Louis Edward Masterson

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 00:01:00came 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 00:03:00main 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 00:05:00and 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 00:07:00any 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, 00:08:00do 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 00:09:00schools 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 00:10:00their 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 00:13:00today? 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 00:17:00no 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 00:18:00Jones (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 00:19:00all 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 00:20:00girl, 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 00:22:00that 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, 00:26:00well 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 00:28:00right. 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 00:29:00on 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 00:30:00tape) 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 00:31:00'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 00:32:00did--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 00:33:00[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.