banner flying on Main Street, inviting you to see this picture titled " ; How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made" ; , you wondered why we were here and just what we were selling. My friends, we' ; re not here to sell you anything. We are here to show you how many of your neighbors MR. S.M. MYERS OUR TREASURER in Oklahoma are taking advantage of the golden opportunity they have to acquire riches by investing in the great Cushing Oil Field. You' ; ve seen our picture, you' ; ve seen how people from Tulsa and elsewhere daily debark from the passenger train at Drumright, to participate in the rush to acquire a piece of the action in the great Cushing Oil Field, hoping to improve themselves financially. You' ; ve seen in our picture how oil, black gold, comes out of the ground, often OUR CHIEF ENGINEER flowing over the crown blocks of the wooden derricks, into wooden tanks or earthen pits in an excess of a thousand, two thousand, three thousand, or five thousand barrels per day. At a market price of a dollar to a dollar and a half per barrel, this sometimes means a monthly income from one well of a hundred and fifty thousand dollars, or often much, much more. We would have preferred to have you visit Oklahoma INTERIOR OF OUR OFFICE and the Cushing-Webb company offices, and to see in person on the ground of the great Cushing Oil Field. But like Mohammad, when the mountains wouldn' ; t come to him, he went to the mountain. Since it was impossible for you to come to us, we have come to you. You have seen in the movie and our offices the recommendations from our bank and from our chamber of commerce and the officers of our company, and the potential oil property we own and proposed to develop adjacent to the great Cushing Oil Field." ; That is the end of the message. Here we have an example of the crucial part of a presentation, the closing. But there' ; s also another important stage in the life of a project, the ending. I remembered well the advice of an old hand of the business of spending other people' ; s money looking for oil. " ; If your well is dry" ; he said, " ; keep your acreage and tell all your investors something might turn up later to make it valuable. And occasionally" ; , he said, " ; something did turn up. But in the meantime you have kept some hope alive, and disappointment is accepted much more gracefully if the realization is spread out over time" ; . CUSHING-WEBB OIL CO' ; S OFFICE In contrast to some promotions that have been made in the oil business, this project was advanced by a reputable company in a very original manner, and we have been able to look back almost a century because the company was enterprising enough to present its wares in a new medium, on film. LETTERS OF RECOMMEDATION You can see that Cushing-Webb was a legitimate operation. The northern most town is Jennings, and the town to the left is Yale. To the east of Yale, you can see the hand and finger pointing to the proposed well, which as I have said proved to be a dry hole. Oilton is the town in the bend of the Cimarron River. Southwest of Oilton is Cushing, and to the east of Cushing at the edge of the field is Drumright. Needless to say, the inhabitants of Drumright prefer to call the field the Drumright oil field. The field actually extends another seven or eight miles south of the wells shown on this map. I' ; m not sure how their lot system worked, but a thirty-dollar investment seems reasonable for almost anything. BETTER BUY A LOT AND GET ONE OF THESE And remember, the investment came with an Oklahoma guarantee. SEE OUR REPRESENTATIVES WE THANK YOU THE CUSHING WEBB OIL CO GENERAL OFFICE STILLWATER OKLAHOMA Thanks for watching the show with me. Reproduction courtesy of Krumme Oil Company Bristow, Oklahoma Produced by George Krumme Written & ; Narrated by George Krumme " ; How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made" ; Copyright 2003 Krumme Oil Company video 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0001-V_Geo_Krumme_How_Oklahoma_Millionaires_Are_Made.xml OHP-0001-V_Geo_Krumme_How_Oklahoma_Millionaires_Are_Made.xml
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made - George Krumme
Description
An account of the resource
A video of the Cushing Oil Field filmed in 1917 or 1918 to promote the sale of interests for a new well to be drilled by the Cushing-Webb Oil Company. Commentary added by George Krumme in 2003.
Subject
The topic of the resource
How Oklahoma Millionaires Are Made
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1917
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
video
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https://bristoworalhistory.org/files/original/cb85f690f8736cb4ee47194dddab5cac.png
60615430ec9a2e7d39fe65094427396f
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Pinehill Histories
Subject
The topic of the resource
History of the Pinehill area north of Bristow
Description
An account of the resource
Several interviews were done by Mary and Bob Mc Carty of people who grew up in the Pinehill area north of Bristow. This collection is the Pinehill subset of the Bristow Oral Histories
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Bristow Historical Society, oral history collection
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Oral history.
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
The person(s) performing the interview
Robert L. “Bob” McCarty
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Abner Dalton Bruce
Mary Lee (Fuller) McCarty
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https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0004-02_Abner_Bruce.xml
Interview Keyword
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Pinehill
Heyburn
oil
school
OHMS Object Text
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5.4 OHP-0004-02 Abner Dalton Bruce OHP-0004-02 Bristow Historical Society - Oral History Archive Pinehill Community Bristow Historical Society, Inc. Pinehill Community and School Oil Pinehill Heyburn oil school Abner Dalton Bruce Mary Lee (Fuller) McCarty Robert L. “Bob” McCarty MP3 1:|15(13)|37(12)|69(1)|88(12)|113(1)|126(3)|142(2)|167(13)|191(15)|207(3)|222(2)|235(13)|253(16)|281(10)|302(10)|337(4)|375(6) 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/interviews/OHP-0004-02 Bruce, Abner.mp3 Other audio 0 Abner Bruce family history BM: This is a personal interview with Abner Bruce and his wife sitting in their living room. MM: We want to put the date on so other people can— BM: October 3, 1976. Alright, Abner, to your best knowledge, do you know of some of the first people that settled in this part? Or when did your folks come into this part of the country? AB: Bob, I can’t tell you any—[indecipherable] they came into Oklahoma, but I don’t know for sure what time they went in to this right here. Abner Bruce discusses his family Abner Bruce ; Alpha Bruce ; Coleman Bruce ; Cora Belle Bruce Carson ; Frank Bruce ; J. Smith Bruce ; James Bruce ; Moten Bruce ; Roy Bruce ; Theodocia Bruce Abner Bruce ; family members https://www.geni.com/people/Coleman-Bruce/6000000036577893136 Family Records 166 Quail, Crops, and Cattle BM: Alright, whenever they first come in to this part of the country, Abner, what source of income did they have? I already know these questions, I want you to answer them yourself. AB: Well, the main thing my dad used to talk about was the market and hunting quail. They came in here and paid to ride a horse to Mannford or somewhere and come home. That was when they shipped these quails to Kansas City. And I don’t know whether that—of course, I know they farmed, but I don’t know, that’s the thing that stuck out. BM: Do you remember what, did you ever hear him say what crops that they planted? At that time? Discussion of selling and shipping quail and cattle cattle ; corn ; crops ; open range ; quail ; stockade fence ; trains selling cattle ; selling quail ; shipping cattle ; shipping quail 337 First Oil Well BM: Now then, number four question: Do you remember hearing say, Abner, or—when was the first cotton planted in this part of the country or community? Do you remember hearing say— AB: I don’t. BM: Okay, now here’s a ques—here’s a question that I was told that you would probably be the only one in the country that could answer this question. When was the first oil well drilled in this community? AB: I can’t tell you that one, but I—in this area right here, why I would think— Discussion of the first oil well drilled in the Bristow area 1922 ; drilling ; Elsa Self ; Mike Hartman ; oil well First Oil Well in Bristow 497 School and Township Fairs BM: Okay. Okay, now then, we’ll come on down here to number six, which would be the school situation—the school. Now, Leo gave us a lot of this information on the schools. AB: Leo would know a lot more about it. BM: When was the first school built? Now, Leo said that he remembered the first school being built in 1903. And his first teacher was a teacher by the name of Nell Watson. Discussion of the school house and township fairs church meeting ; community meeting ; election ; Nell Watson ; school ; teacher ; township fair school ; township fair 675 Development of Heyburn Lake BM: What year did the government come in go to buy up all that land? (pause) Can I tell? AB: [Indecipherable] I think it was about ’49, ’48 or ’49. BM: To your knowledge, Abner, whenever the government come in and went to buy this land up, to your knowledge how many families was affected by it? AB: I couldn’t tell you. I don’t have a recollection of the [indecipherable]. Discussion of the development of Heyburn Lake government ; Heyburn Lake ; lake Heyburn Lake 806 School Teachers at Pinehill BM: Who was your first teacher? Would that be any chance Mr. Bob Lucas? Or was that Mr. Taylor? MM: He said, “Not really.” AB: Before that. BM: Well it must’ve been—well, now, just a minute. Discussion of teachers and classmates at Pinehill school Bob Lucas ; Mark Shockley ; Minnie Mayes ; Nancy Curtis ; pinehill school ; teacher classmates ; Pinehill School ; school 887 Watermelons and Chicken Roasts MM: Oh, just a minute! Who raised the best watermelons? When you was a young who—who, who got some good, who raised the best watermelons? AB: I always thought Joe Fobbs (ph) did. MM: Who? That’s the one you stole the most of? AB: Huh? MM: Is that who you stole the most of them from? Discussion of watermelon stealing and chicken roasts chicken ; Greer ; Joe Fobbs ; W.O. Baker ; watermelon chicken ; watermelon 952 School Teachers BM: Well, I—who was your first teacher, Eunice (ph). UW2: Oh, I started school down at [indecipherable], so I didn’t come here until I was ten years old. BM: Alright, what was your first teacher’s name? Discussion of teachers at Pinehill School Bob Lucas ; Charlie Thomas ; Mark Schockley ; Pinehill School ; school ; teachers Pinehill School ; teachers 990 Oil Companies in Bristow AB: [Indecipherable] started out the Prairie and then Sinclair and then [indecipherable]. BM: Sinclair and what other—which other—what others was in here on that, Abner? AB: Prairie, Prairie Oil Company. BM: Prairie Oil Company. Discussion of the oil companies in the Bristow area Conoco ; drilling ; Mid-Continent ; oil ; Prairie Oil Company ; Shell ; Sinclair ; Sun Oil Company ; Sundocks drilling ; oil ; oil companies In this 1976 interview, Abner Dalton Bruce (1918-1987) describes his early life in the Pinehill Community outside Bristow Oklahoma including his family’s income from the quail market in Mannford, farming, shipping cattle on the railroad, early oil drilling in the community, participation in fairs, and the impact of the construction of Heyburn Lake upon the community. BM: This is a personal interview with Abner Bruce and his wife sitting in their living room. MM: We want to put the date on so other people can-- BM: October 3, 1976. Alright, Abner, to your best knowledge, do you know of some of the first people that settled in this part? Or when did your folks come into this part of the country? AB: Bob, I can' ; t tell you any--[indecipherable] they came into Oklahoma, but I don' ; t know for sure what time they went in to this right here. BM: What--when I said folks-- AB: Well he did though, he had a sign, 1895, that was [indecipherable]. BM: Eighteen-ninety-five, okay. On 1895, Abner, do you know how many of the boys was that come in here at that time? How many of the Bruce boys come in here at that time? AB: Why, I think their father-- BM: What was his name? AB: --brought the family in here. Coleman Bruce. BM: Coleman Bruce. Alright, then there was five brothers, is that right? AB: [Indecipherable] I believe they' ; re[indecipherable]. BM: Alright, what was their names? AB: Five brothers and one sister. BM: Okay, let' ; s have ' ; em. AB: Abner Bruce was the oldest, and my dad, Frank Bruce, and-- BM: Mote? AB: Smith! BM: Smith? AB: And then-- BM: Then Mote. AB: Then Mote. Then Roy. BM: Then Roy. AB: Then the sister' ; s name was Cora. BM: Cora. Alright, we' ; ll go on--get just a little bit further here now. Whenever they come in here-- AB: Here' ; s why--[indecipherable] grandmother was--she came in here with my grandfather. B: Grandfather and grandmother moved the family in to this part of the country. MM: What was the grandmother' ; s name? BM: What was the grandmother grandfather' ; s name? AB: Coleman and Alpha, I believe, was her given name. She was formerly Moore but [indecipherable]. BM: Alright, whenever they first come in to this part of the country, Abner, what source of income did they have? I already know these questions, I want you to answer them yourself. AB: Well, the main thing my dad used to talk about was the market and hunting quail. They came in here and paid to ride a horse to Mannford or somewhere and come home. That was when they shipped these quails to Kansas City. And I don' ; t know whether that--of course, I know they farmed, but I don' ; t know, that' ; s the thing that stuck out. BM: Do you remember what, did you ever hear him say what crops that they planted? At that time? AB: I sure don' ; t remember. BM: Alright, we' ; ll go a little further. Now, the quail that you say that he--they also had a few cattle in there too, didn' ; t they? AB: Yeah, yeah. BM: They had cattle and they had, they had the quail market. Why, I do know that during that time they planted corn and stuff to grow-- AB: Yeah, I would think so. BM: --planted corn and high gear and feeds, feed-- AB: But another thing, there wasn' ; t enough fences in here for these cattle, so [indecipherable] at that time-- BM: It was all open range. AB: --the fences. ' ; Cause they had to have a stockade fence. BM: Had another question, where did they take it to sell it? Where did they take their product to sell? AB: Well back on the cattle, as far as I know, Oklahoma City. They shipped them on the trains. BM: Alright. AB: And the quail I was speaking about, they shipped them to Kansas City. BM: You stated there that they shipped their cattle to Oklahoma City, their quail to Kansas City. How did they get these cattle into Oklahoma City? AB: They drove them to the stockyards in Bristow. And they' ; d load them on there and [indecipherable]. BM: And the quail, they' ; d dressed them-- AB: Dressed them and iced them, and some were [indecipherable], I don' ; t know, back in there at that time, cold weather' ; s when you hunted, they dressed them out and ideally [indecipherable]. BM: Now then, number four question: Do you remember hearing say, Abner, or--when was the first cotton planted in this part of the country or community? Do you remember hearing say-- AB: I don' ; t. BM: Okay, now here' ; s a ques--here' ; s a question that I was told that you would probably be the only one in the country that could answer this question. When was the first oil well drilled in this community? AB: I can' ; t tell you that one, but I--in this area right here, why I would think-- BM: I mean, that would be over here on the Elsa Self, then back up north up here around Louis' ; s, that, now, see that would be this community. AB: That was all [indecipherable]. This over here, I think 1922. BM: Nineteen-twenty-two. Do you have any--do you have any idea who drilled that first well? AB: A man named Mike Hartman (ph), I think. B: That' ; s great. And where was it drilled? AB: Well, it was one of these--Harjose (ph). BM: Harjose (ph). Harjose (ph) lease. AB: Offset to this place of place of my dad' ; s. BM: And that would be drilled in 1922. AB: I believe so. BM: Do you have any idea, Abner, if that well--that first well--do you have any idea how many barrels, or did you hear them say how many barrels-that that well made? When it came in? AB: No, it was pretty light and it--it didn' ; t last but a short while. BM: It didn' ; t last but a short while. Then they went to developing that--drilling around the rest of the community. AB: Well now, they drilled offset on my dad' ; s, it was still producing. BM: The offset drill from the first well that was drilled on your dad' ; s is still in production. Do you have any idea how much the offset well produced when it came in? AB: No, I couldn' ; t [indecipherable]. BM: Okay. Okay, now then, we' ; ll come on down here to number six, which would be the school situation--the school. Now, Leo gave us a lot of this information on the schools. AB: Leo would know a lot more about it. BM: When was the first school built? Now, Leo said that he remembered the first school being built in 1903. And his first teacher was a teacher by the name of Nell Watson. AB: [Indecipherable.] BM: Yeah. And, now then, on this school-- AB: Wait, I would like to ask you, where did he tell you it was built? BM: Well right up here on the north part, right up here on the corner. Which would be-- AB: I know, I know the location. BM: Look, look at this map, it' ; d be right here. That you got right there in your hand, it' ; d be right there. This other one down here was the church. And it went--moved up to here. There were two burned here, and the last one was here. Alright, Abner, here' ; s another question I want to ask you: What all purposes was that school used for? AB: Well, the last one is the only one I' ; m familiar with. BM: Okay, do it. What all was it used for? AB: About every committee or community meeting, or church meeting. It was used for the churches. [Indecipherable.] BM: It was used for churches. AB: Well, fairs--township fairs and election purposes. That was about it. BM: Alright, now then, you' ; re the third person that I' ; ve heard this " ; fairs" ; from. I don' ; t remember it. You said " ; township fair." ; What all was exhibited at these fairs? AB: Oh, at that time-- BM: The ones that you remember, Abner. AB: Well, I remember stock--horses, cattle, and crops. And a few of the crops at that time were cotton and corn and [indecipherable] and et cetera. BM: In other words, it' ; s just like the fairs of today, then. It was held at the, at the school. AB: Yeah. BM: What year did the government come in go to buy up all that land? (pause) Can I tell? AB: [Indecipherable] I think it was about ' ; 49, ' ; 48 or ' ; 49. BM: To your knowledge, Abner, whenever the government come in and went to buy this land up, to your knowledge how many families was affected by it? AB: I couldn' ; t tell you. I don' ; t have a recollection of the [indecipherable]. BM: Okay, we' ; ll go on down here to the last question: How do you feel about this lake? AB: You might want to get me in trouble. BM: No, I don' ; t want to get you in trouble, I want your honest opinion. I want your honest opinion, I' ; m asking everybody that, that question. I need it for the park recreation and planning. These tapes will help with the park recreation and planning. MM: Well, you know, it [indecipherable] if we don' ; t want it to, you don' ; t have to. BM: They want to know. They want to know this family' ; s situation-- pause in recording as tape switches sides BM: --the reason I hit you with that. They want to know how the people feel. Now that' ; s, that' ; s the reason I hit you with that question. AB: Well, I was against it before it started and I haven' ; t changed my mind, but it' ; s all done and done, but it never was [indecipherable] put down our throats is how I think about it, don' ; t sound right but that' ; s the way I' ; ve always felt. pause in recording BM: Who was your first teacher? Would that be any chance Mr. Bob Lucas? Or was that Mr. Taylor? MM: He said, " ; Not really." ; AB: Before that. BM: Well it must' ; ve been--well, now, just a minute. MM: He knows, he' ; s got a list of ' ; em-- BM: It wasn' ; t Nancy Curtis (ph), then, no it must' ; ve been Minnie L. Mayes (ph). AB: Mark Shockley (ph). BM: Mark Schockley (ph). MM: You was wrong. BM: No! I wasn' ; t wrong on that either! Mark Shockley (ph) come in there after Killian (ph). See, Killian (ph) was in there and then Mark Shockley (ph), and then Bob Lucas (ph). AB: Just one year for him. BM: Right. MM: Who was the first--who was the first [indecipherable] Sunday school-- AB: Well, I was talking to them today, the graduating students who were in eighth grade because they had changed. Of course my cousins--Eva (ph) and Nolan (ph) and myself and (pause) is all I can think of at that time. MM: Was Valerie in your class? AB: Yeah! Valerie was. I guess she was? BM: Yeah. Alright, Abner, let' ; s-- MM: Oh, just a minute! Who raised the best watermelons? When you was a young who--who, who got some good, who raised the best watermelons? AB: I always thought Joe Fobbs (ph) did. MM: Who? That' ; s the one you stole the most of? AB: Huh? MM: Is that who you stole the most of them from? AB: No, I didn' ; t have to steal from any of these [indecipherable]. MM: Who' ; d you steal one of those off of? AB: I never stole but one watermelon in my life (laughs) and I got caught in that, but Greers. BM: Mr. Greer over there, he lived over on the W.O. Baker place. AB: Yeah. MM: How about them chicken roasts, did you ever go on any of them? AB: Well, I heard about them but I, I didn' ; t, no. MM: Some of the younger kids, I think, did that [indecipherable] steal from their own folks and take them and roast them. AB: No, I never--I didn' ; t take that--I heard them talk about them. MM: [Inaudible.] BM: Well, I--who was your first teacher, Eunice (ph). UW2: Oh, I started school down at [indecipherable], so I didn' ; t come here until I was ten years old. BM: Alright, what was your first teacher' ; s name? UW2: Oh I can' ; t remember that far back. BM: Why now, say, Mark Shockley (ph) was Abner' ; s, and you come in here when you was ten years old, so therefore it had to be about eight or-- UW2: Bob Lucas, I think that Bob Lucas taught at [indecipherable]. MM: Charlie Thomas (ph), then. AB: You went to the new schoolhouse, when you started school. MM: Did you ever go to Pinehill School? UW2: [Inaudible.] AB: You was in this township. BM: You was in the township but you wasn' ; t in this district. pause in recording AB: [Indecipherable] started out the Prairie and then Sinclair and then [indecipherable]. BM: Sinclair and what other--which other--what others was in here on that, Abner? AB: Prairie, Prairie Oil Company. BM: Prairie Oil Company. AB: I believe they' ; re actually the ones that built it. And then Sinclair bought the Prairie Oil Company. MM: I need some information on the early oil companies-- BM: Now, did Sundocks or Sun Oil Company--didn' ; t they some stuff in here, too? AB: They never did down in here. They had some stuff over there north of Louis--where Shell is. BM: Shell. AB: And I believe, I believe it' ; s Sun. BM: Sun and Shell both-- MM: Did Mid-Continent have-- AB: But they was both out of here before-- MM: Mid-Continent-- B: Mid-Continent and Conoco, Conoc--Mid-Continent was over there, too. AB: Well that' ; s, that' ; s what they call Sun now. BM: That' ; s what they call Sun. AB: Yeah, I called them Sun but it was, it' ; s Mid-Continent, yeah. MM: How many [inaudible]. BM: No, we' ; re going to have to go, we got some more stuff we got to do. end of interview audio 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0004-02_Abner_Bruce.xml OHP-0004-02_Abner_Bruce.xml
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1900
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Abner Dalton Bruce
Description
An account of the resource
In this 1976 interview, Abner Dalton Bruce (1918-1987) describes his early life in the Pinehill Community outside Bristow Oklahoma including his family’s income from the quail market in Mannford, farming, shipping cattle on the railroad, early oil drilling in the community, participation in fairs, and the impact of the construction of Heyburn Lake upon the community.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
OHP-0004-02
Subject
The topic of the resource
Pinehill Community and School
Oil
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1976-10-03
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
audio
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https://bristoworalhistory.org/files/original/42e075bd4866f4c507bfa73b86f579bf.png
39e64eda7cac32bc12a610cbaf5db8f2
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Pinehill Histories
Subject
The topic of the resource
History of the Pinehill area north of Bristow
Description
An account of the resource
Several interviews were done by Mary and Bob Mc Carty of people who grew up in the Pinehill area north of Bristow. This collection is the Pinehill subset of the Bristow Oral Histories
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Bristow Historical Society, oral history collection
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Oral history.
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
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Robert L. “Bob” McCarty
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Louis Edward Masterson
Virginia (Bruce) Masterson
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https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0004-01_Louis_Masterson.xml
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Pinehill
school
fairs
community
crops
livestock
Heyburn Lake
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5.4 OHP-0004-01 Louis Edward Masterson OHP-0004-01 Bristow Historical Society - Oral History Archive Pinehill Community Bristow Historical Society, Inc. Pinehill Community and School Heyburn Lake Crops and Livestock Pinehill school fairs community crops livestock Heyburn Lake Louis Edward Masterson Virginia (Bruce) Masterson Robert L. “Bob” McCarty MP3 1:|8(4)|35(6)|71(7)|108(3)|139(7)|154(17)|184(8)|211(11)|228(2)|245(1)|277(2)|301(12)|333(7)|352(7)|373(7)|399(3)|418(3)|433(12)|446(4)|470(6)|501(10)|539(7)|556(4)|595(7)|613(9)|629(2)|661(2)|685(4)|716(12)|755(10)|773(10)|795(2)|814(13) 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/interviews/OHP-0004-01 Masterson, Louis & ; Virginia.mp3 Other audio 0 Family History BM: --during the 1900s, starting back about 1900 up to the present time of 1976, second day of October 1976. Sitting on their front porch. The first question, Louis, I’ll ask you, who was the first, or do you know who the first people—white people—that came in and settled in this community? LM: I sure don’t know, Bob, I don’t know. Family history of the Masterson Family Abner Bruce ; Alpha Bruce ; Coleman Bruce ; Cora Bruce Carson ; family ; J. Smith Bruce ; James Bruce ; Moten Rheudulph Bruce ; Pinehill ; Roy Clyde Bruce ; Theodocia Bruce Family history https://www.geni.com/people/Coleman-Bruce/6000000036577893136 Family History 163 Crops and Livestock BM: Alright, now then. They were some of the first ones that came in and settled in this part of the country. For their livelihood at that time, what was their main source, do you remember hearing them say? Of livelihood? LM: You mean farming? BM: The way they made their livin’ when they first came in here. LM: Well, they just what little—Dad, they farmed, you know, like corn and stuff and they, what they lived on— Discussion of crops and livestock cane ; cattle ; cattle drive ; corn ; crops ; farming ; maize ; oats ; railway ; sorghum molasses ; wheat cattle ; cattle drive ; crops ; farming ; livestock 331 Selling Eggs and Butter VM: --grandma’d churn her butter, take it in on, you know, Saturdays, to Bristow and they’d sell their eggs there. They’d drive ‘em in the wagon, you know. Dad’d take ‘em in the wagon, take all their stuff that they had to sell on Saturday ‘cause— MM: Cream. Selling eggs and butter for grocery money and clothing butter ; cream ; eggs ; wagon butter ; eggs 382 First Oil Wells BM: Now, Louis, to your knowledge, do you have any idea when the first oil well was drilled in this community. LM: No I don’t, Bob, I don’t know where they was [indecipherable] ’22 or ’23, so they done a lot of drilling after then but I don’t know what the first well drilled. They drilled on the Elsa Self when I come here, he had drilled on it and Frank Lucas (ph) had some on his. BM: Are some of the wells that were drilled in 19-and—when you came here, then, are they any of those wells still in production? The first oil wells drilled in the Pinehill community barrels ; drilling ; Elsa Self ; Frank Lucas ; Moten Bruce ; oil ; oil well ; well drilling ; Oil well ; Pinehill 515 Schoolhouse and teachers BM: Okay, now then, we’ll go into the school itself. Leo gave, said he was around when the first school was built. VM: Up on the hill? BM: Up on the hill south, a mile south from where the last school was. He gives pretty good stories there about it. To your memory, what—which one of the schools did you go to? VM: I went to that one up on the hill, just right west of— Discussion of school teachers at Pinehill School Miss Easton ; Mr. Hicks ; Pinehill School ; school ; teachers school teachers 676 School House and Community Activities BM: Do you remember them having those old time literaries that they had? VM: I remember them but I don’t know when it was, you know. But I know dad was always on the school board from the time the school started. Dad was always on the school board. BM: What—was the schoolhouse ever used for anything besides school? LM: Well, they had church there and— VM: Yeah, they had— Schoolhouse being used for community activities and memories of fairs canning ; church ; community assemblies ; elections ; fair ; literaries ; pie suppers ; schoolhouse ; sewing ; voting election ; pie suppers ; Pinehill school ; schoolhouse 924 Lake Heyburn BM: What year, Louis, did they come in here, the government come in and buy up this land along Polecat Creek and Skeeter Creek? LM: They started in ’48. BM: Nineteen forty-eight. LM: And they, they didn’t get the dam built until the next couple of years, you know. VM: That was ‘51. LM: They had to gorge all of this out. VM: ‘Cause Elsa, Elsa went down there and worked on it, when he was, he came back from— Building of Heyburn lake and the families displaced Boyds ; Canfields ; cattle ; dam ; Ellis Head ; farming ; Frank Bruce ; Hennessey Jones ; Heyburn ; John Wilson ; Les Wilson ; Mr. Bruce ; Nehemiah Jones ; Pinehill ; Polecat Creek ; Reeds ; Skeeter Creek displacement ; Heyburn Lake ; Pinehill 1202 Watermelons and daily life MM: Just a minute. Ask him—Virgie didn’t tell why she doesn’t know watermelon. You ask her— BM: Okay, now Virgie what meanness—when you were going to school as a little girl, what meanness did you get into? MM: What real funny happened? Memories of stealing watermelons and chicken fries chicken ; chicken fries ; Mr. Bruce ; watermelon chickens ; watermelons 1306 Community Parties VM: No, I sure wasn’t. We went to parties, brother used to take us to a lot of parties with him, but as far— (all talking at once) VM: Yeah, we had town parties, you know— MM: What about the singings in the school I’ve heard about? LM: Yeah, didn’t we— Discussion of town parties Crawford ; Dunham ; parties ; play parties ; town parties ; Vann ; Victor's Chapel parties ; town parties 1426 Games BM: What kind of games did you play? VM: Oh, Skip-to-the-Lou-My-Darling and (laughs) BM: Go on. You never did play Post Office? VM: Oh, yeah. We played Post Office, oh sure. And Ditch ‘Em! BM: Ditch ‘Em? Games played at town parties cake ; Ditch 'Em ; games ; Post Office ; town parties games ; town parties 1570 Creeks and falls BM: Now there’s another question, on these old falls around, like this, the upper falls and lower falls, that upper falls is the one that would be there coming across the creek here— LM: That was down by Frank’s. BM: That was down there by Frank’s. VM: And the other falls was, you know, where we lived there on the creek, where we’d go across the big—that was our big swimming hole, what was called the Old Biloxi (ph). LM: That wasn’t a falls, there. Creek and falls in the Pinehill area cornfield ; creek ; falls ; Ned Butts ; Old Biloxi ; Shepherd Fall ; Snake Fall ; swinging bridge creeks ; falls 1700 Gravestones Near School MM: What about them little gravestones at the schoolhouse? LM: Which schoolhouse would that be? MM: At the Pinehill School [indecipherable]. VM: Crawford—it was just up the hill where Crawford lived, but it wasn’t any kin to us. We just knew it was a grave there and they knew who was buried there, but I can’t remember who mama said it— Gravestone near Pinehill School gravestone ; Jack Claver ; Pinehill School gravestone 1753 Town Parties MM: When you mention town parties where [indecipherable] and them were eating, do you think it would have real pot lucks or something for they—they called them town parties and you took food and stuff in to them. I thought that’s what you were talking about. VM: No, that was just for a party we’d go to. MM: Well that’s what I thought you meant, was town parties, and town—you know, or two married couples sometimes— Town parties and weenie roasts by the creek creek ; pot luck ; town parties ; weenie roast town parties 1793 Frozen Creeks in the Winter MM: Well, has anybody ever been skating on them creeks, on there? LM: Well, [inaudible] (interference on tape) would get up there on the ice and everybody’s get up there and skate all the way [inaudible] (interference on tape) in ’29 or maybe ’30 when we had that bad winter. Man that froze up! And I had some reels down there in that [indecipherable] and I couldn’t leave them in the water and we didn’t have no water in the wells, we had to often times carry ‘em and wash ‘em in the creek. And you’d, you’d fall down and it was froze up, you couldn’t walk— Walking to school and bonfires near the frozen creek Birdie Reed ; bonfire ; Creek ; frozen creek ; ice ; John Wilson ; Pinehill School ; Skeeter ; Willa Greenwood frozen creeks ; walking to school In this 1976 interview, Louis Edward Masterson (1903-2000) and wife Virginia (Bruce) Masterson (1909-2002) discuss the early settlement of the Pinehill community in Creek County, Oklahoma including the crops and livestock that were raised by farming families, daily life, school life, social life including town parties and socials, the establishment of the Pinehill School, early oil well drilling in the area, the construction of the Heyburn Lake dam and its impact on the local families as their land was seized by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for its construction. BM: --during the 1900s, starting back about 1900 up to the present time of 1976, second day of October 1976. Sitting on their front porch. The first question, Louis, I' ; ll ask you, who was the first, or do you know who the first people--white people--that came in and settled in this community? LM: I sure don' ; t know, Bob, I don' ; t know. BM: Well, now, would--do you have any idea when Moten, Frank, Rowe, and them came in? Do you, Virgie? (pause) Were they in here before statehood? VM: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Mmm-hmm. MM: [Inaudible.] BM: Well then let' ; s kind of put this--put a date on that, say, around-- MM: Let' ; s let her look it up, she can see-- BM: --around 1900. LM: Well they was here before 1900. VM: Oh, yeah. LM: They were here before 1900? VM: Oh, yeah. BM: Well let' ; s go back, on back then, say around 1890. LM: [Inaudible.] MM: Leo was born up here in 1897. LM: Well, Moten was only [inaudible]. VM: You mean Uncle Alvin? BM: Leo was born-- VM: Leo. BM: Leo was born here in 1897, I believe is what he said on that. VM: Mmm-hmm. BM: So that would throw them somewhere around 18-and--in the neighborhood of 1895, -4, -5, somewhere in that neighborhood. LM: Yeah. BM: And there was four brothers, is that right? LM: Yeah. VM: No, there was five boys. BM: Five boys. VM: Five of ' ; em. BM: Okay, who were those boys? VM: Uncle Abner, Uncle James, Uncle Smith, dad, and Uncle Roy BM: " ; Dad" ; would be Moten. LM: Mmm-hmm. BM: Alright, now then. They were some of the first ones that came in and settled in this part of the country. For their livelihood at that time, what was their main source, do you remember hearing them say? Of livelihood? LM: You mean farming? BM: The way they made their livin' ; when they first came in here. LM: Well, they just what little--Dad, they farmed, you know, like corn and stuff and they, what they lived on-- BM: Alright, you said " ; corn and stuff," ; now what, what other stuff did they plant besides corn? LM: Maize, I think-- MM: Little bit louder, Louis. BM: They planted corn and maize-- VM: High gear. BM: High gear, wheat-- VM: Wheat. LM: Wheat, oats. BM: Oats. VM: Oats. BM: And that was their farm products, and they raised cattle. VM: Yeah, and they raised cattle. MM: What was that crop-- BM: Whatever they, you know-- BM: Where did they go, if they went to sell any of this, of their farm product, where did they take it to? VM: Well, they shipped their cattle to Kansas City and Oklahoma City. BM: They shipped their cattle to Kansas City and Oklahoma City. VM: Yeah. BM: Their grains and corn was such as that if they sold any of that they would' ; ve had to take to a railway- VM: They just sold it to the neighbors and things, you know-- BM: Sold it to the neighbors-- VM: --raised it and sold it to the neighbors that didn' ; t raise, you know, the farming stuff. BM: They raised it for themselves and if the neighbor got in trouble and had a little burnout or hard luck, why they all chipped in and helped one another out. LM: You know, they take ' ; em farmer teams and that' ; s the way certain of ' ; em would do it-- VM: Yeah, they' ; d farm a lot of cane and a lot of sorghum molasses. LM: [Indecipherable] cane and sorghum-- BM: Louis, you said a while ago that they shipped their cattle to Kansas City and Oklahoma City. How did they get the--how did they get their cattle to those points? LM: Well, we' ; d drive up about three hundred head from here to Kellyville [indecipherable]. MM: It was community cattle drives? BM: You had the community cattle drive. LM: [Inaudible.] (dog barking) pause in tape VM: --grandma' ; d churn her butter, take it in on, you know, Saturdays, to Bristow and they' ; d sell their eggs there. They' ; d drive ' ; em in the wagon, you know. Dad' ; d take ' ; em in the wagon, take all their stuff that they had to sell on Saturday ' ; cause-- MM: Cream. VM: Yeah. And their cream. MM: What' ; d they do with the money? VM: Well, that' ; s what they bought their groceries with. BM: That' ; s what they bought their staples with. (all talking at once) VM: and their, what they had to use for our clothes, you know, and just their living [indecipherable]. BM: Now, Louis, to your knowledge, do you have any idea when the first oil well was drilled in this community. LM: No I don' ; t, Bob, I don' ; t know where they was [indecipherable] ' ; 22 or ' ; 23, so they done a lot of drilling after then but I don' ; t know what the first well drilled. They drilled on the Elsa Self when I come here, he had drilled on it and Frank Lucas (ph) had some on his. BM: Are some of the wells that were drilled in 19-and--when you came here, then, are they any of those wells still in production? LM: Yeah, the Elsa Self lease is still in production. BM: Elsa Self lease is still in production. Now up here where you live, is there any of those wells to your knowledge that were drilled during that time? LM: Well, they-- VM: They were drilled in, uh, 19-and-- LM: --' ; 22. They' ; s had--I was here for that first discovered well in this field here. He had drilled on Moten Bruce' ; s and the drilling started in ' ; 27, ' ; 6 or ' ; 7. BM: Twenty-six or ' ; 27. LM: And they drilled all this in here. BM: To your knowledge, how much--how much did the first well produce? LM: That kind were making all the way from a hundred to three hundred barrels, these wells right here, these. BM: A day. LM: They were flowin' ; well. BM: They were flowing well. LM: At that time. BM: And there' ; s still some of those wells still in production. (pause) Virgie, do you remember any of the earlier ones than that? VM: [Inaudible.] BM: Alright. LM: And these wells all were drilled here [indecipherable]. VM: Brucie was a baby. ' ; 26 and ' ; 27 [indecipherable]. BM: Okay, now then, we' ; ll go into the school itself. Leo gave, said he was around when the first school was built. VM: Up on the hill? BM: Up on the hill south, a mile south from where the last school was. He gives pretty good stories there about it. To your memory, what--which one of the schools did you go to? VM: I went to that one up on the hill, just right west of-- BM: Is there anything in particular that you remember that went on at that time? (pause) Your first teacher was who? VM: Hicks. Mr. Hicks. BM: Professor Hicks. VM: Mmm-hmm. BM: You know his first name? VM: No, I don' ; t. We always had to call him Mr. Hicks, and that the way we were about--mom and dad always made us call her Miss Easton (ph) when we didn' ; t know their name. BM: And your, you said Miss Easton (ph)? VM: Mmm-hmm. BM: Now Miss Easton (ph), was she your second teacher? VM: Mmm-hmm. BM: She was your second teacher. Who went to school with you at that time? VM: [Inaudible.] BM: How many other--others went to school with you that you can remember? That went to school at the same time that you did? VM: Myrtle and Ellen. BM: Myrtle and Ellen who? VM: Crawford. BM: Who else? VM: And, well, [indecipherable] Bruce. BM: Any more that you can think of? VM: Well-- LM: [Indecipherable.] VM: Yeah, Claude. BM: Claude Bruce. VM: Yeah, Claude Bruce. And Larry and Annie Pinehill. BM: Pinehill. Yeah, their last name (poor tape quality) VM: --and Martha Day-- BM: Do you remember them having those old time literaries that they had? VM: I remember them but I don' ; t know when it was, you know. But I know dad was always on the school board from the time the school started. Dad was always on the school board. BM: What--was the schoolhouse ever used for anything besides school? LM: Well, they had church there and-- VM: Yeah, they had-- LM:--church and pie suppers and all that stuff, you know, and get-togethers. BM: They used it for church activities. VM: Mmm-hmm. BM: Any other activities besides church? VM: Yeah, -- LM: I guess they did have some literaries there but, you know, I never did go to one of those, you know, and-- BM: Would they use it for a place for the people in the community to go to-- LM: Community assemblies, that' ; s what it was. VM: Mmm-hmm. BM: The school was used as a community center or meeting place for everybody. It was used, then, for several different activities. LM: Yeah. BM: Do you remember of the tri-county state--tri-county fair being held there? VM: The school over there? Yeah! BM: So there was fairs up there. VM: Yeah, there was a fair out there. BM: Okay, what--how was this fair conducted? Was it conducted then as it is today? As these county fairs are conducted today? VM: Well, it was more or less, you know, like people canned stuff and bring there. I don' ; t remember bringing the stock and stuff, but they--you know, exhibit their--what they bake or, and what they can, and what things they made like quilts and dresses. BM: What did you take? Did you ever take anything to one of these fairs? VM: No, but Plessy did, I don' ; t know what-- BM: But Plessy taking-- VM: Plessy took something but I don' ; t remember what it was. I think it was canned. MM: [Inaudible.] VM: The more I think about it, she said that she did sewing. She didn' ; t [indecipherable] and she took sewing. And penmanship, she, you know, she-- BM: Penmanship and sewing. VM: Mmm-hmm. LM: Well when I come up to this country, your dad and Moten was both on the board there, and they was on the board for often years and years. BM: Louis, did you ever take anything to one of those fairs that was out there? LM: No, no, I didn' ; t, you see I was gone-- BM: There has been brought up that a--there was a, at one time there was a talking movie presented at Pinehill Schoolhouse. Do you know or do you remember or know anything about it? MM: Valerie said she-- BM: Valerie said--Valerie' ; s the one that came up with that. VM: It must' ; ve been after I [indecipherable]. BM: But the school was used for all different activities. VM: Where they went and voted and things, you know, they' ; d hold-- LM: It was open [indecipherable]. BM: What year, Louis, did they come in here, the government come in and buy up this land along Polecat Creek and Skeeter Creek? LM: They started in ' ; 48. BM: Nineteen forty-eight. LM: And they, they didn' ; t get the dam built until the next couple of years, you know. VM: That was ' ; 51. LM: They had to gorge all of this out. VM: ' ; Cause Elsa, Elsa went down there and worked on it, when he was, he came back from-- BM: Built in ' ; 51, the dam was built in ' ; 51. What year was it completed? LM: That was when it was completed, in ' ; 51. BM: They completed it in ' ; 51. VM: ' ; Cause he worked down there in ' ; 49. LM: He was running with the sand and the concrete and the [indecipherable] but now it' ; s washed in [indecipherable]. BM: How many--to your knowledge, how many people was affected or that lived in these bottoms that had to leave here? Had to leave this community on account of all of the--on the account of the government coming in and buying up this land where they wouldn' ; t have a way to make a living? LM: Well, now, I figure, Bob, was at least fifty families--and they all had families and all that, the head of families--moved-- BM: Fifty head of the family. LM: Yeah. [Indecipherable] when they bought it they had to move, you didn' ; t have no place to go when you accepted like they had [indecipherable]. Frank Bruce place [indecipherable] stay. And those others all just about newcomers come in here since [indecipherable] and built these homes that' ; s in here now. BM: Can you name some of the people that was affected by, that farmed these bottom lands-- LM: Yeah, you-- BM: --they was farming these bottom lands whenever the government came in and bought the land up. LM: Well, you, there' ; s Ellis Head for one, and Les Wilson, and John Wilson, see it took all their farm, and they took from that over at Mr. Bruce' ; s place, and there was families all in here [indecipherable] in here was a farm. Hennessey Jones (ph), Nehemiah Jones (ph), they had a bunch of stuff in--Canfields, Reeds, Boyds, they was [indecipherable]. Then I know there was every bit of fifty of, you know, head of families. Head family. BM: Well, here' ; s another question I want to ask you: What do you think that this lake dam being built in this community do you think, what' ; s your opinion on it? What' ; s your opinion on this lake-- LM: Well, I just think, Bob, that it just had no business to build it because it took so much good land out of it that the farmers need to make a livin' ; on and put people to movin' ; and they had to go and relocate and things and left me, now I [indecipherable] up here now, cost me around four thousand dollars to move the house out from around there so I could move off of government land. They took all our good land and left the hills, and so-- BM: About all there' ; s left to do now, there' ; s no farming land, about all there' ; s left to do now is to run a few cattle. LM: Yeah, run a few cattle. And they' ; ve talked about taking it away from [indecipherable] state have it. BM: Let the state have this land down here now. LM: Is there anything else you can think of? MM: Does he have a list on who sits on Pinehill [indecipherable] of the families on something I thought that you could get it, and I don' ; t-- LM: Yeah, I' ; ve got that list here of every people that was affected to this dam, their name [inaudible] (interference on tape). BM: Okay. MM: Just a minute. Ask him--Virgie didn' ; t tell why she doesn' ; t know watermelon. You ask her-- BM: Okay, now Virgie what meanness--when you were going to school as a little girl, what meanness did you get into? MM: What real funny happened? BM: What real funny, come on, tell us something real funny. VM: Aww! (laughs) BM: Tell us something real funny. MM: Tell us something funny on Louis, or one or the other, we' ; ve got to have something funny. BM: We gotta have something funny on you. VM: Well, the only thing I can think is Louis' ; d come to the schoolhouse when I, you know, when we were going together and I' ; d walk home with him after all the evenings up there, and I--course he would just kiss me, I guess! (laughs) LM: And Bob Lucas, he never did run me off! I' ; d go up there and get her and then go take her home! BM: Did you never--did you ever go watermelon stealing, Virgie? VM: No, I really didn' ; t. I never did. MM: Who raised the best watermelons? VM: Huh? BM: Louis, who raised the best watermelons during that time? LM: I don' ; t know, I stole a lot of ' ; em. I never tore no patches up, I just go get it, and-- VM: We just never thought about stealing any watermelons. Grandpa always raised-- BM: We got to have your vote on the one that raised the best ones. LM: Well, I don' ; t know for sure but I believe that' ; d been Mr. Bruce up there, my dad, you know, raised the best watermelons but he didn' ; t have ' ; em. BM: Moten raised the best watermelons? LM: [Inaudible.] VM: Not really [indecipherable]. BM: You never did go on some of these old chicken fries, did you, Louis, these old--go out here, steal somebody' ; s poor old farmer' ; s hen? LM: No, not up there. I did where I come from. VM: Now my brother and them did. BM: Now, Virgie, never was in the middle of it, was you? VM: No, I sure wasn' ; t. We went to parties, brother used to take us to a lot of parties with him, but as far-- (all talking at once) VM: Yeah, we had town parties, you know-- MM: What about the singings in the school I' ; ve heard about? LM: Yeah, didn' ; t we-- VM: Oh, yeah, we used to go--oh, yeah! We would all--what was it, Crawfords and that Marvin, oh, what was their name? MM: Some of the Vanns, wasn' ; t it-- LM: I can' ; t think of Marvin' ; s name now. MM: Was it some of the Vanns? VM: We' ; re kin to Crawfords, now. LM: Yeah, you take the Vanns, they--there' ; s also their land [indecipherable]. MM: What about them singings. We need something on tape on that. [Indecipherable.] VM: Well, yeah, we used to go over there out at the schoolhouse of a night and sing, you know. Even had--some of them, some of the teachers give us singing--you know, singing lessons and things. MM: Did you go to other communities? VM: Oh, we' ; d gather at our houses, like Crawfords and-- MM: I mean, did other communities come and sing, people from other communities would--? LM: Oh, yeah, they-- VM: Oh, yeah! Mmm-hmm, yeah. Come from up from Victor' ; s Chapel (ph) up there, and Dunham (ph), and-- LM: Dunham (ph), and [indecipherable]. MM: How long did they last? VM: Oh, they didn' ; t last more than a couple hours, I guess, over there, gatherings and things. MM: Did you go to the other places, then, when they had singings? VM: No, we went to parties, we threw--we' ; d walk to the town parties or ride horses to the town parties [indecipherable] ride a horse. BM: What kind of parties was them, Virgie? These old play parties? VM: Yeah, just play parties, yeah. BM: What meetings did you-- VM: We' ; d have town parties, like a cake, and take a cake down there, you know. BM: What kind of games did you play? VM: Oh, Skip-to-the-Lou-My-Darling and (laughs) BM: Go on. You never did play Post Office? VM: Oh, yeah. We played Post Office, oh sure. And Ditch ' ; Em! BM: Ditch ' ; Em? VM: And play, you know, they' ; d come in and they' ; d say, " ; Who do you love?" ; you know, and they' ; d tell all who they just loved, how much they loved certain-and-certain people, you know. But all they wanted ' ; em to say was just, say " ; Who do you love?" ; (laughs) BM: Now this party that--Ditch ' ; EM, now how was that played? VM: Well, you' ; d take a certain boy that, you know, [indecipherable] and if he didn' ; t--if he wasn' ; t the right one then you would start over-you' ; d ditch ' ; im! And run back to--in the house, and get another! All the girls done all the ditchin' ; . (laughs) And ditched the boys! BM: Is there anything else you can think of? LM: You turn that porch light off, them bug' ; s' ; ll-- MM: That' ; s fine. Turn it off-- BM: Okay, I' ; ll turn it-- pause in recording BM: Alright, about these town parties. VM: Well, one time they had a town party down there at Uncle Frank' ; s house, set down the road there? And Cora went with all of us girls, they was about--Flossie (ph) and Hazel (ph) and Vivian (ph) and Velma (ph) and I forgot. And Cora went with us. And she was carrying the cake, and we as all trying to get--to help her, you know. But she went followin' ; , you know, with the cake, and she run off. She fell with it. But we saved the cake! It didn' ; t hurt it at all, so Velma at that party--and I don' ; t know who all else brought cakes like that, you know, well we played party games and that' ; s all there was to it. BM: Now there' ; s another question, on these old falls around, like this, the upper falls and lower falls, that upper falls is the one that would be there coming across the creek here-- LM: That was down by Frank' ; s. BM: That was down there by Frank' ; s. VM: And the other falls was, you know, where we lived there on the creek, where we' ; d go across the big--that was our big swimming hole, what was called the Old Biloxi (ph). LM: That wasn' ; t a falls, there. BM: No, that wasn' ; t a falls there, that was a-- VM: But there was a rock. LM: The other fall is down here, the Shepherd fall (ph) is down here to the Snake fall (ph). VM: But it was just a rock fall. BM: Now that fall went across--which way did that go across there on Shepherd' ; s fall (ph) there. LM: You know right there, Bob, where that going-in place where they go in and go--make that bend around there where the--where you put your boats in there? BM: Mmm-hmm. LM: Well, it just went across that--there used to be a cornfield in there, a big field in there, I rode through there often. BM: Well there was an old swinging bridge across that, that field right there-- LM: Yeah, that was a little further up past the way. [Indecipherable] just [indecipherable] and they had an old train[indecipherable], big long thing that was there for years and years. VM: And Ned Butts (ph) built a swinging bridge across the--down here at the--just across from the old Indian cemetery. BM: Where that swinging bridge went across there, that was where--called the old Thomas place, wasn' ; t it? Didn' ; t they call that the old Thomas place? LM: No, I don' ; t know if I, if that' ; s true. [Indecipherable] was the last year I lived down there but the guy owned [indecipherable] over there, but the last time was in ' ; 23 was the guy--oh, I can' ; t think of his name. MM: [Inaudible.] LM: He--I can' ; t think of the guy' ; s name now, but I always had [indecipherable] one of them girls. And I don' ; t know what her name was. She--Lynn, Lynn, that' ; s right. Boomer and Lynn [indecipherable] they was there then in ' ; 23 when they come in. And they kept it up so the schoolkids from the sidewalk crossed it [indecipherable]. MM: What about them little gravestones at the schoolhouse? LM: Which schoolhouse would that be? MM: At the Pinehill School [indecipherable]. VM: Crawford--it was just up the hill where Crawford lived, but it wasn' ; t any kin to us. We just knew it was a grave there and they knew who was buried there, but I can' ; t remember who mama said it-- MM: We had some of the other kids ask about them graves in there close to the schoolhouse. VM: Yeah, there' ; s a, there' ; s a grave just right there on the-- BM: Which way from the schoolhouse, Virgie? VM: It' ; d be west. BM: Be west up on top of the hill. VM: West and a little back north, uh-huh. BM: Be up in there somewhere, then, about-- VM: Just be like straight north of Jack Claver' ; s (ph) house, I believe, I don' ; t know where it-- BM: Be right straight north up there, then, north of where Ennis' ; s house was up on the hill. VM: Mmm-hmm. BM: Well I never did know that there was a graveyard out-- LM: The old schoolhouse is up there, you know, the old one was up there where the old [indecipherable] was. But they had this new one built when I come here, I don' ; t know how long it' ; d been built. MM: When you mention town parties where [indecipherable] and them were eating, do you think it would have real pot lucks or something for they--they called them town parties and you took food and stuff in to them. I thought that' ; s what you were talking about. VM: No, that was just for a party we' ; d go to. MM: Well that' ; s what I thought you meant, was town parties, and town--you know, or two married couples sometimes-- LM: There' ; s [indecipherable] weenie roast that we did about every--every week, pretty much, [indecipherable] marshmallows and we' ; d have a roast, maybe be 25-30. BM: Twenty-five or thirty couples get off by the creek-- LM: Yeah. VM: Mmm-hmm. LM: Build up a big fire. BM: Big bonfire and have a big weenie roast. LM: Big weenie roast. MM: Well, has anybody ever been skating on them creeks, on there? LM: Well, [inaudible] (interference on tape) would get up there on the ice and everybody' ; s get up there and skate all the way [inaudible] (interference on tape) in ' ; 29 or maybe ' ; 30 when we had that bad winter. Man that froze up! And I had some reels down there in that [indecipherable] and I couldn' ; t leave them in the water and we didn' ; t have no water in the wells, we had to often times carry ' ; em and wash ' ; em in the creek. And you' ; d, you' ; d fall down and it was froze up, you couldn' ; t walk-- VM: I remember that I stayed all night with Birdie Reed (ph) and we started to school, that' ; s when my house was all--the house was right (pauses) --you know where Willa Greenwood (ph) lived, didn' ; t you? They lived in that house. LM: We lived up on that corner of Skeeter--[indecipherable]. VM: Well we come and John Wilson lived over at Aunt Sally' ; s house, was down the other side of the road where-- LM: Where the schoolhouse was when I come here-- VM: Well I and Birdie got to playing and cuttin' ; up and playin' ; in that snow ' ; til we froze our hands and feet. John Wilson and Ida took us in and thawed our feet out and then we went on to school, but we was tardy, but ohh we froze our hands playing. And Dorothy was with us, she tried to get us not to, you know. MM: What did they do, go out and build a big bonfire on the creek and then skate and play around it? VM: We was just going to school, but we just got to playing in the snow and the ice on the way there, when we froze our hands and feet. MM: Well. How far is the farthest you ever walked to school? VM: Well, we went downhill on the creek where we--the houses were, down here where we was talking about, where Coleman was born down there, where, and Bruce, he--well, Raymond was born down there. The house sit not too far from the creek down here. LM: Be about a mile and a half. Mile and a half. VM: And that was the furthest we ever walked. BM: Louis, you was on the school board here for quite a while. How, how deep did--how much land area did the school district cover? MM: How many miles wide-- BM: How many miles wide and how many miles long? LM: Well, the it went plum out to this 33 highway up here, it went to back in the corner right in here [inaudible] (interference on tape) where you started coming down that blacktop. BM: So that was the south edge of it. LM: Where Elsa' ; s, that was the south edge of it, right along-- VM: Then it took the, the old Livingston place. LM: --everything off the 48 highway right there, way down the place where the Vanns live [indecipherable] on the schoolhouse. Went up this way with the--the other line was down here to [indecipherable] where that guy built that house [indecipherable], everything inside that was Pinehill. BM: Everything inside of that would be Pinehill, then. MM: Well, so, he' ; s better off than I thought. BM: Yeah. He was better off than I thought he was. LM: But I don' ; t remember just how many miles it was in the square here, in this district. But you see, that took in Jones, Shady Jones (ph), the horse-stealin' ; all going on out there toward-- MM: Point at that map, it shows about ten miles square. LM: I imagine it is, that just about covers it. BM: Now this map, the--our teacher, she' ; s end of interview. audio 0 https://bristoworalhistory.org/ohms/viewer.php?cachefile=OHP-0004-01_Louis_Masterson.xml OHP-0004-01_Louis_Masterson.xml
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Title
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Louis and Virginia Masterson
Description
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In this 1976 interview, Louis Edward Masterson (1903-2000) and wife Virginia (Bruce) Masterson (1909-2002) discuss the early settlement of the Pinehill community in Creek County, Oklahoma including the crops and livestock that were raised by farming families, daily life, school life, social life including town parties and socials, the establishment of the Pinehill School, early oil well drilling in the area, the construction of the Heyburn Lake dam and its impact on the local families as their land was seized by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for its construction.
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OHP-0004-01
Subject
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Pinehill Community and School
Heyburn Lake
Crops and Livestock
Date
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1976-10-02
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audio