oklahoma today january-february 1986 volume 36 no.1

1 JANUARY-FE LIARY '86 BLIZZARDS OF TRIVIA: OUR FIRSTS BESTS L FAVORITES

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CUISINE ART -NORMAN'S SWEET SALUTE TO CHOCOLATE

OFFICIAL MAGAZINE OF TZHE STATE OF :.--a - - ~ .

OKIAHOMA TODM

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January-February '86 George Nigh, . Governor Vol. 36, No. 1 .T"%, .."J-

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COVERS 1 l6 1 31 Set Sail tor the Firsts, Bert. 8 Favorites Tulsa Boat Show The biggest, the best, the first, the Water sportsmen driven off the lakes last, the richest, the oldest, the wildest, by winter can start the '86 season early- the weirdest.. ..A celebration of Sooner indoors-at the Tulsa Boat, Sport and superlatives. Travel Show. 46

Oklahoma Portfolio

Visions of winter by a gallery of Backstage at the Ballet Oklahoma photographers. Famed dancer Edward Villella is determined to keep Ballet Oklahoma on its toes.

A classic Oklahoma scene, transformed by snow. Photo by Larry D. Bmwn. Inside Chocolate: The MagnHicent h n t . American bison, near Confection Canton Reservoir. Photo by Just in time for Valentine's Day,Sylvia J. and Lloyd R. Brockus there's a love feast just made for 111. Back. Turner Falls chocomaniacs, courtesy of Norman's winter. Photo by J. R Toland. Firehouse Art Center.

Here We Rest

Fmm the new book by Kent Ruth and Jim Ago: a look at the fascinating stories Sooner tombstones tell.

FEATURES DEPARTMENTS Today in Oklahoma .................................... 4 BooksRetters..............................................6

Bodedine cases Uncommon Common Folk .........................8

Why the Panhandle came to be and Oklahoma Omnibus ...................................15 other true tales of how Oklahoma got to Destinations: Oilcrease .............................52- ... . . be in the shape it's in. 7. ---

......., , 1 EnteltalnmentCalendar.............................58

The magazine you hold in your hands took nearly two years to produce, f m first planning session to final press run. In honor of Oklahoma TODAY'S 30tlr biflhday, we'd like to s k e some of the history of the Sooner State's o fficiaZ magazine.

This issue begins the 30th year of publication for Ok/ahoma TODAY maga-zine. To celebrate this anniversary, we are including a special section on Firsts, Bests and Favorites in Oklahoma, which you, our readers, helped select.

Ok/ahoma TODAY has grown and changed since 1955, when State Rep. George Nigh first introduced legislation creating the state's official magazine. The staff of Ok/ahoma TODAY continues to inform and entertain its readers with a great deal of pride in the progress and the beauty of our young state and its people. And that same George Nigh, now completing his second term as governor, has spent a political lifetime pro- moting travel and the economic development of Oklahoma.

Those first issues in 1956 had only 20 Jan.-Feb. 1957

pages with five to 10 color photos. That seems slim compared with the 52 pages and 30 color photos in an average issue now. Editor John McWilliams published stories in that first issue on industrial growth, the Halliburton oil-well cement- ing plant in Duncan, the National Cow- boy Hall of Fame, the Frontiers of Science Foundation, the premier showing of the movie "Oklahoma!", work on state highways, the new Roman Nose Lodge, fishing and the University of Oklahoma football team.

Undoubtedly editor McWilliams had to rush to get that first issue published by January. You might be surprised to learn just how much planning and careful attention to detail are involved with publishing Ok/ahoma TODAY. Unlike other businesses that manufacture the same product over and over, each issue of a magazine must be created and designed individually, with no two alike.

The initial planning for this issue began about 15 months ago. Throughout the year, managing editor Kate Jones and editor Sue Carter meet weekly to consider story ideas they've collected and to discuss editorial content. They aim for editorial as well as geographical balance, hoping that each reader, no matter what his interests, will find several stories to enjoy.

After the schedule of stories is set, Kate contacts and makes assignments

with free-lance writers and photogra-phers. The photographer must be given an assignment a year in advance so that photos are available to illustrate stories on special events and places in the proper season. For example, photos of Nor- man's Chocolate Festival had to be taken last February for this issue. Through the years, most of the state's top photographers have contributed to Ok/ahorna TODW.

No writers or photographers work full time for OkIahoma TODW. This means Kate spends much of her time conferring with free-lance writers about who should be interviewed for their assignments and

the types of information to include. Top- ics may vary from art exhibits to rodeo, from chicken fried steaks to migratory birds. Most will suggest something fun to do or an interesting place to visit. Other stories describe some unusual bit of history or nature that makes our state special. Long hours are spent interview- ing persons in the area, researching in the library, writing, rewriting, editing and weaving in all sorts of facts to inform and entertain.

When the photographer sends in transparencies or black-and-white photos, the real challenge begins. Art direc-tor Pat Shaner may sift through 200 color slides to find the perfect five or six photos to illustrate a story. Occasionally, things go wrong-the lighting is poor, too many phone wires are in the fore- ground, facial expressions are poor-and the photos have to be reshot.

Oklahoma TODAY 4

After the manuscripts are edited, they are sent to the printer in Tulsa for type- setting. Layout sheets are designed for each story allowing space for titles, photos and captions and noting where spots of color go.

Pat then determines how much each photo slide should be enlarged. The slides are sent to an engraver where each is carefully "read" by a complex piece of equipment called a laser scanner. The outcome is four pieces of film in the correct size. Each negative will print one of the four colors of ink used in printing-black, red, yellow or blue. From these negatives, a color proof, called a Cromalin, is made, which Pat critiques. A few will need to be corrected for a better color match.

Meanwhile, galleys of typeset manuscripts are being corrected, proofread and shortened to fit the assigned space. The columns are pasted onto heavier sheets of paper called boards, following the original layout sheets. Story titles, photo captions and blurbs are added.

A final check is made before sending the boards to PennWell Printing Co., the OkMoma TODAY printer, in Tulsa. The printers make a negative from the boards, then strip in the photos and each color area. Two more proofs are made,

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including a color proof, to be checked by the editors. Columns of type must be straight, photos and captions must match, and colors must be exact. Noth- ing must be left out or overlooked.

Finally, more than a year after the issue was first planned, it is ready for printing. Okidoma TODAY is printed on a large web press, similar to the kind that prints newspapers. High-quality paper from a large roll winds through several printing rollers. Eight pages on each side of the paper, called a signature, are printed at the same time. Although the press will run much faster, 24,000 signatures are printed per hour to achieve maximum quality. Three press runs are required for the 48 inside pages. Another four-page signature for the Okkzhoma TO- DAY cover is printed on a smaller press.

While the presses are running and spewing out thousands of copies, Pat works with the PennWell pressmen, ad- justing the ink to make sure the color and registration of the photos are exactly right. Every effort is made by PennWell technicians throughout the printing process to make sure the highest standards of quality required by the O k / d o m a TO-DAY staff are met.

Once the signatures are printed and collated, the pages are cut, stapled and

Bdore Ok/ahoma TODAY goes on press, PennWe/l employees ~ i / l ~ o y dD ~ W ; and ~ u b check color and regitmtion. The magazine's cover section is printed on a Japanesepress calleda Komon', which is most ofen used to printposters andhigh-quality arrreproductions.

January-February '86

trimmed in the bindery. Subscriber labels are applied in the printer's mail-room, and the magazines trucked to the post office. Other copies are boxed for delivery to newsstands across the state.

Soon the 35,000 copies printed for this anniversary issue will be passed among our 160,000 readers scattered across the

Spring 1973

50 states and the 45 foreign countries. Some have been subscribing since 1956; others will see their first copy of Okkzho-ma TODAY in a doctor's waiting room or a hotel gift shop.

Some of you helped choose Oklaho- ma's Firsts, Bests and Favorites for the story that begins on page 32. If we've overlooked your favorite item, let us know. Perhaps we can include it some other time.

Most of all, we hope that after all the careful preparation and effort to bring you one of the nation's top magazines- we can say this after winning two major national awards for overall editorial excellence in 1985-you'll continue to enjoy Okidoma TODAY for the next 30 years. -Sue Carter

Next issue: Spend an afternoon at the movies and learn about the first films made in the Sooner State, the heyday of the movie palaces, the roster of Hollywood stars who shone here first-and what the state is doing to lure high-dollar producrions across the border. Then travel to Muskogee for the Azalea Festival-and to the Skyline Drive with photogmpher David Fiuger- ald. All in the March-April issue of Okhioma TODAY.

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The Vanished Splendor 111: Post- card Memories of Oklahoma City, by Jim E h a r d , Mitdell OlipAant and Hal Omway; Abalade Book Shop Publishing Co., $18.95. Oklahoma Trivia Card Set; Sbsortail Gama; $19.95. It's about time someone came up with a trivia game for Oklahomans, and Linda Ken- nedy Rosser, author of Pioneer Cookingin Oklahoma and Chnkfnzas in Oklahoma, has obliged. The set of 250 trivia cards (plus 24 "symbol cards" and 26 "picture cards") is divided into "Frontier Fun," "All Sports," "Spaces and Places," "Te- pees to Towers," "Famous and Infa-mous" and "State of the Arts." It's designed to be used with the Trivial Pursuit game board.

The difference is that instead of need- ing to know who Joltin' Joe was or everything about Watergate, you need to know how many NCAA Division I championships OSU's won or what Okla- homa train robber was pardoned by Ted- dy Roosevelt. And just in case you've never invested in a Trivial Pursuit board, Rosser has come up with a way to play trivia using just her cards.

Readers who've gotten hooked on the visual trivia in the first two volumes of Vanished Splendor have a Christmas treat this year: Volume 111. This one continues the tradition of reproducing post- cards of "lost" Oklahoma City, and natives can gaze with longing at views of the Toddle House, the old M-K-T depot, Adair's Tropical Cafeteria, Ander- son's Antiques.. .. County Courthouses of Oklahoma, by Dr. C k d a Gra&j, edited by Tim Zwink and Gordon Moon; Okkzhoma Historical ~&i? ty ;$15.95. They're all here, fKm the Art Deco of Adair County to the "courthouse modem" of Woods, from the Doric columns of Tillman County to the clock tower of Carter.

The book begins with a history of

counties and county government in Oklahoma. It then details the pedigree of every county courthouse ever used- including a rented adobe in Kenton, ho- tels in Arapaho and Kingfisher and the Creek Council House in Okmulgee. Historic photographics and brief text give a county-by-county rendition of what buildings were used as court-houses, when old ones were renovated or torn down-and what rose in their places.

I've read Oklahoma TODAY off and on since the first issue-mostly off. I am now a new subscriber again-this time I think 1'11 stay. Okldoma TODAY is looking better all of the time.

Perhaps my attitude has to do with nostalgia; I'm more interested in what's happening in Oklahoma than I used to be.

~~~d schmidt Hei&ts9New York

I've intended for a long time to let you know how really outstanding I feel ORla-Aoma TODAY is. The layout, copy, selection of stories, pictures and continuity of excellence from issue to issue-all are indeed top drawer.

Congratulations to everyone con-cerned with this fine publication. Makes a native Oklahoman even more proud to be a Sooner.

Chester L. Stinnet Sr. Texarkana, Texas

1 would like to order two 1986 scenic calendars. I have also ordered OkMoma TODAY as a gift for my wife; she plans to renew it when it is time.

I was in Oklahoma for two years and eight months until May 1985, and I am

now working in Japan. My wife and I traveled all around Oklahoma state by car during that time.

Katsuhiko Machida Kawaguchi City, Japan

Your November-December 1985 is-sue is your best Okkzhoma TODAY ever.

"The Monk, The Mummy and Ma- bee," "Last of the Big Tops" and "Rid- ing Herd on the West" opened my eyes as to what may really be seen in Oklahoma.

I want to visit them all.

Edie Danielson Oklahoma City

Oklahoma is one of my favorite places. I've made many trips to the state to visit relatives in Elk City.

Your magazine deserves much praise for its fine coverage of the many phases of Oklahoma life. The Indian Territory phase of the state's life I find fascinating, and I hope to see some articles relative to it in future issues.

Margaret McCabe Pittsford, New York

OR/o/roma TODAY w e l c o m e s l e t t e r s from our readers. Our only r e q u i r e m e n t s : They must be signed, and we r e s e r v e the right to edit and/or c o n d e n s e them. Send your c o m m e n t s to: Letters, ORlahoma TODAY, P.O. BOX53384, Oklahoma Civ, OK 73152.

STATEMENT OF OWNERSHIP. MANAGEMENT AVD CIRCULATION (required by 39 U.S.C. 3685 filcd Scpumber 28, 1985) for 01Um 7VDAY Ma@"=, puMmdon number 407140, p~brihed bimonthly. 6 ~SIICS annually. annul subnipdon pries $10, by the suu of ~k l~h - . Tourism and ~ s r a r i o " ~ e p ~ m a t B ~ X ~ Mahorns (SV. O ~ ~ O M OK 73152.at P.O. s , county. Edimr-inChicf: Sue Csnsr. Okhhom Taurim and Rsradon Depmnenr. P.O. BOX 5 ~ ~ k l n h OK 73152. ~ ~ . b ~. city. Edimr: ~ n r c r IO~CS, ~ k l s h ~ ~and~ U O I I Depmncnt, P.O. B ~ X ~ d a h ~T O U ~ ~ S ~ SW.

~ j ry .OK 73152. OWNER: STATE OF OKLAHOMA. CUM- TUDAY, OklahomaT O U ~ ~ ~

~ c p ~ m n a f ma (SW. OK 73152.P.O. BOX SW. bondholden, mongrgser and chcr suri ty holden or holding 1 p e m r am o ~ of W.I mountof bonds, I I IO~~~SS or omcr scaritin:

EXTENTANDNATURE OF CIRCULATION: (A) Tod number o fmpk prinpd (net p- run): 28.657 wcrpgc number of is. or a h iuuc during pruding 12 months. 32.W single iuuc -mt filing d ~ u . (B)pad e i ~ ~ t i ~ ~ : (I) Ma thmugh dden and anien. nrccr vendom end munur saln: 5.792 avcng number m p k of t x h isme during w i n g 12 months: 5.559 ri* iuuc ~~1filing date. (2) M d subacrip~ks:18.872 avsr~genumber of mpier efsrh i w c during w i n g 12 monthp: n , asin& iavc firmb dare. (C) T0.I pPid eircuhdan: 24.W fwcng. n v m k m p k of t x h iave during prrccding 12 months, 29,014 dnglc iaue nenmt filing L o . (D) F m dimibution by mi l , onicr or other m a r . m p b , annplimcnmry a 4 orhcr f e mpies: 1,019 wcngs number -pie ofeach k u c during prmcding 12 months. 7-52 single huenearat Iidingdau. (E) T ~ I numbcrmpadisaibution: 25,681 of each iauc during @ing 12 mmths. 29,806sin@ issue "-st filing dau. (F) cop.a=not dirrributcd: (I) OR= W, kit OW,, ~ ~ ~+led dp pfwr printing: 256 avers@ number ofm+ ofeach kue during p d i n g 12 months. 1.665 single kuc (2) Return urrgm.: 2.728avcmge number m p k ofeach iauc during p d i n g 12 months. 529 single irsuc nearen filing LU. (G)TOTAL:28.657 we.gc numbcr of mpia of each duringissue p d i n g I2 monrhs. 32.W sin& iauc m m t filing dau.

IrrIIily that dK smumma made by mc above are m m and mmplca. csla&) sue Caner. ~ d i ~ ~ - i n c h i d

Oklahoma TODAY 6

BIG AND I BEAUTIFUL AS1 ALL OKLAHOMA!

ORDER FORM I My name j (Fill in men if only sending gifrs)i Address 1 City j State Zip I Day Phone # I I1 Please send me -1986 scenic calendars I to me at above address I

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1986 Oklahoma TODAY Scenic Calendar

13 outstanding full color photographs show Oklahoma's scenic beauty, all around the state

9" x 1 2 calendar features large boxes for writing in appointments and memos

Printed on heavy weight paper with durable plastic binding

A beautiful way to keep track of all your days in 1986!

Please send -1986 scenic calendars to the following people with gift cards en-closed:

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PriceQty 1986 scenic wall calendars @ $5.95

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U N C O M M O N C O M M O N FOLI

By Kathryn Jenson White

Weldon explains that, "I'm not a duck hunter, but I have friends who are, and they bring me ducks. I set 'em up like I want and put 'em in Ziploc bags in our freezer. Then I take them out and use them to work by for a while."

What started out with reluctance has now become a full-scale enthusiasm. Even though Peggy teaches elementary school, as she has for 21 years, and Weldon tends to 200 head

This shoveler taka the Johnsons 50-60houn to make, and costs $300. It's I$e-sized and even pp)e& tiresame as a lice shoveler.

. *... -. I , . ' . fI, . . I- . : .- .

1: eldon and Peggy Johnson have been married long

1enough that having a conversation with the two of

them is often like talking to one person with two different voice pitches. Sometimes, the female pitch starts an answer and the male pitch slides in to finish; sometimes it's the other way around. Sometimes for a word or two there's even two-part harmony, but usually the conversational pass is a smooth one.

What these two Gotebo residents like to talk about most are mallards, $$

of registered sheep, they've finished nearly 600 animals since they began working with wood only three years ago. Weldon is the one who carves the animals, and Peggy bums the coloration into the wood with woodburning tools. Peggy got so good so fast that she was asked to teach a woodburning class at a national woodworking school in Nebraska. She says, "I didn't want to do it, but Weldon insisted. I teach school all year, and I just wanted to go up there, relax and do what I wanted to do..." "Which is go to the shopping - .. -

- ,, - mall," Weldon . .. . .. finishes with a ..r 1 ,

pintails, blue and ' . - grin. Peggy continues green wing teals, shovelers, buffleheads and wood ducks. Actually, since late in 1982, ail the ducks they talk about are wood, bass wood, since that's what they use to create some ducky works of art. This all began when Peggy saw a wooden duck a friend had carved and then detailed with a woodburning tool. Although she admits neither she nor Weldon knew anything about ducks or woodworking and that Weldon was as $ close to unenthusiastic as a person could be at the idea of learning about either, she insisted they try their hands at it, and he gave in.

Now, Weldon spends a lot of his time researching ducks and various other animals, and Peggy has to move frozen mallards out of the way to take a pot roast out of the deep freeze.

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as if he hadn't spoken: "Iwant to tell you, you teach adults and they wod you. You can't relax; there's someone over your shoulder every minute." Weldon admits the exposure was a bit intense; each day for a week, they generally began work at 7:45

a.m. and ended at 10 p.m. Although Weldon wasn't officially a

carving instructor, he taught his teachers and his fellow students a thing or two as well. "Weldon took 'Realistic Animals,' where they carved a bugling elk," Peggy recounts with pride. "He got his done before anyone and ended up doing two of those, a horse and a bullfrog while they were still doing the one." Weldon continues the story with a laugh: "Since this bull elk is bugling, he's got his head back and his

Oklahoma TODAY 8

U N C O M M O N COMMON FOLK

mouth open. Well, I carved in his tongue, but everyone else just cut the hole out for his mouth. Then someone else got to looking at mine and said, 'What're you doin' dm?' I told him that since it was a stag elk, I was leavin' the testicles and the sheath on. Even the instructor had taken his elk's off. Boy, everybody went to trying to get a piece of wood to glue back on. I carried them high about that, I can tell you."

Peggy explains that, "Weldon does a lot of research. He's realistic and I'm stylistic. I want it to look pretty, and he wants it to be right. We don't always agree on how it ought to be burned." "Uh huh," Weldon inte jects, "but I'm always right." "He may be right," Peggy continues, "but we sort of compromise." "Unless," Weldon breaks in again, "it's something I really want, that I've put a lot of carving into. Take the turkey. We got into it over a turkey's feathers, and I finally drove to a neighbor's place 25 miles from me, caught his 01' turkey and pulled feathers out of all the different parts of his body. I had quite a tussle gettin' those feathers, but I got 'em." "And the buffilo," adds Peggy. "He was havin' a terrible time with a buffalo, so we got in the pickup and drove down into the Wichita Mountains and right out into the middle of a herd of them. Weldon sketched on his wood, and when we got home he had to cut the ears off and move them to another place."

With this concern for correctness and style, the Johnsons obviously spend quite a bit of time on each piece. Weldon estimates that, "It takes about eight hours to carve a big duck out and smooth it down. After it's sanded, I draw in my feathers with a pencil, and it probably takes about four hours more to carve the feathers in and dress 'em down. When I first started I used an emery board to go around every feather. Now I've got a tool with a little buffer on it that's made out of those pads they buff floors with. I can buff it down in three minutes now rather than three hours."

Peggy's part of the two-person I I


production process takes at least twice as long as Weldon's 12 hours, so the total time is a minimum of 36 hours. They ask around $250 for the large ducks, so, as Weldon explains, including materials, "If you take the price of one of our ducks and divide it by $5, you can figure just about the number of hours we got in it." They sell small ducks, 4% inches long with the same detailed woodburning, for about $25. Since $5 an hour seems fairly low pay for the beauty of their art, Peggy is quick to add, "But it's fun, it really is."

Although they sell most of their ducks right out of their home, the Johnsons get orders from all over, since Johnson ducks with their creators' address and phone number on them have migrated to just about every state. This modest advertising, the only that the Johnsons do, has led to some major sales. "A lady in Lawton bought a mallard and sent it to her son for his birthday," Weldon recalls. "He called us and asked if we had any on hand, and we told him we had 22. He said he wanted every one of 'em."

Although both Johnsons are pleased with the enthusiastic response to their art, they're still a bit surprised at it. When they took up their hobby, they honestly never imagined ever selling one of their ducks. Now, looking back over the hundreds they've sent out of the nest, Weldon says, "I tell everybody I've made only one perfect duck since we've been doing this. I'll show them Number One, and they'll kind of grin. Then I'll tell 'em, 'I didn't think there was any room anywhere for improvement when I made it.' Boy, it's a silly-looking thing. Its eyes stick out on the outside of its head, and his bill's about twice as wide up at the head as what it's supposed to be."

"Needless to say," Peggy needs to say anyway, "I didn't do a very good job of burning it, either." That confession inspires Weldon to add, "Each feather she did had only about four bums in it. Now some have close to 100." In her own defense, now, Peggy must continue, "I couldn't see well enough. After that first one I got

a magnifying visor like doctors wear when they're sewing a person up. That's how I'm able to get the lines so close together. "

Peggy's duck work is more physically tiring than Weldon's. She says, "What Weldon does relaxes him. I love to do it, but I can't relax at it. But, then, I'm not a relaxed person. I make a big job out of everything." "That's for sure," Weldon agrees and continues. "Once, I sat down in front of a window right after I got started

1 doing this. It was 5 o'clock and just about sundown. I started carving, and after a while I thought I'd get up and get myself a drink. I figured I'd been there about an hour. Well, I looked at my watch and it was 9 o'clock. I'd been there four hours, sitting right in front of a window as the sun went down, and I'd never even looked up."

In addition to providing a satisfying hobby and business, woodworking is bringing honors to the Johnsons. Last May, their ducks were displayed in the Governor's Gallery at the State Capitol. They shared this show with Gerald Mobley, whose art has won in both federal and state duck stamp contests. Weldon admits, "I kind of wondered about taking our stuff up there with him winning all that national recognition. He had beautiful work and I was worried, no longer than we'd been at it. But he didn't take nothin' from us, I didn't feel like. They went real well together."

Looking at Weldon with affection, Peggy says, "It's good because we're getting close to retirement, and we have something to do together." "We thought we'd make a run when we do retire," Weldon explains, "just travel along to arts and crafts shows. I like to visit people and see what they've got." Peggy laughs and says, "He dg?ni&b likes to visit." They both do, and they're wonderful folks to talk to. But you really ought to see their work; in this case, one pintail is worth 1,000 words. III

G e a nominee for "Uncommon Common Folk"? Wn'te to Kadqln [lo Oklahoma TODAY, P.O. Box 53384,

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BORDERLINE

CASES

l'ikmap ofpmto-ORIaAoma dates from theyeats 1819-1822.Its Iegmdreah, in part, "Map of Arhnsa (sic)andother Temton'es of the Unitedstates."

Oklahoma TODAY 10

By Jon Mark

Here's the "story behind the story" of how Oklahoma got its shape. With Arkansas

and Missouri to the east, Kansas and Colorado to the north and Texas to the south and

west, Oklahoma "got what was left over" before she, too, became a state in 1907. And

it was a fight every step of the way.

The Eastern Border:

How 12,000 Square Miles of Oklahoma Were

Almost Left in Arkansas

Oklahoma is one of 14 states carved from 800,000 square miles of the 1803 Louisiana Purchase. In 1819, Congress created the Arkansas Territory to include parts of present-day Oklahoma east of the 100th Meridian (100 degrees west longitude), the meridian that today forms our north-south border with Tex- as. It was the beginning of a 105-year battle to fm Oklahoma's borders.

In 1824, Congress decided the west- em border of Arkansas Territory should run from 40 miles west of the southwest comer of the state of Missouri due south to Red River. The idea was to separate the white settlers of Arkansas Territory from Choctaw Indians recently moved to what is now Oklahoma from their home- lands east of the Mississippi. The line drawn by Congress passed just east of present-day Muskogee and assigned 12,000 square miles of pre-Oklahoma to Arkansas Territory.

But U.S. Secretary of War John C. Calhoun made a treaty with the Choc- taws in 1825 specifying that the border with Arkansas began "100 paces west of old Fort Smith and thence due south to the Red River." In 1828, President John Quincy Adams made a similar treaty with the Cherokees by drawing their border

with Arkansas Territory from the start of the Choctaw line (100 paces west of Fort Smith), "thence in a direct line (north) to the Southwest Corner of Missouri." (This treaty created the characteristic jog in our eastern border, by the way.)

Calhoun and Adams moved the western border of Arkansas Territory 40 miles east of where Congress had fured it, sav- ing 12,000 square miles for the Choc- taws, the Cherokees and, ultimately, Oklahoma. In 1825, Arkansas surveyors staked the border from Fort Smith 120 miles south to the Red River. U.S. government surveys of 1856 and 1877 con- firmed the 1825 line ran not south, but four miles west of south at the river. The Choctaws, deprived of 136,204 acres including valuable salt springs, were paid 50 cents an acre compensation. But the false line of 1825 remains the border.

The Northern Bo-ler:

How i0,000 Square Miles of

Oklahoma Were Almost Left in Kansas

Congress fixed the southern border of Kansas (the future northern border of Oklahoma) at 37 degrees north latitude when Kansas was admitted to the Union in 1861. But 36 degrees, 30 minutes (Thirty-six Thirty) north latitude was

used to separate Virginia from North Carolina, Kentucky from Tennessee, and Arkansas from Missouri (except for Missouri's Bootheel region). Why was the southern border of Kansas placed 34 miles north of the line used to separate six previous states?

The southern border of Kansas was to be Thirty-six Thirty when the Kansas- Nebraska Act of 1854 was first proposed by Illinois senator Stephen Douglas. He wanted the nation's first transcontinental railroad to go through Nebraska; South- erners wanted a route through Texas and Mexico. Historians think Douglas moved the Kansas border north (to 37 degrees) to gain support of Southern congressmen seeking to protect slavery in the West-Douglas agreed to permit slavery south of 37 degrees if Southern- ers would support the Kansas-Nebraska Act, and consequently earlier railroad development in Nebraska.

Southerners had their own schemes. By 1854 many Cherokees lived in a 34-mile strip of land between Thirty-six Thirty and 37 degrees. From the Arkan- sas-Missouri line to present-day north- west Oklahoma, some 10,000 square miles were involved. Southerners in Congress argued against "disturbing" the Indians by including them in Kansas Territory (by making Thirty-six Thirty its southern border). But historians sus- pect that Southerners intended to organ- ize a slave-holding state where Oklahoma is today, a state incorporating the same Indian land.

The Civil War changed everything. Slavery was crushed, the organization of Oklahoma was delayed many years, and


both northern and southern railroads to

California were built in the post-war boom years. But the politicians of the 1850s had done their job. Ten thousand square miles of Kansas were "wheeled and dealed" into what became Oklahoma.

The Panhandle: How "No Man's Land" Became Oklahoma's

What we call the Oklahoma Panhan- dle may have the most complicated history of any strip of land in North America. First claimed by France in 1682, it was given to Spain in 1763, then traded back to France in 1800, then sold to the U.S. as pan of the 1803 Louisiana Purchase. In 1819 it was returned to Spain, transferred to Mexico in 1824 and attached to the Republic of Texas in 1836.

In 1845, Texas became a state by re- linquishing lands north of Thirty-six Thirty. In 1850 the eastern border of New Mexico Territory was fixed at 103 degrees west longitude, and in 1854 and 1861, the Kansas-Nebraska Act and Col- orado Territory legislation organized all land north of 37 degrees. Since the Cher- okee lands of pre-Oklahoma ended at 100 degrees west longitude, the result of all this was to create a piece of land 167 miles long and 34 miles wide just north of the Texas Panhandle. It became "No Man's Land" because no one seemed to want it.

From 1861 to 1890, No Man's Land filled with ranchers, squatters, cattlemen, Indian bands and outlaws fleeing surrounding jurisdictions. A typical No Man's Land story, possibly true: A homesteader was mistakenly hanged for cattle rustling. As the vigilantes were riding home, they met the real rustler putting stolen stock in the dead man's pen. They hanged him, too, and rode to tell the homesteader's widow the joke was on them!

Residents of No Man's Land attempt- ed self-government and law enforcement by establishing the "Cimarron Territory" in 1887. But in July 1888, near present- day Hooker, a Kansas sheriff and three of his posse were shot to death by the men they were chasing as the lawmen rested in a hayfield. The outcry for law and order was heard in Washington. On May 2, 1890, Congress created "Oklaho- ma Territory" and attached No Man's Land to it-for lack of anywhere else to put it. It's been "The Panhandle" ever since.

The Western Border: The Saga of

the 100th Meridian

It was all because of John Melish. His 1818 map of the American West was used in 1819 by U.S. emissaries negoti- ating with Spain to trade Florida for por- tions of present-day Oklahoma and Texas. The 100th Meridian (100 degrees west longitude) was chosen to divide Spanish from American territory. But the 100th Meridian as shown on Melish's map was about 90 miles east of its actual location.

Eventually, the State of Texas inherit- ed all Spanish and Mexican land north of Red River and west of the 100th Merid- ian-which Melish placed east of present-day Fort Sill. Surveys of 1853 and 1859 moved it to within 4,000 feet of its actual location. Thinking the matter closed, in 1860 Texas established "Greer County" on the 1% million acres in the far southwest comer of Indian Territory.

For 30 years, Texas operated courts and schools, collected taxes, and issued countless land certificates to Civil War veterans. Then Red River took a hand.

It seems the original treaty setting

TAispre-Runvim of Indian Tmioo7y is from the I888editon of Gaskell's Atlas of the World.

Oklahoma TODAY 12

Texas' north border had specified the main channel of the salty old river. Texas had assumed that that meant the north, or Prairie Dog, fork. But in 18% the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Greer County was in Oklahoma Territory, not in Texas, because the south fork was the main channel. The Texas boundary was still the 100th Meridian, all right, but the 100th Meridian where it crossed the south fork. That decision wiped out every Texas property title in Greer Coun- try. Thousands lost title to their homes.

The precise location of the 100th Me- ridian was still in dispute. The 1859 survey placed it 4,000 feet too far west. A 1902 survey moved it east 3,600 feet, but it wasn't till 1929 that an astronomical and geodetic engineer appointed by the Supreme Court found it once and for all. One historian writes of Mrs. I. F. C. Moss, who occupied the same house near Hollis for 45 years, but lived in one territory, two states and three counties because of the troubles.

The Southern Border:

"The Most Complicated Boundary

Dispute on Record Anywhere"

The Greer County case established that Oklahoma extended to the sou& bank of Red River. But Texas continued to collect tolls at the south end of bridges over the river, and claimed jurisdiction to its midpoint. The situation grew serious in 1918 when oil was found under the south bank near Burkburnett, Texas. A land boom erupted, violence flared over conflicting claims, and Texas Rangers occasionally seized control from Oklaho- ma authorities.

In 1919, Oklahoma sued Texas in the U.S. Supreme Court, and the U.S. government sued Texas on behalf of Okla-

An 1874 venion of the Indian Tenitoly, wid d e GmCounty country labeled ')ubliclanak."

homa Indians. The four-party case concluded in 1927 after an unprecedent- ed number of reports, rulings and surveys. At issue was the river itself: How does one find the south bank of a stream that forever meanders? The court stud- ied history, plant ecology, hydrology and law, then concluded the Oklahoma border was the "cut-bank"-where the flow of water stops the growth of vegeta- tion on the south side of the river. In 1924, border markers were placed at the south cut-bank.

In 1931, Oklahoma and Texas clashed over bridges again. Texas judges ordered certain bridges closed, certain ones open. Governor "Alfali Bill" Murray insisted that Oklahoma owned the river- bed and controlled any bridges spanning

it. He declared martial law to make his point and sent the national guard to take custody of bridges south of Durant. The courts ultimately upheld Alfalfa Bill.

Since 1924, Red River has shifted its course continuously. The Supreme Court markers no longer mark the south cut-bank where the river has mean-dered. An oil well taxed by Oklahoma is sometimes found south of the water; small pieces of Texas sometimes lie north of it. But except for these vagaries, since 1924 Oklahoma's been in fine shape. la

jon M ~ ~ ; o in Tuba ad/kaadwoh Am wdfor Oklahoma TODAY on -ding from M@L to heflora and fauna o f Rdhd V a I . .

Oklahoma TODAY 14

COURTESY MaAHOMA HlSTORlCAL SOCIETY

I I Like mighty armies, they moved full use. Jesse Chisholm-a mixed- reach shifting rail towns in Kansas.

slowly northward through the Indian blood Cherokee-was a trader, guide, Nevertheless, from Red River Cross- Territory. The came first by the hun- interpreter and salt maker rather than a ing near T e d to the Kansas border dreds, then by the thousands; in dusty, 1 cattleman. He spoke more than a doz- near Renfrow, all cattle herds followed restless herds stretching as i r as the en Indian languages and was one of the the same trail. At one time it was de- eye could see. They were longhorn cat- few frontiersmen who had the trust of scribed as 200 to 400 yards wide and tle, worth $3 a head in South Texas, both Indians and settlers. Chisholrn bare as a city street. Although it mean- selling for $20 to $30 at Kansas rail started several trading posts on his sup- dered slightly to reach the best river centers and bringing up to $50 at Chi- ply route from the Arkansas River near fords and waterholes, the trail went cago processing plants. Wichita to the North Canadian River along a line later followed by the Rock

Joseph McCoy, a young Illinois live- near present-day Yukon-a distance of Island Railroad. stock trader, came west in 1867 to es- 220 miles. Because he marked the Today, in its course through Oklaho-

1 tablish Abilene as the first Kansas cattle stockyard and terminal site. News trav-

route his trading wagons followed, the name CbisAo/m Trad stuck and was later

ma, U.S. 81 has the Chisholm Trail for historical background. A scattering of

I eled swiftly, helped along by McCoy, who sent handbills to Texas towns and

applied to the entire trail. Chisholm didn't live to see the huge

highway markers, monuments and tombstones define the trail at Medford,

hired a stockman to ride south and cattle herds and cowboys follow his Pond Creek, Enid, Hennessey, Dover,

' spread the word. Even before the wagon path into Kansas. He died in the Tuttle, Chickasha, Rush Springs and stockyards were finished, 20,000 head spring of 1868 after eating contaminat- Duncan. of cattle grazed near Abilene. ed bear's grease during a visit to the Also noteworthy is the Chisholm

More than 37,000 cattle moved into camp of his Arapaho friend, Chief Lit- Trail Museum at Kingfisher and the town before the end of the 1867 sea- tle Hand. Today, a monument marks Monument Hill marker, two miles east son. The number rose, year by year, to his grave on a grassy hillside 9% miles of Addington. The museum, operated a peak of nearly 600,000 longhorns in 1871. In all, nearly 14 million cows were driven through Oklahoma during those historic years.

Many trails were used for these

northeast of Geary. Credit for breaking the trail south to

Red River belongs to Buffalo Bill Matthewson, a famous hunter, guide and horse trader. In July 1867, Mat-

by the Tourism and Recreation De- partment, is open free of charge, Tues- days through Saturdays, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Sundays 1 to 5 p.m. It contains trail artifacts, memorabilia and

drives. But the biggest and most popular route was the famous Chisholm

thewson met a large herd of longhorns near Red River. He made an agree-

restorations of early-day buildings. Near Addington, a tall stone monu-

Trail. Cattlemen liked it because it was ment with the owner to guide the herd ment, built in 1893, marks the camp- shorter, less settled, had easier river to Chisholm's trading post on the site where drovers once stacked fords, more water and better grazing. North Canadian. Chisholm's wagon sandstone rocks in two piles-10 feet But the long, two-month drive through tracks then led the herd into Kansas. across and 12 feet high-to signal the Oklahoma was not hazard free. Cow- They reached the new Abilene ship- trail's entry into Oklahoma. boys had to face swollen rivers, stam- ping pens in late August, the first Tex- In most places, weather, prairie grass pedes, Indians demanding steers for as herd up the trail. and farm plows have long since re-safe passage, cholera, wind, hail and rustlers.

prairie fires, Long after cattle drives became history, controversy developed over the

moved all traces of the world's greatest cow trail. In a few locations, however,

As busy as the trail was for a time, its exact route of the Chisholm Trail and the route is worn too deeply into the history was brief. Fences began appear- ing on the open range in 1880, and,

the man for whom it was named. Much confusion came from the fact that a

sub-soil to erase the millions of long- hom hoofprints that tramped out histo-

four years later, the Chisholm Trail was strangled in barbed wire.

cattleman, John Chisum, pioneered several trails through Texas to reach

ry along the Chisholm Trail. mil

Ironically, the man who loaned the Red River. Later, other trails also Gene Hi// is a free-hnce writer who lives trail his name never saw the route in branched off the Chisholm route to and wods in Bartk&//e.


SET SAILBy Missy Kruse Photographs by Bill Akers

It's time for that most dreaded of winter illnesses-cabin fever.

The cure? According to 80,000 Oklahomans (and neighbors from surrounding states), it's the Tulsa Boat, Sport and Travel Show.

A combination hodcshow, wish book and family reunion, the Tuka Boar, Sport and TraweLShm /urn some80,OOOpeopk andnearly 300 dibitors.

k lahoma TODAY 16

T he January event at Tulsa's Expo Square is the opening number for the state's boating

and fishing season. For five days, it draws outdoor-sport lovers from as far away as Nebraska, sometimes through sleet, snow and ice.

Some die-hards charter buses; others come with boat in tow hoping for a trade. For most, it's a chance to salivate over

for theJBoat extravagant on-the-water toys including yachts in the $3300,000 price range. At the other end of the scale is a $295 mini- bass boat.

The show also includes motor boats, sailboats, houseboats, recreational vehi- cles and numerous displays by fishing equipment dealers, manufacturers and vacation-spot promoters. Last year's show had 281 exhibitors from throughout

the nation-and nearly 40 on a waiting list.

The show celebrates its 30th anniversary this season. "It is more than a boat and tackle show. It has become a social gathering," says general manager Fred Chrisman, who has run the show since 1966. "We see many of the same people year after year and have watched their kids grow up. Because it's a social event,


most come to spend the day." No wonder. The building housing the

show is the size of 13 football f i e l d s and packed to the walls. Sponsored by the Tulsa Downtown Lions Club and Magic Empire Recreation Inc., the show has grown from a handful of exhibitors to one of the largest in the nation. Promot-ers say some aspects, such as the sailboat exhibits, are impossible elsewhere. The masts would bump the ceiling.

For the serious looker, it's the ideal place to comparison shop. And dealers say they think that is a good thing. "The show gives them a place to start look-ing," says Phil Keeter, owner of Tulsa's Romer Marine.

"No matter what I do for advertising, I couldn't get as many prospects as I do at the show. We have no qualms about being here with competitors. We think our products stand up well against them. And we can attribute one-third of our year's business to the show, much of it coming 30 to 90 days after the show closes."

Clyde Bayer, owner of Bayer Marine, Tulsa, agrees: "I do 20 to 25 percent of my business at the show. We get repeat customers, some for 30 years."

For the fishing fanatics, the show has a special lure (no pun intended). Here they can pin down well-known Oklaho-ma fishing personalities like Joe Krieger and Jimmy Houston on the more ab-struse aspects of their sport.

At the exhibit the size of some convenience stores, Houston holds court for a constant stream of admirers from small fry to retirees, all eager to shake his hand and tell him "I sure like your show." Houston accepts their comments and compliments with good humor and a perpetual grin, signing autographs and shaking hands. Along with the free ad-vice, fans can buy his latest recommend-ed fishing tackle and even a pair of the famous Jimmy Houston sunglasses. The show is one of nearly 90 such personal appearances Houston makes each year.

Less spectacular, but no less fascinat-ing, is a space several aisles over belong-ing to Don Lively of Sand Springs. His booth is 5 x 5, but he and his assistant

Oklahoma TODAY

have managed to draw a small but atten-tive crowd. They are making jigs for striper fishing. In moments they have converted a few raw materials into a sale-able item.

Developing a product is not new to Lively. A former production manager for a local manufacturing firm, he converted what could have been a bad time in his career to a lucrative business.

"I was laid off from my job several years ago, and I had plenty of time to fish," he says. "I began to find there was not a lot of equipment available for strip-er fishing. I started out as a custom rod builder and then began to develop speciality items for striper fishing."

In addition to his local retail store, he wholesales his products across the re-gion. Fishing equipment is the most competitive business in town, he says. "The boat show offers me the exposure I need to show what I have available."

The product that John and Norma Thomas are selling down the way is de-signed to make sure that Lively's lures make it into the water. The Checotah

.IIUIMIIII *Getting There

I l k y d s Tuka Boat, Sport and Travel Show m7.l sport 10% aim3 of evny1ing imaginabk &ling mY water spom: boa&, swim mmr, s k , $ding &k, tkhd mkhhk like J i m q and C h h Houston and lven vauation literatun.

i% 301 annual show b setforJanuary 2 9 - F h r y 2 at TuIw's Expo cenkr. Houn: W d h d z y , 5-10 p.m.; X4un&, 2-10p-m.; F w p noon-lOp.m.; Solu&'* 10 a.m.-10p.m.; Sumby, noon-7 p.m. T d ,on sak at& door, dbe U

ford u b and$l fordi&iren 6-12. i%u+ w7..be Family Nite, d a sp&/jkmi4 dmkion ptice 485.

To 4Expo Squan from & Tumpde ( I 4 ) , take & Yak txit n o d ; Ejcpo Square iat Zlst and Yak.

For mom infomdbn, call Frcd or R& C h h m n at (918)582-5438, or w* P.O. Box 2992, Tuka, OK 74101.

couple are newly established as boat builders.

John Thomas has actually been in the boat business 16 years, selling other manufacturers' goods. Two years ago, he decided there was a market for a boat that didn't contain as much glitter and glamor-but did offer a lot of boat for a smaller price tag.

He developed what he calls "a tough boat-lighter, stronger, with a rolled gunnel." For the uninitiated, that means it is made in one piece.

For Thomas, the boat show is a chance to catch the attention of the buy-er who might not know that such a prod-uct exists. He is one of a number of dealers who use the boat show to wedge their products into the consumer's con-sciousness alongside better-known names.

Joe Becker, of Tulsa Sailcraft, has been exhibiting in the show for 12 years. He gets added help from sailing enthusi-asts he knows: "Last year I had 80 vol-unteers who came up from the lake to talk boats to prospective buyers. Many are representatives of the sailboat clubs who simply enjoy talking about sailing."

Boat buyers are a special breed, he thinks. They don't buy quickly. "The mere fact you are at the boat show can help generate business," he says. "A po-tential customer may come back a year or two years later ready to buy. But they keep looking until they have saved enough to purchase. "

Chrisman, the show's director, says the event has other benefits than those directly attributable to boat and tackle sales.

"The show brings money into the state through lodging, food and shopping done by out-of-towners.And inevitably it generates money to the lake areas for many of the same nasons.,,

For those who take in the event the benefits are simple, yet obvious. The Tulsa Boat Show is p m f positive that there's just no bad time in Oklahoma to go fishing. M@ K m e I ~ Band won% in Taka; ~ i f iuersho~IphotogapAerforh Taka Boat, S ' and TrmI Show.

of a s u m m sumhe

Is ccrpwred exquisneg.

on our new art jwster,

photo91~- by

DovM FifzgmUM

at W a r Lake In

so-m OManOma,

near IheSkyline Drha

Ke poster mwsuteb

$8' x 24".

I t I s p ~ o s ,

h-w-isht pcrper

and vy~rnlshed,

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n u m h of ftressb postsnr

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prus $1 lor ShIRpIng.

frame not Cncluded.

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David Fitzgerald is a native Oklahoman and owner of Fitzgerald Associates in Oklahoma City. During his 18-year career as a professional photographer, he has published two books--0Rkzhoma in 1979 and Dunh in 1981. His work has ap- II peared in national magazines, as well as in exhibitions across the country.

MARGO WRIGHT

T o order, use form between pages 18 and 19, or send $3.95 plus $1 for shipping and handling to: Oklahoma TODAY, P O Box 53384, Oklahoma City, OK 73152.

If ordering by credit card, you may call 1-800-652-6552 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Mon.-Fri.


- - -

I

, : z. - . . -

Oklahoma TODAY 20

By Jane Beckman Photographs by David Fiizgerald

he dancers aren't

~ glamorous at 10:30on a TTuesday morning.

, Those shiny Lycra sweatpants have made a hundred trips to the washing machine. A gray sweatshirt has been scissored 3 inches down the back for more freedom of movement. Some of the weary leotards are held together with safety pins. No one has put a lot of effort into hair and make-up.

The practice studio's wall of mirrors reflects the dancers' movements. Artistic director Edward Villella calls a halt. "You have to be more specific musically, folks," he says, and the music starts again. Ballet shoes squeak on the floor. The pianist at the black grand pounds out the chords, reading from sheet music labeled 'Y'uccompugne b dunre."

Villella stops the dancers again. "I think the phrasing is not quite right," he says, and explains how it should be put right. The dance begins again. Muscles stretch and flex. By 10:45 sweat soaks the dancers' hair. When Villella stops the group to explain a movement, the dancers' breath is coming in pants. One bends forward, bracing her hands against her knees as she listens. A ballerina shakes off sweat the way a dog shakes off water. Then come the pirouettts. The company whirls and twirls around the room.

Continued A balhina's task: Appear fragile and wi/-l o w and hawe hestamina ofa long-distance runner. Francoise Thouveny, Suze Chetwer andSuzy Strain, "Concerto Bamcco. "

r January-February '86 2

i

At 11 Villella calls a break. T h e dancers applaud the director, then sprawl in an anteroom gulping coffee and soft drinks.

This is rehearsal for the 17-member Oklahoma City-based Ballet Oklahoma, a 12-year-old company that has moved in the last few years from semi-professional

to professional status. Rehearsals, like the classes of the School of Ballet Okla- homa, are held in its functional, if not exactly elegant, headquarters on North Classen. T h e 8,500-square-foot build-ing, which houses the three rehearsal studios, dressing rooms, a warren of ad-

ministrative offices and a costume shop, was previously a boat showroom and warehouse.

But artistic director Villella is pleased with the facilities, which he calls "wonderful." T h e building was one of the factors that prompted Villella, who was

,- - tomuLonjures the m a p of “C'als,-Fantas~e, " with Suzy Strain andJames Cam~ron.-Oklahoma TODAY

for years a principal dancer with George Balanchine's New York City Ballet, to take over the direction of the young ballet company in June 1983. Another reason, Villella says, was the Oklahoma Symphony, which has a conductor who understands ballet.

Villella spends approximately 50 per- 1 Villella comes out and puts in what he cent of the ballet season in Oklahoma calls the "inside understanding": the City. He has a ballet master, Cherie No- musicaliv, snlistic approach, theatrical ble, who teaches daily company classes or dramatic understanding and the tech- and conducts daily rehearsals. T h e ballet nical aspects of the ballet. master gets a ballet up on its feet. Then Villella thinks this is a good system. "I at least two weeks before each series. think I am equally valuable to Ballet

Above. It's the sweat-and- strain discipline of daily d e a n a k that puts the

magic in b a h . B e ba//et master gets the work on its

feet; at /east m o weeks b&ra a performance,

Edward Vi//eC/aputs in what he calk 'He inside

understanding."

Far left. Artistic dimtor Edward Vi//e/h maka a

fine point concerning "Minkus Pas de Tmis" to Mary St. Romain and

Helen Rosentha/.

Left. Enhancing the dame: Vi//e//a wih Jimmy

Gamonet.


Oklahoma in New York, where I have constant contact with costume designers, scenic designers, choreographers, com- posers. I am also within the dancers' market. The biggest market for dancers and dance is New York City, and it is where the state of the art is."

Ideas on costumes are relayed upstairs to Ballet Oklahoma's costume shop, a room that seems to have been designed for gnomes. There isn't much head room, and foam padding on a pipe serves as a wall-to-wall pin cushion, at the same time it keeps anyone taller than a midget from putting a knot on his head as he crosses the room. One wall covered with mirrors reflects wires hung with pink tu-

tus and white leotards, rods with satiny soldiers' jackets sporting glittery epau- lets. Another wall is drawers with inuigu- ing labels: Whik Scnaps, Rmade, Mak Tim,Dad Fa-, Chiffon. In this shop, costume designer Thomas Augustine, who came to Oklahoma from the costume shop of the New York City Ballet, creates the ballet's costumes with the help of a wardrobe mistress and several seamstresses.

While Augustine runs the costume shop, the school of Ballet Oklahoma, which offers a variety of classes for both children and adults, is under the direction of David Holladay, a featured dancer with the company last season. A great deal of the balance of running Ballet Oklahoma falls to the general manager.

Donovan Gray, who took on that title with the 1985 season, thinks one of the best things Ballet Oklahoma offers its patrons is the "DanceTalk" series con- ducted by Edward Villella. DanceTalk, billed as "a special performance de-signed to illuminate and entertain," is held in the small Stage Center theater and gives people a chance to learn about the technical aspects of ballet, as well as training, physicality and particular bal- lets. The audience can ask questions and see things up close. The point is to be informal as well as educational-and to have an entertaining evening.

Gray also thinks that the general public frequently isn't aware of some of the behind-the-scenes facts about ballet. In-

"Ballet Oklahoma is. .. helping to camy on the gread tradition that baddet has in

Oklahoma, going back to tht Indian ballerinas. "

juries, for instance. Ballet Oklahoma is a relatively small company, and sometimes a program will have to be changed because, with a performer or two out with injuries, there will not be the required dancers for a particular ballet.

Then there is the high cost of ballet shoes. Even with only 17 members, Bal- let Oklahoma's yearly shoe bills run $14,000 to $15,000, and probably only $3,000 to $4,000 of that goes for men's shoes. Those wispy little ballerinas are incredibly hard on toe shoes, and indi- vidual dancers put different amounts of wear and tear on their shoes. There are some dancers who can't get through a single performance with the pair.

When asked what he thought was most special about Ballet Oklahoma, Gray answered, "It's here. Ballet Okla-

Jane Beckman putstar her m'n'ng c a m from her home town of Waiters, near Lawton. D d Fitzgeraki, whose most mmt book ofphotographs ~ t i thi Ozarks, iiv6 in Okkzhoma City.

homa is a major cultural institution not only for Oklahoma City but for the state as a whole, in helping to carry on the great vaditon that ballet has in Oklaho- ma, going back to the Indian ballerinas and the whole heritage that has evolved with Yvonne Chouteau and the Tall- chiefs, the Hightowers.. .that what this institution provides is an ongoing oppor- tunity for the nurturing of Oklahoma talent.

"As a whole, the regional ballet movement has been an important part of the entire decentralization of dance out of New York City that started in the '70s and indeed back to the '60s. It's not limited to ballet, either. The same is m e in the original theater movement. It's creating a very diverse vitality in the arts throughout the country. Rather than emanating from a single point, it's now radiating within us all." KO

Oklahoma TODAY 24

/

Invitation to the Dance dward Villella is recognized as one of the es when one goes to the ballet!' I think there .,

" E greatest dancers ever-the only American this perception that it is an elitist art form, and to be asked to dance an encore at the Bolshoi unless you are in dark suit or black tie or long Theater in Moscow. For 25 years Villella was a gown, you don't belong at the ballet. And it's member of Balanchine's New York City Ballet, just nonsense. I spent 25 years at the New achieving "principal" status in 1960. H e York City Ballet and at Lincoln Center and danced "Stars and Stripes" for President Ken- New Theater, where you can indeed be sitting nedy's inaugural celebration and gave com- next to someone in black tie or long dress mand performances for presidents Johnson, sitting next to people in sneakers, dungarees Nixon and Ford. In 1975 he won an Emm! and a sweatshirt. So you really should go in a Award for his CBS-TV children's ballet, "Har way you are comfortable. lequin." In June 1983 he became artistic direc I grew up at a time when New York was1 tor for Ballet Oklahoma. Villella begins his all that sophisticated in terms of the approach comments about his work at Ballet Oklahoma to classical dance. Our tradition really starts by talking about his innovative DanceTalk from around 1940, when the first big formaliza- program: tion of dance occurred, which was the incep-

I Just the word balkt itself is intimidating tion of American Ballet Theater that happened to a lot of people who've not either seen around '39, '40. The New York City Ballet

ballet or been exposed to it in any form. And really didn't happen until '48 or '49. It's a very really what we are trying to do with DanceTalk short tradition.. .. is eliminate that intimidation and simply say, Now it took George Balanchine 50 years to

'Folks, there is nothing that you cannot enjoy.' build the New York City Ballet. So for me to

It's not even a question of understanding, come here and say in 10 years' time I'm going because ballet is a form of entertainment. to make a New York City Ballet would be real Therein lies the public-relations pitch that we folly. But what I have said is that, over a 10- are basically entertainers, we are not dry educa- year period, we can within three years' time tors stuffing culture down the throats of unsus- get very solidly established and change every-

' pectins folk. We wish to demonstrate that this thing that was not positive from the past, re-do is a basic human physical art form, and we play the administration and the approach to manag- our games on stage to music rather than doing ing a company, inform the board and illumi- our physicality in other arenas. nate the board in terms of what it means to get

And there ti a sophistication to it. But isn't into a serious professional framework, to that what life is all about: improving the quality change the artistic direction and to improve the of your life, improving the quality of your ex- dancers and the choreographic level. posure? The hardest thing is to get people to Well, now to do that overnight is impossible. w m e the first time. Generally our reaction to Three years is a very, very challenging frame- the DanceTalk has been that once people are work. But I think we are more or less on either dragged or come voluntarily, they say schedule with that. I think after those three almost in a uniform manner: 'I never knew it years, our next challenge will be in the next was like this. I never knew ballet could be two to three years to establish a regional pres- enjoyable. I didn't know what it was about. ence within a four- or five-state area. T h e next I've learned more in this hour and a half than I challenge over the next five or six years would have in 10years being dragged by my wife and be to establish some kind of national visibility. my children to see ballet. Because I generally So that we are not just unto our own specific sit and look at something that I am, number area or region. one, intimidated about and, number two, That does not say that we are going to be a know nothing about; therefore I have my own New York City Ballet or an American Ballet built-in inhibitions in terms of my eyes and Theater. That takes enormous resources. T h e ears.' budget of the New York City Ballet is som

So really what we are trying to do is elimi- where around $19 million. And you don't c-nate that barrier. And I think once we do that, that in 10 years. A genius took 50 years. So, I we can show that there is a great deal of plea- think what my purpose here is: to establish a sure out of going to the ballet. good, solid, highly professional, highly vision-

I am stunned, but I am still asked from time ary artistic product that in 10 years' time has q1D time: 'Can you please tell us how one dress- some kind of national visibility.

I January-February '86 2

-Oklahoma TODAY

FHOCOLATE By Kathryn Jenson White

Photographs by Steve Sisney

Confcssedchocophi/e Dan D a v i s j n t conceieedof a choco/ate fes-h a / as a w q to rake funds for Norman's Fidouse Art Center. ''Inever met a choco/ate I didn't Me, "hesays.

f you think ambrosia and nectar are the only food and drink of the gods, you're culturally narrow. While Greek and Roman deities were supping and sipping on these, the higher

ups were showing much better taste by indulging in the fruit of i7ieobmma cacao, the first part of which means literally "food of the gods." What "cacao" means you ought to know already; it's the Spanish word from which we get our "cocoa." Beobmma cacao is the scientific name for the tropical American trees that yield the per capita average of 9.1 pounds of chocolate Americans consume every year. They also produce the more than 5,000 tons of cocoa we purchase each year for home use.

Aztec myth has it that their god Quetzalcoatl started a still-strong tradition by giving chocolate to his people as a gift of love. Since the Aztec word for chocolate, xoco/at/, translates to "bitter water," it may not sound like such a great gift. However, Montezuma, the Aztec emperor, quaffed 50 tankards daily of the


ground roasted bean mixed with wine or fermented corn- mash. After giving Montezuma the wherewithal to do so, Quetzalcoatl was tricked by a rival god and stripped of his powers. He sailed off into the sunset, swearing to return someday.

In 1519, when Hemando Cortez blew in from Spain, the Aztecs understandably mistook him for their long-awaited god. They gave him gold, jewels and, of course, the cacao they thought he had given them in the first place. Hernando repaid their generosity by plunder- ing their empire, taking his beans and going home to Spain. From these appropriately mythical and dramatic roots come the most popular sweet food and drink in the world.

Each year in Norman, a group of dedicated mortal chocophiles (some say "chocoholics") gather to make history by presenting a chocolate feast worthy of Quetzal- coat1 himself. They are members of the Firehouse Art Center, and their annual Chocolate Festival is a major fundraising event. This daylong binge is a delight to the

Above. Mixed-media confections abound-like Laura Warnher's eyes as well as to the mouth. Both palettes and palates "Lady Codiwa," with listed ingredients of chocolate-coloredacrylic, gold are involved, becomes the inspiration forfoil and a dqartmmt-store mannequin. Below. Camille Waller of Noman's Cookie Castlesmes up variations on the classic chocolate chip a*ists in the gallery and galley Using every medi-cookie. (The items with the pink hearts are called 'kookie pops.") urn imaginable, local creators cook up pieces of art with a

chocolate theme. Using every ingredient necessary, local cooks create pieces of "culinary art" with a chocolate base.

While the art in more traditional media like paint, metal, glass and wood will last for many years and that made of flour, sugar, vanilla and chocolate will disappear by the end of the day, the creators of both kinds insist they are equally art. Elyse Bogart, who displayed both edible and enamel earrings resting in pleated paper bon- bon cups, says, "It's just as satisfying to have someone eat something as look at something. Creation is creation, regardless of what happens eventually to what you create. Of course, if somebody stepped on a pair of my earrings, I'd be upset because they're not meant to be destroyed; they're meant to last. But if I make something that's meant to be eaten, that's OK."

At the Third Annual Chocolate Festival in 1985, --eating was more than OK; it was divine. As a happy crowd on the first floor strolled from exhibit to exhibit contemplating pieces of art, an even happier crowd upstairs strolled from exhibit to exhibit consuming. ~ i eces of

" I

chocolate roulage, mocha-filled crepes and chocolate- chip pizza. Each year, Norman restaurants and food shops supply all these goodies, sampled in hour-long sessions throughout the afternoon.

Each hour is one of bliss, of course, but total nirvana is achieved in the evening session, called the "Chocolate Gala." During this heavenly time, the culinary creations are cut into with great fanfare and savored with even greater pleasure. Champagne pours from its bottles as

Oklahoma TODAY 28

freely as the o o h and aah of delight pour from the mouths of the tasters. It's a good idea to get your art viewing out of the way earlier in the day if you choose to attend the evening session, because most of the eyes in the room roll heavenward at the first bite and stay there throughout the evening.

All this cultural and culinary chocomania was the brainchild of Dr. Dan Davis, a Firehouse artist who works in stained glass and is also the associate dean of the College of Liberal Studies at OU. He insisted to a doubting board of directors that a Chocolate Festival would get a great response and strong community support. Dan convinced the board to try in 1982, and they planned on 300 attending; about 500 people turned out. With no samples left, they sold non-tasting tickets good for satisfying only the eyes.

"Right after the first festival," Dan remembers, "Jim Kenderdine, one of the board members, called me up and told me he was going to have chocolate crow for lunch." The next year organizers planned for 500; 900 came. Dr. Kenderdine, who teaches marketing at OU, must have had chocolate turkey that year. During the 1985 bash more than 1,000 chocolate lovers showed up, and there's no doubt in anyone's mind that the crowd will increase again in 1986.

Dan Davis knew of the power of chocolate from personal experience. He says, "I never met a chocolate I didn't like. On my last birthday, all my office staff wore brown. We had a chocolate cake, and they gave me a brass chocolate Hershey bar. I've got about 100 different chocolate memorabilia things, and on my first trip to Europe last summer I'd convert my change to chocolate at every border." Dan says he doesn't ever consider chocolate as a gift for someone else because it's just too hard to give it away. He confesses, "I don't think I'd want my wife to know exactly how much I spend on chocolate in a week. I try to have some each day, and I'll eat just about any kind. If there's no dessert in the house, I'll have a handful of chocolate chips and peanuts. "

The question of financing a chocolate habit has become a much more interesting one in the last few years. While the 45-cent Hershey bar is still available, true chocolate aficionados hanker after melting morsels with names like Godiva and Neuhaus and prices in the $20- to $30-a-pound range. Chocolate has become chic, and Norman merchants set up booths at the Firehouse each year that offer the &e de la mhe of "chic-olates" to those willing to pay the price.

Erika Ripley, a 9-year-old who likes chocolate a lot but would pick a hamburger as a snack if she had the choice, knows the difference between these luxury chocolates and relatively inexpensive candy bars. Gesturing toward the booths of high-class stuff, she explains that


Above. Visitors may say that creations like Buche de Noel and chocolate hazelnut torte are too pretfy to eat, but thq're still quite willing to hold out their plates for samples. Below. Volunteer Belinda Armstrong shows of/ the aart of making fine candy by hand.

ERIKA RIPLEY

"This chocolate is meitier. Plus it's a lot fresher." Erika also explains rather impatiently the reason she can eat so much chocolate and stay slim: "I'm a kid. I play soccer. "

Even though she is a kid, Erika knows the two things that set excellent chocolate apart from the merely acceptable: mouth feel, or meltability, and freshness. A luxury chocolate liquifies in your mouth as soon as it hits the tongue. That's because cocoa butter melts at approxi-mately body temperature, and luxury chocolates contain lots of cocoa butter. T h e cheap stuff has little, and imitations, like the brown stuff that covers a Baby Ruth candy bar, contain none. The smoothness of the choco-late is also a result of how long it's been "conched," that is, smoothed between rollers. The longer the conching, which can go on for up to three days, the smoother and more expensive the chocolate.

As Erika also points out, the luxury chocolates are fresher, too. Godiva claims that the cream that goes into their candy has been out of the cow for no longer than three hours. Freshness has nothing to do with preserva-tives either, because the aristocrats of chocolates have none. They also don't have nearly as much sugar as do the plebeians, since it is a cheap bulking agent that tends to make the chocolate "grainy" rather than "creamy."

Getting There

n e fourth annual Chocolate Festival will be heki' at Norman's Findouse Art Centeron Febmary 8-not coinn'dental/ly, the Saturdq before Valentine's Day. Approximate houn: 10 a.m.-5 p.m. and 7-10p.m.

Tickets to &e mtrmaganza are $5for center memben, $7 for thepublic, for any one of seven hour-longsasions duringthe daytime portion of thefestival. Once inside chocolate he-, you may stay as long as you wish.

Ticket hoMm are entitled to 10 samples from 40 kind of daocobte, including ice cream, chocolate-cmeredstrziwbmk and men pn'cey Godiva confctions.

Doon will close around 5 p.m. to pnpare for &e "Chocolate Gab," whid lastsfrom 7-10p.m. Ticketsare$20formembemand $25 for the pubkc. Gala-go& may indulge in unlimited chocolate samples, chmpaagne and tastes of chocolate &nary masterpieces.

M t s go on sale Thanksgr'enng weekend at the center, 444 4. Flood, Nonnan, OK 73069, or call (405) 329-4523.

To get to the Findouse Art Centerfrom 1-35, take the N o d Campusm't,ako calledState Hidway 77 South. Once in town, 77 becomes Flood Street. n e center is four blocks south of Main.

These terms, the first an insult and the second a compliment, are but two from the fairly extensive, spe-cialized vocabulary of chocolate connoisseurs. Others in-clude "character," any distinctive taste or aftertaste, and "cheesy," a desirable tangy kind of "character" that comes from aging milk chocolate. "Americanw-style chocolates are those in which the filling is formed first and then hand dipped or machine "enrobed" in choco-late; those in the "European" style, on the other hand, are made by molding two chocolate sections, then filling them. Since this method produces a thicker chocolate coating, it's the one most true chocophiles prefer.

Pam Clinton, one of those and an organizer of the festival, says, "I don't think we've ever figured out why chocolate does what it does, but almost everybody likes some kind of it. Here, everyone is in a good mood. T h e children are happy as they eat desserts Mom isn't screaming about, and the adults become almost childish. They make sure they get every possible morsel of choco-late they can. I've heard several people with two plates explaining that a friend couldn't come, so they're taking the extra ticket's worth of samples home to him or her."

The strong sensuous and even sensual pull of choco-late is a mystery, even though it seems that its wonderful flavor ought to be reason enough for its popularity. Some knowledge of chemistry as well as cuisine helps a bit. Chocolate is a complex substance with more than 300 identified compounds in it; its complexity explains why coming up with a believable synthetic chocolate has been impossible so far. T h e real stuff contains caffeine and theobromine, both mild stimulants, and phenylethyla-mine, a chemical whose presence in the brain is associat-e d with falling in love. Th is may explain why Montezuma always drank xocolad before visiting his har-em and why he insisted that its members do likewise.

Although they've just about gotten all its compo-nents figured out, scientists still aren't sure what choco-late does and doesn't do. They insist now that it does not cause acne, and that it may not even be a major culprit in tooth decay. It seems something in the cocoa bean inhib-its placque-forming enzymes. Although it isn't non-fat-tening, milk chocolate has only 150 calories an ounce, and some doctors suggest now that an ounce of chocolate is worth a pound of anything else in a diet. It's so satisfying that it effectively kills the appetite.

While none of the above will totally erase the guilt that comes from indulging in an hour or more of eating chocolate, who cares? The "sinfulness" of chocolate is at least half the fun. And it's not every day that you can as successfully and pleasurably combine good taste with something that tastes this good.

Bob Kahryn White and Stme Stkney /he in Nonnan and completely immersed t h m e / v ~ ~in chocohte /orefor h i s adc/e.

30 Oklahoma TODAY

OMohumans aiwuys seem wiiiing to take the time to chart OWhiie, no

m M e r how busy tney are. T;hey also aiwuys seem wiiiing to fnug on

their home state.A combimibn of these fbvv tendmcies in the

wnbnts of this arWcle, me Oun,pmenis a0sempiing of Sooner

s u m . Wlh ihe help of our subscribers and other Wrks frosn ail

aeosamlwuiksofllfein Ihestate, w e ~ ~ u p w h a f ~ ~

canptwdlyclcrmasfbfints,besb a n d c r n d . O f c o u t s e , ~ w k ?

visited witit o m w w t beyondjust ftkode three to supply us od-

dests,~nnlebts,bi- and so on. Hk,ended up wiltr m h mQteriai

foranarticleft,~Nmesihelengtnofthisone,sowk?'venQdtopkkouf

~ k s l w r e w i l t r y o u h e m . -January-February '86 31

0klahoma is second nationally (af- i "thousand cubic feet") of gas. Two- i moustache and most of his hair. All ter Texas) in the drilling and com- : thirds of this amount left the state. : he had left, in fact, was a hirsute -

pletion of wells. Since the beginning of icU -Blcorsr orL ws i thunderbird perched over his ear. the indusy in the state, operators have : 1927, when we poured oil into i Surrounding the bird was baM. drilled more than 380,000. The typical i 227,775,000 barrels : To create this master hairpiece, oil well has a 28-vear life s ~ a n and : i Laverne used both an electric and a produces an averaie of 6.1 barrels a i ~ ~ E m ~ N Gi hand razor. She did the fine work day. The typical gas well produces for i The Wheat Belt town of Hennesse~ : around the outline of the bird with about the same time. In 1984, we had i takes place in this spelling bumble i Nair. Although Charles suffered 22,230 producing gas wells, with an : bee. With all good intentions, area i some mild sunburn on his denuded average production of 60,000 cubic feet i hdkiduals m n e d the after Pat i scalp, his pain was eased by an per day. 13s a lucrative business for the i Henness~, a cowboy and freight : abundance of Tootsie Pops and the state, even in these less-than-ideal eco- ! hauler who was killed in the area in i new nickname "Kojak." nomic times. Every minute of every : 1874. The town's name, though, : Although Charles has day, gross production taxes from oil and has something the man's name doesn't: i camouflaged the bird by letting his hair gas supply the state with $1,200-30 I an between the and J's The : grow south for the winter, he's percent of our tax base. : added e spelling is the one found on all i turning Laveme loose

: monuments and markers in the i the clippers again next year. i town, including the local legend's : DYEPEST OIL WEIl M R DRILLED i tombstone. In 1985, however, : BIGGESTSPIDER In 1974, Lone Star Production : during the town's yearly Pat Hennessy i 'Those of you who guessed some drilled the #1 Bertha Rogers in i Days, the big banner on Main Street i kind of tarantula weren't even close. Washita County. Unfortunately, this i showed the "e-less" spelling. : The winner in this category stands well in the Anadarko Basin was a dry : Hennessev earns an E + for effort. 15 feet tall and has a beetle's body, a hole. Its depth was 31,441 feet. i ~ S T W ~

VoIkmagen Beetle. This giant

DEEPEST PRODUCING OIL WEU i Greater love hath no man for his structure north of Lexington on U.S.

The Tipton 2-29, which Mesa : square dance club than does Charles 77 started out as an advertising gimmick dreamed up by Lee Roy Petroleum drilled in 1982, went to i Winn of Norman, who, with his wife Wilson, owner of a Lexington 25,607 feet. Located in Beckham i Laverne, has belonged to the Volkswagen parts dealership. Growing County, this is the 12th deepest well : Thunderbird Square Dance Club for out from the sides of the spider's ever drilled in the state. i eight years.

i This immeasurable devotion Beetle body are six legs made of more BIGGEST PRODUCING 011 WEU

: evidenced itself last August, while than 300 feet of pipe in three Comanche County is the location of different diameters. the Seymour 1-9, which Kerr McGee i Charles and Laverne were brought in while drilling for natural BIG@ESTNX)TP#INTS

gas. When they hit oil at 15,262 feet, Even before Wayman Tisdale left they were assigned the largest the state, the biggest footprints were "allowable" in state history. An not those found under his tennies. allowable, which is the quantity of That honor goes to prints left by a oil that a drilling company can remove stegosaur or two plodding through from a well, is figured on a depth Oklahoma during the 150-million-year and acreage grid chart. The Seymour 1- Mesozoic Era, which saw the rise 9 was so deep that it went off the and fall of the dinosaur. Each of the existing chart. The allowable finally prints located in Cooper's Arroyo on granted was 2,136 barrels a day for the northeast end of Black Mesa is 1,917 days. between 12 and 14 inches in

diameter and about 2 to 3 inches deep. YEdRwmrMosroins : vacationing on Lake Texoma. Charles The tracks are in two sets, each AND OIL WEU COMHEllONS i told his wife that he'd like to have a containing about 12 prints. 1982, with 12,030 well completions i shorter haircut for swimming, and she Truman Tucker, the 80-year-old recorded : volunteered to help him out. Before unofficial historian of the area, found Y E A R ~ M G G E S T o i n s ~ S i the end of this haircutting session, the prints when he was a young 1981, when Oklahoma sold i which took the better part of the man. He's found many more sets since 2,029,669,716 MCF (MCF stands for : morning, Charles was minus his beard, then, and continues to search for

Oklahoma TODAY 32

them. The Panhandle and the far i many Mr. Tucker has found, and they i HrOnEST #)IMW M southeastern part of the state are the i are accessible to the public. Those i Black Mesa. The State Highway only areas with Mesozoic strata, so i who decide to go track tracking, : Department marker lists the height as dinosaurs didn't make tracks : however, are advised to gain i 4,973 feet, but the official height anywhere else in Oklahoma. i permission from land owners before : according to the U.S. Geological

These prints are the best of the : making themselves to home. i Survey is 4,978.

PLLlCYFORAWORTHlM What better place to take a walk than one where there's as much room for the imagination to move around as there is for the body? Robber's Cave State Park, the readers' choice in this category, is such a place. Hikers here have plenty of local legend to feed their imaginations and a vista of ruggedly beautiful country on which to feast their eyes.

Located about six miles north of Wilburton in southeastern Oklahoma, Robber's Cave State Park reputedly was once the hideout of a variety of outlaws, including the Doolins, the Younger Brothers, the Dalton and Rufus Buck gangs, Henry Starr, "Machine Gun" Kelly, "Pretty Boy" Floyd, Belle Starr and the James Brothers. The walls of the cave in which these wild bunches supposedly hid themselves are silent as to the truth or falsehood of the stories. "May have" seems to be as good as a definite "did," however, as modem folks shod in hiking rather than cowboy boots throng to the area.

Kent Ruth reports that one colohl tale refuses to die. It holds that "Fiddlin' Jim," one who loved Belle Starr, was killed as he fiddled at the entrance to the cave. His murderer, the romantic legend continues, was a rival for this infamous beloved's hand. Some claim that on certain nights, especially when the harvest moon is shining just right, the haunting strains of Fiddlin' Jim's last song fill the crisp night air.

Be that as the case may be, there's no denying that those who wish to hike can do so with pleasure at Robber's Cave. The cave trail, 100 feet up the side of a, literally, breathtakingly steep sandstone cliff, is only one of many exciting and eye-pleasing paths through the area. In fact, the park offers more than 12 miles of hiking and backpacking trails. With some 8,000 acres of land and three lakes, the area allows for a variety of walkways through the pine forests of eastern Oklahoma.

One word of warning: The danger from outlaws and their ghosts may be questionable, but keep an eye up. This is also a favorite place for ;-rappellers. - ~ r .A. w.Brownlee, Tulsa. Black Mesa

: lOWCST~NTOYlAUD i A spot on the Little River in : McCurtain County, just before the i stream flows into Arkansas. The i official height, again according to the : U.S. Geological Survey, is 280 feet.

imnnurCAIE : Roosevelt Bridge, built over Lake i Texoma on State Highway 70 in the

early '40s. It's 4,900 feet long. II :This one begins here but ends in

Texas. It's the Willis Bridge that


crosses Red River on State Highway i was designated part of the famous 99. It's 5,400 feet long. : highway shortly after the federal

government declared in 1926 that lOlNQYSTR#AD State Highway 3, which runs from :: Route 66 would run from Chicago to

i Los Angeles. By 1936, Route 66 had : become Rerouted 66, and this portion i of it became a county section-line : road.

-border to border. Because of some : fancy routing somewhere between Ada and Shawnee, it's a longer road i going east than it is going west. From east to west, it runs 614.72 miles; i in the opposite direction it runs 606.81.

FIRST Although many people would guess i the Santa Fe Trail as the oldest road in i the state, many people have often : been wrong. In this case, they certainly i are. Before the Santa Fe, the @Id i Texas Road felt the footprints of many : a pioneer moving to Texas through i Indian Territory. Records show that i the road was used as early as 1821. : Located in the Osage Trace on the i west side of the Grand River, this i path through the wilderness later : served as a point of reference for the i M-K-T pailroad, which built its tracks i almost ~arallel to it and. much later, :

READERFAVORITW-J -. - . - . -.

SCENIC YIEW

It, too, runs almost parallel to the i road, about a mile or two west. EARUEST W S n N O SECIWN OF

66 For three and one-half miles of roadway beginning in Miami, a person i can still get his or her kicks on part : of the original Route 66. This section, i constructed sometime between 1919 i and 1924 as part of State Highway 7, :

to tho; who plotted out Highway 69. i I Far and away the readers' favorite in this category was the Talimena Scenic Drive, on State Highway 1 east of Talihina. This 35.12-mile drive, more familiar to most people as the "Skyline Drive," snakes its way along the crest of the Ouachita Mountains through the Ouachita National Forest. It's generally

' measured from the junction of U.S. 271 and S.H. 1 north of Talihina east to the Arkansas line. The frequent turnouts on the drive allow slow-driving motorists to stop and gasp at the brillantly colored hardwoods and pines that paint the area with such beauty during the leaf-turning months. --celvinWiles. Panama

WYIlRSTTllWNWIlYCK Occurred in Kellyville when, on Sept. 28, 1917, two Frisco trains collided. Twenty-three people were killed and 80 were injured. FIRST MI- ENl€R STAW The Missouri-Kansas-Texas (M-K-T), in 1871

OULY MI- TUNNEL In 1887, consuuction was completed on the 1,180-foot-long Jenson Tunnel, which as an example of expert

SWE SISNN : masonry consuuctibn has few equals.

Oklahoma TODAY 34

In addition to being our first and : pack here. Built in 1902-1903, the : County owns this beauty. The tree has only railroad tunnel, this one is the only i sandstonebuilding is a fine example of i a circumference of 43 inches, a one the U.S. ever built in a "foreign i Romanesque Revival architecture. i crown spread of 60 feet and 113 points. nation." When the tunnel was bored, it : Although several were built, this may : It stands 55 feet tall.- . was in the Choctaw Nation, in the i well be the only depot of this style

FIRST SHELliRBELT PIANIEDsoutheastern comer of what is now the i to survive in the Southwest. The most : Sooner State. Although its %-year- : impressive of its many striking : IN IIPA?lON

: One of the many programs begun byold shape limits ability to accommodate i features is its crenellated tower. Today : modem freight cars, the Jenson . President Franklin Roosevelt, thei the famous structure on Shawnee's . Tunnel, located on a branch of the : Main Street is home to the : Prairie States Forestry Project, got Frisco line, is still in use. i Pottawatomie County Historical i its start right here in Oklahoma. On

i Society's museum. : March 18, 1935, an Austrian pine ~ ~ R A I L K ~ D ~ W ~ ~ i that now stands more than 40 feet tall The Wewoka, of course. Located on i i was planted in Greer County north the north side of Wewoka, this '/z mile : : of Mangum on the Horace Curtis farm. of track with four cast-iron switch :

' - 3 F i This was the first tree in the first stands has recently been nominated for i i shelterbelt. The program, designed to the National Register. When the : j reduce windcaused soil erosion,Rock Island built this sidetrack station, t : went on to plant nearly 223 million it had no idea of its ultimate national : i trees in 18,599 miles of field fame. : windbreaks during its eight-year

During the Seminole Oil Field i -. i existence. In Oklahoma alone,boom of the 1920s, the idea of a : i 2,679 miles of shelterbelts on more railroad car "getting lost in the : than 5,000 firms held 20 million Wewoka Switch" became a popular i : trees. excuse for merchants who didn't . ----- - 5 : have what a customer wanted. In 1926, i i ~ O E S T T W E the Fixico No. 1 well came in, and ' : Between 1913 and 1936, East the area went crazy. Getting caught in : klahoma boasts three trees that i Qnual University at Ada waged a the Wewoka Switch became more qualify as the tallest of their type i fierce battle with the Srnithsonian than an inconvenience; it became a i in the nation. These national champs : Institution for some fragments of a nightmare. : are a red mulberry owned by the Clin- i petrified tree. ~~t this just

The phrase was pushed far I ton Combs Estate that is 61 feet tall : gq handful of extra-hard w&. No, it beyond the town boundaries of I and 249 inches around, a blackjack oak was the largest emple of the oldest Wewoka or the state line of owned by E. M. Robinson that is 48 i tree ever found, a 250,000,000-year-oldOklahoma. When folks who've never : feet tall and 169 inches around and a : Caiir;CUhn, even been dose to the place find i soapberry owned by Richard i The tree chunks were uncovered themselves in a bind, they might well i Downe~that is 75 feet tall and 90 inch- i by-what else?-mting pigs. Their refer to it. : es around. Our in-state records are as : owner, a Chickasaw Indian, told

i follows: FINEST R A I M : John Fitts, a local geologist, about what

0 i W r r S r m i the pigs drug in, and Fitts called in

8 : A sweetgum on the property of John i Dr. Davis White, head of the U.S. 2- i Shipp of Mdurtain County. This : Geological Survey in Washington,

: lumberjack's dream measures in at i D.C. Although Oklahomans weren't : 135 feet tall. i too wild about the idea, Dr. White

: mounted a full-scale effort to raise '"e-'Ieaa crraMFEmNCS i money to move the tree to thei Johnny Carson, Zsa Zsa Gabor and : Smithsonian. He died before he could

i Roone~w~~~~have room On i achieve his goal, however, and Fins : this sycamore to carve the names of i gave the uee to E~~~andin 1936.i a1 their spouses. It's 279 inches i To prove that the OK tree was: around, and is owned by Opal : OK left where it belonged, local folksi Domres of Tulsa County. i raised money enough to have the

Shawnee's Santa Fe Depot, listed on the National Register, leads the

i BIGWST REDBUD, SKAE mE : Thad McFarland in McCurtain

i fragments put together in the shape of : a tree trunk. It sits on the Ada


campus today, a reminder that the big guys don't always beat the little guys.

T he Oklahoma Wildlife Depart- i ment k e e ~ s records on catches :

Oklahoma anglers report to them. Re- i cord holders range from a 1-pound-15- i ounce goldeye that Jerry Murphy i caught in Tom Steed Reservoir to the : following fish, so big that the anglers i didn't even need to lie about them.

LAWEST FlSH CAUGHTBY ROD AND UNE Dean Owens dropped the water level of the Neosho River by at least an i inch on March 21, 1984, when he i caught a mammoth paddlefish. Also : known as a spoonbill, this fish weighed in at 100 pounds even. It was 55 inches long and had a girth of : 39/4 inches.

FlSH CAUGHT BY OTHER LEGAL MZANS Red River gave UD, with glee, no - . i doubt, a 1%-pou~d-12-ounce alligator :

Although his teeth are once again all white, that color is only half the story in the rest of Cecil's life. "I own only red and white clothes, except," he confesses, "for one black suit I wear to funerals. But I won't wear it to my own."

Wearing red and white clothing 365 days a year is a hard habit to break. So at his own funeral, Cecil says,

"I'll wear red and white, of course. I've had the whole thing arranged for 20 years. My casket is red and white, and I'll be posed with my index finger pointing up for #1, the only way I've allowed myself to be photographed for years. I'm going to have red and white carnations and three flags flying: Old Glory, the Oklahoma State flag and the OU flag. I want the

gar to David Uhles in July of 1984. : B

This mammoth representative of the :: i. ugliest fish in thestate (perhaps the . u

: 3 world) was 84 inches long and 33% : Y,

inches around. -ST RESERVOIR Lake Eufaula, with 102,500 surface : acres BIGGEST W FAN Wearing your heart on your sleeve is : one thing, but wearing your favorite i football team's name on your front : teeth is auite another. ~ idahoma f Citian ~e 'ci l Samara, the undisputed i champion booster of the OU Sooners, i may have retired his chompers inlaid : with red enamel letters spelling Big i Rd-but he hasn't forgotten them. i He wore them for four years, and : didn't get to finish a meal in a restaurkt during the whole time. i "The last straw came," he remembers, "when I was eating an i expensive steak at Applewoods. By

READER FAVOR11-FISHING HOLE Oklahoma is known for the beauty of its lakes and for the high-quality fishing of all sorts these jewels offer. However, while many lakes were called, none

restricting the cri- n teria for federal as- sistance in build-

the time I smiled and had mv ~icture: taken all the times I was askkd, my i steak was cold."

Oklahoma TODAY 36

music to be the National Anthem, i and sitting in on classes. He recalls, "Boomer Sooner" and "When the : "The professors would slip me Roll is Called Up Yonder, 1'11 Be i paper and pencils and lend me books. There." "There," Cecil continues, Without OU, I don't know where "is upstairs on the 50 yard line : I'd be today. Everything I've gained in watching OU play." i life, I've gained through OU." He

: shares all he gains by turning his red-g! and-white mania into money for 5 charitable organizations. His most

1.g i recent projeG is the Make-A-Wish 'i program sponsored by local law-! enforcement groups. : -a W N ELNATOR : Union Equity Co-operativei Exchange owns the state's largesti elevator, built in the mid-'50s. It's : located in Enid and holds 16.3 million: bushels of wheat, and that ain't hay.

The extremes to which Cecil has taken his fan-atic love of OU are meant to be amusing. The teeth, the "Big Red Rockett" 1923 Model T Ford, the red station wagon with the OU logo on each side are fun for Cecil and for other fans. But seriously, folks, Cecil dotrr care for OU deeply. Too

This giant among elevators can accommodate 42 rail cars on one side and 50 on the other. It can receive 13 rail cars per hour, with each car holding 3,300 bushels of grain. That totals out to about 42,000 bushels of wheat per hour, or more than 1 millon bushels a day.

poor to attend school past ;he third i BIOOEST YELIR grade, Cecil made up a lot of his : war -ON education reading at the OU library i 1982, with 228 million bushels

ago, the SCS was assisting on between 2,000 and 3,000 ponds a year. (They'.. now help only with ponds built to control erosion.)

The average farm pond has a surface area of one acre; depths vary according to terrain and the part of the state in which the pond is located. Western ponds must be deeper than eastern, for instance, so they won't dry up. Most, however, are at least 8 to 10 feet deep at the dam.

For help with fish to put in that 8 to 10 feet of water once the pond is filled, the owner goes to the De~artmentof Wildlife Conservation. In the fall. thev

a 4

give him oyher 500 bluegil and 100 catfish per surface acre, and in the spring 100 bass. By the second year, the bluegill are up to 6 inches long, and by the third the bass will weigh in at 2 to 2% pounds.

If Eve hadn't eaten the apple, this perfectly stocked pond would remain in the perfect balance this initial fish dump places it in. She did, however, and nothing remains perfect for long. Excited anglers tend to deplete the bass population too rapidly, leaving too many bluegill in relation to the bass. The bluegill then eat bass eggs, and the bass population is soon zero.

The key to maintaining balance is to restrict greed. If those who fish farm ponds take out no more than 15 pounds of bass per acre per year, balance will reign. If anglers just can't stop themselves from overdoing it, the SCS will do a balance check and recommend corrective measures. -B. DO^ Davis, a-01

: BIGGEST YCdR M C;ATIZE AND i CCUWS IN-: 1975, when this industry, the i biggest in the state, listed 6% million i head of cattle and calves.

: ONLYOMAHOMAHORSETOWINi KENll lcmDERBY(S0~ : The aptly named Black Gold, who i raced to win in the golden jubilee

Derby of 1924. His dam was a : "county-fair" sprinter named Useeit;i his sire was the famous stallion i Black Toney. His owner was Rosa : Hoots, an Osage. "The Indian colt" ! was a crowd pleaser who fooled the i odds-makers. At first a 30-1 long : shot, he went to the post at 2-1.

i Mosr HOlRSES M R HMO IN U.S. i We may lose out to our big-sister : states, California and Texas, in total ! horse population, but when it comes : to number of horses per capita we win, : heads up. The Hone Industry! Directory allows us 308,000; other : estimates range upwards of 500,000.i If you take the lower figure, that's .09 i of a horse for every Sooner.

i WNNlNoEsr HoRss IN : Eastex, an Ada-bred quarterhorse : owned by dentist H. D. Hall and his

wife, P e m lo. In his racine career,. -, -i Eastex has won $1,836,179zand is : still running. That makes him the i leading money-earner among : quarterhorses in the USA. (By the i way, in 1985 he nosed out another Ada i horse for this title-Mr Master Bug, : owned by Marvin and Lela Barnes,i who's won $1,793,718.)

i FIRST FlAG TO FLY OVER : The Royal Standard of Spain was i brought to Oklahoma by Coronado in i 1541. After this first flag, Oklahoma : saw 12 more before adopting our i official state flag in 1925. In order, : those that came after the first andI: before the 14th and final are:

Great Union flag of Great Britian Royal Flag of France Standard of the Empire of Spain Standard of the French Republic The United States Flag, which had 15

stars and 15 stripes


The United States Flag, which had 20 stars and 13 stripes

The Flag of Mexico The First Texas Flag The Lone Star Flag of Texas The Choctaw Flag The Confederate Battle Flag The first Oklahoma State Flag

S M U S T C O U m Marshall, with 360 square miles

URGESTCOUm Osage, with 2,293 square miles M Y CWMY IN UNmD SWFS B B R E D BY FNE STmS Cimarron County, which is touched by parts of Texas, New Mexico, Colorado, Kansas and, of course, ~klahoma FIRST WHm m M E N T Ferdinandia, near what is now Newkirk. A trading post was established there in the 1720s. At present, the site is on private property and not open to the public.

OLDESTSSlTLEMENTSnU UOSnNo Salina, which Major Jean Pierre Chouteau first visited in 1796, became an established trading post in the early 1800s.

FIRSTSiCH001, pRINnNe MESS AND MOI€STANT MI-Union Mission, opened in September 1821 to minister to the Osages. The site is five miles east of Mazie in Mayes County.

OLDEST MIWARY P#ST Fort Gibson, in Muskogee C o u n ~ , was in This OutPost was a popular embarkation point for exploratory expeditions into Indian country and the site of many treaty signings. It was briefly abandoned in 1857, taken over for a short time by the Confederates during the Civil War and later reoccupied by Federal troops. In 1890, it was permanently abandoned.

Fort Gibson earned the nickname "Graveyard of the Army" when in its first 11% years 570 men died there. It seems that the combination of hard labor and poor living conditions, moistened by easily obtainable bad

.W

: i liquor, was a deadly one. The fort's i 72 hours). Muskogee War Memorial . : Park, where the Ba@h is docked, : residents had a reputation for : intemperance, and desertions were i was formally dedicated on Memorial i commonplace. Punishment was often i Day, 1973. i meted out in the still-standing : FIRST RLEPHONE COHMRSAMm : stocks, a favorite of tourists today. : -ME-i Tourists can also see the log : This tale comes from Only ini stockade with the enlisted men's and : Ok]a,ijoma, by C. W. u ~ west:~ y

i ~fficers' quarters, the guardhouse, : 1t ,ms that a 16-year-old : OUO and : Cherokee named Ed Hicks brought

widethe are i the first commercial phone to what i many more buildings and ruins. The : was not then the Sooner State in 1886. : fort is open from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m., i Starting in Tahlequah and stringing : Monday through Saturday, and from 1 i lines as they went, Hicks and his crew i to 7 on Sunday dudng b l i g h t : reached Fort Gibson on Aug. 6, i Savings Time. It closes at 5 when we 1 1886. One of the workmen men : revert to Standard Time. i i J. Stapler, Hicks' uncle, waiting in

i Tahlequah. The workman said, : ONLY SZIBWRINE BER~HED i IN : "Hello. Who is this?" Stapler i Two tow boats and six flotilla barges i replied, "This is the devil, and I'm : brought this submarine through 15 :

: coming after you."

i locks of the McClellan-Kerr : rOWN MOST BEHIND HE ME i Navigation System to its current home i Truman Tucker, a lifelong resident : near the Port of Muskogee. The i of the Panhandle, says of Kenton, "If i U.S.S. Ba@h, a 323-foot vessel with : you want to get confused, just ask i 1,800 tons of displacement, i what time it is." He's right, because : travelled 1,350 miles from Port Orange, i Kenton is the only town in i Texas. The Baf ih holds the record : Oklahoma not on Central Time. i for sinking the most enemy subs in a i Truman thinks local businessmen : single patrol during WWII (three in i decided to count the minutes with

Oklahoma TODAY 38

those on Mountain Time in the late '20s. Since most locals shop in New Mexico and watch television shows that originate in Colorado, both Mountain Time states, that works out OK. However, school kids living in Kenton attend classes in Boise City, which is on Central Time, so households where they live set their clocks in time with the rest of Oklahoma.

Galen R. Smith, pastor of the Wheeless Baptist Church, may have it toughest of all. Every Sunday he drives 20 minutes from his home in Kenton to preach a 10:30-11:30 service at his church. He then drives 20 minutes home and preaches a second service in Kenton at 11. Either he's aging twice as fast as most of us, or he'll never get an hour older.-

S I E H S T rnNAME Moral. Brooks Walker named this town for his success in preventing saloons at the townsite.

FUNNIEST SENENCE W E FROM TOWN NAMES Sallisaw Henryetta Wagoner Catoosa. LOOSYST row NAME Row, as in fight. Colcord since 1930, this town earned its first name because

: of its large number of drunken i for items with "I'm slap out of that : brawls and killings. - : today."i." 9' : MOST-mWNNAM€S.:: -1: Perdue, Veto and Vamoosa, all of lp'"

which no longer exist. Given the state :L of the world today, Reason, which is :?" also no longer in existence, is a close

runner-up here. :

: 1 Needmore. This was the original d : name of Bernice, but residents

i : changed it in 1913. It means exactly what it says: Folks were poor there.

I \ m: i FUNNIEST TOWN NAME i No doubt about it. The fiberglass : Slapout. One story with several : beaver that sits atop its own trailer in its i variations explains the origins of this i own little niche on Main Street of i name. The basic plotline has a : Beaver wins, tails down. This 600-: storekeeper answering most requests : pound, 14-foot-tall beauty came to i

awu 7vWN Guthrie may not have held onto its right to be the state's capital, but it's won our readers' hearts as the best small town the state has to offer. This may well be because with its famous restoration, Guthrie has made itself look like the hometown many of us remember, no matter what its name. Guthrie began as the territorial capital, and consisted of nothing more than a collection of tents and rough-hewn wooden buildings. With time, however, it grew to be a beautiful Victorian city. With more time, progress began to run the past out of town. Before it was too late, residents decided to restore and renovate.

They found 60 of the central buildings had survived the ravages of moderni- ty; only five were lost. With millions of dollars in private money and support from public programs, Guthrie was born again. Today, the 1910 Pollard Theatre, the State Capital Printing Co.building and iust about all of downtown Guthrie play host to -those who enjoy seeing& dast living in the present.

One of the highpoints of a tour of the town is a visit to the Oklahoma Territorial Museum, which presents exhibits on all phases of life in territorial times. Many works by favorite- son artist Frederick Olds are also on display. The museum is attached to the Carnegie Library, which may be the only one built with a gymnasium and a music conservatory. Tom Mix was the first gymnastics teacher when the library was completed in 1902. Another of the most famous sights

i and sites in the city is the Scottish

i :


Beaver in 1976 from a manufacturer in i over the activities with a cow chip at Wisconsin. The town raised the : least 2 feet in diameter rather than a . money through donations, change cans i scepter clutched in his two front in local stores and projects dreamed i paws. That's right. The 14-foot up by school children. : fiberglass beaver is standing on its i

During Beaver's famous annual i hind legs and holding a 2-foot fiberglass : Cow Chip Throw, this big guy reigns : cowchip. Some unsuspecting visitors i

1 i;lREADER FAVORITE PJlCJVIC SPOT Readers obviously see red when asked to choose a winner in this area; Red Rock Canyon takes the honors here. This very rugged, very red valley almost hidden by the green rolling plains around it is located '/z mile south of Hinton on U.S. 281. The state park covers about 310 acres, and it includes a small lake, a swimming pool, hiking trails, fishing areas, playgrounds and tent and RV camping areas for those who want to have another picnic tomorrow.

As they chew their lunch, picnickers can ruminate on the fact that during the mid-1800s, the California Road, a major wagon trail, passed through the canyon. Ruts carved by the wagons' wheels are still to be seen in the sandstone.

They can also try to digest the fact that similar canyons occur in Caddo and i to the town have been known to ask in Canadian counties, and that all have been cut in the Whitehorse formation, a i all innocence why the town decided soft, massive red sandstone of the Permian xed beds. The Whitehorse was i to have their mascot hold a honeybun.

' formed about 200 million years ago. The canyons range up to several miles long and 100 to 200 feet deep. Red Rock itself is about 1% miles long and 80 to 90 he famous "If you don't like feet deep at its deepest point. the weather in Oklahoma, wait a

As they down their iced tea and colas, visitors can also drink in the beauty of : minute" is a comment based more the forest of sugar maples that line the bottom of Red Rock. These Caddo i on fact than fancy. Those fearless .maples occur 175 miles farther west than the usual range of sugar maples, and i individuals who never blink for fear many of them reach 75 feet in height. -Karen Donyai, OKC : they'll miss a major weather

i WlEmSTw : 1957, when the Kiamichi Tower in i LeFlore County recorded 84.47 inches i of water that fell from the sky : DRIEST YEAR i 1972, in Eva town. Less than an i inch of rain, .34 to be exact, fell. : COLDESTMr ! We've never had a colder dav than

I I -27 degrees Fahrenheit, and ke've hit 1 Ii that toGfrostine; level only twice:

: Feb. 13, 1905,~in Vinita, -and Jan. 18, : 1930, in Watts. II: : Actually, this honor, if you want to : call it that, goes to several locations on

Oklahoma TODAY

several days. However, all but one of the readings occurred in one year, f PUCE TO TAKE A RIDE ON HORSEBACK 1936. July 18 and 19 of that year saw f Lake Murray is the equestrians' choice for a long canter. The riding stables the mercury hit 120 degrees in Alva : there are open year-round, offering trail rides and hayrides as well as plain old and Altus, respectively. On August f horse rental for individuals. Moonlight rides, beginning at dusk and lasting 1 '/r 1, Poteau felt the same sizzle, and on hours, are a popular variation, with night riders in groups of 10 or more picking August 10 Altus joined the : their way along trails transformed by moonlight. simmering crowd. It wasn't until July f For those who want a night out of the town, overnight campouts are 26, 1943, that Tishomingo entered i available. For these the minimum is 16 people, and the per-person charge for this Hell of Fame. : the trip includes an evening steak dinner and breakfast the next morning. This

i ride leaves at noon and returns at the same time the following day. -Vinson H. Shields, Sherman, Texas

i maximum width was two miles, and i "Dewey," both of which are towns in the : the length of its path was 221 miles. : state, and "Enid" spelled backward is i Although it destroyed the measuring i "Dine." Dine is not a town in the state, but : devices it passed over, experts estimate : it's at the base of one of two theories : that its wind speeds were 200 to 250 : about how Enid got its name. The fdncier f miles per hour. The good Come

: theory is that a Rock Island official

1 out of this waste-laying whirlwind named it after a chamer in Tennyson's: 14/h King. However, Others: was a change in thinking about i preparation for such storms. New

: believe that a group of cattle drovers turned i the "Dine" sign on a cmktent backward i attitudes and procedures, along with : ,so that it spelled Enid. Those drovers were

: advances in technology, have made : such rogues! (Ruth KingGray, Vita)i it possible today to reduce tornado i : fatalities considerably. : +Geronimo died at Fort Sill in 1907. : ODDESTGWAGE : (Dr.and Mrs. Homer A. Brown)

" How odd is it? Odd enough to make , +Cockleburrs were called "Alfalfd Bill F : it into a "Ripley's Believe It Or Not" campaign buttons." FE . column, and that's pretty odd. This (Dan and Emma Moore, V i t a ) $ Grandfield structure located on U.S. 70 2 i was the creation of the late Floyd +Roy Rogers and Dale Evans were : Svlvester. In the earlv '30s. Mr. married near Davis. (c.A. Lawrence)

~ilvester, an employee of the Bell wr)RsT-

It roared into Oklahoma due west of Oil and Gas Refinery, built the +Cherokee Stand Watie was the last Arnett along State Highway 51 and building, which measured 24 by 12 Confederate general to surrender.

roared out again along State feet, out of cement and quart oil cans, (Mie Hutton, Norman)

the latter of which were made of FIRSIS AND FORE- AT WHighway 281 north of Alva. Ground steel at that time. This garage, built Since OSU began to get the nation's and aerial surveys strongly suggest when economic times were tough, is attention on the football field, the that for this entire path of about 90 a great example of Oklahoma makin' name "Aggie" has become less the miles, it didn't leave the ground. This devastating weather event, do and, more precisely, can do. punchline for tired jokes and more a commonly recaced as "the one'that label betokening respect. Long blew Woodward away," hit Oklahoma before Pat Jones began to stalk the on April 9, 1947. It also damaged sidelines with his now famous Texas and Kansas, killing 185 people, "Oklahoma Aggies" sweater, however,

OSU deserved that respect. While injuring more than 1,000 and fools were wasting their time destroying more than $10 million worth

of property. In Woodward alone, it developing Aggie jokes, the Aggies

killed 105 and injured 720; dollar were spending theirs wisely

damages in Oklahoma were fixed at developing, among other things, the $8.1 million. The storm capable of following: causing such devastation ra;lks : BRSWmwmmmW f +The first and still only vaccine among the top 10 of all time. Its : +"Yewed" spelled backward is : against anaplasmosis, a disease that once

January-February '86 4 1

wiped out whole herds of cattle. The vaccine, which was released in 1965, cost $750,000 to develop; in this first year of use, it saved U.S. cattlemen $35 million.

+The first red crepe myrtle bush. +The ktest growing tree, a cottonwood, for pulp-wood production. In just three years, the OSU tree will gmw 6 inches thick at the trunk.

+A cattle ear tag that repels insects. Working like a dog's flea collar, this tag protects its bovine bearer from ticks and certain flies.

+A water additive that protects chickens from heat and humidity. In 1980, 20 million broiler chickens died from these two causes; OSU estimates that if the hapless hens had been given water laced with this additive, 16million of them would have made it.

+Short sorghum. Sorghum used to stand much taller than a man and to have drooping heads. OSU developed shorter varieties and bred strength into the stems to hold the heads up straight. Because of these improvements, irmers were able to replace expensive hand harvesting with mechanical.

+In addition to all these, OSU also claims the first building constructed in Oklahoma for higher education. The recently restored Old Central building, which is now a museum, was erected in 1894. FIRSlSINOMAClOlklAAMDl?fEhWKm Although environmentalists tell us now that it's no good for the ozone, the aerosol can revolutionized liquid product packaging and marketing when it was introduced in 1942. A Bartlesville resident, Lyle Goodhue, put the pssust in the cans.

This next Oklahoma first gets mixed reactions, with the majority on the negative side. Carl Magee of Oklahoma City unveiled the first parking meter on July 16, 1935. It wasn't all his fault, though. It seems a member of the Chamber of Commerce Trafiic Committee asked him in 1933 to help solve the parking problem downtown. Under cover of night on July 15, 1935, workmen installed 180 "Park-o-Meters."

i No one has anything bad to say i about our last first; it's the shopping : cart, and the world has Oklahoman i Sylvan N. Goldman to thank for it. i Observing in his Ardmore grocery

i R E l W R FAVORITE! : SWIMMING HOLE

: store that people bought only as much i as they could carry, Goldman

decided to make it possible for them to i carry a lot. In 1935 he introduced : the first model. i Norman sculptor Lena Beth i Frazier has just completed a bronze : sculpture commemorating this boon i to comfortable consumerism. i Goldman's sons, Alfred D. and : Monte H. Goldman, commissioned the i work. It shows the late Mr. : Goldman standing with one hand on i the 1955 model of his invention. i The subject himself dictated the cart's i contents: a loaf of bread, a carton of : eggs, a carton of milk, a box of cereal : and a stalk of celery. The sculpture

i Whether you're a toe-tester or a belly-flopper, you're best off immersing i yourself in Turner Falls according to our reader pool. Turner Falls Park, in the : heart of the Arbuckle Mountains, is the oldest park in Oklahoma. Springs that

flow down from the mountains form Honey Creek, which cascades down a 77- f foot waterfall into a beautiful swimming area. : A Tourism and Recreation Department brochure once described Turner

Falls as one of three geological windows into our past. (The Grand Canyon and i the Black Hills of South Dakota are the other two.) Relatively recent history : shows that by as early as 1868 this was a popular recreation area. The City of i Davis operates the 720-acre park. -Dr. Gene L. Muse, OKC

: ONE-MYADYZNIURE i With one day to spend doing anything they wanted, readers chose to pack up i all their cares and woes, head out to the Illinois River and jump into a canoe. : The top stretch of this beautiful waterway, called the Upper Illinois, runs for i 70 miles above Lake Tenkiller; the lower Illinois continues for 12 more miles : below Tenkiller Dam. Both sections have many commercial canoe float ser- i vices available, all of which supply canoes, paddles, life preservers and shuttle i service to launching points. Those who like to paddle their own canoes can set : in at several public-access points. i The Upper Illinois has an abundance of small-mouth bass, fishing for which i can easily while away an afternoon's time. During early spring, the annual sand : bass spawning run attracts avid anglers from all over the state. The Lower i Illinois is the state's only year-round designated trout fishing stream, and the i state stocks it with 98,000 new trout each year. : If you'd rather just float along than fish, that's fine, too. The easy-flowing i Illinois offers long stretches of peaceful water interrupted with mild rapids. i Canoers can choose to spend anywhere from a half hour to five days on the : water, traveling from one to 70 miles. The Cookson Hills, which surround the i river, offer beautiful flats and high cliffs; they're at their best in the Sparrow i Hawk Mountain area, where huge bluffs suggest that civilization is much : farther away than it actually is. -David HUE,Killeen, Texas

Oklahoma TODAY

will remain as a permanent exhibit in front of the Sylvan N. Goldman Room at Oklahoma City's Kirkpatrick Center. FIRST DEOREE IN CCUlNIRY & m R N MUSK: Rogers State College in Claremore was the first in our state to take country and Western music out of the barroom and put it in the classroom when they began offering associate degrees in the field in the mid-'70s. Right now they have some 17 majors, who take courses like "Country Harmony I & 11" and "Progressive Country Band"; the latter course takes C&W out of the classroom and puts it back in the barroom. Actually, the students perform at banquets, fairs, rodeos and a variety of other places all around the U.S.

The Hank Thompson School of Country Music allows aspiring mangers and plunkers to play around with the likes of Leon McAuliffe and Eldon Shamblin, and to fiddle around with Jana Jae. The Great Southwest is only one of several musical groups that allow the students to learn by doing as they travel and peform.

01' Hank may not have done it quite thisaway, but the school has supplied Roy Clark with a couple of band members and Me1 McDaniels with a lead guitarist. Other graduates are actively performing in various capa ' 'es in the field.

: FIRST CCUlRlWUS TO BE BUILT A m R SlAl€=

i The Love County Courthouse in Marietta was begun in 1907 and became a functioning seat of county business in 1910. Listed on the

i National Register, this building of

i Georgian design with Gothic and Victorian features is famous for its

i Corinthian columns and rounded

i tower. It's one of only two in the

: state with working clocks in their clock towers.

i OLDBTROUNDMRN In 1898, William Harrison Odor

: i : i i

I

i 8 :E

: began construction on this one of only i three round barns in the state. The i barn is 60 feet in diameter and 43 feet : in height. It took six months to i build from the time oxen began to clear i the ground for it. To shape : the rafters, Odor soaked green burr- : oak timber in water until it was soft i enough to bend into a specially : designed form. The joists, studs and i other dimension lumber are of oak i 'that came from the farm. It's hirly : dilapidated at present, but the : Arcadia round barn is enshrined forever i on the National Register. : OIVLY-FOLKART : ENWRONMENT SnU EX7Sl7NG IN S W E i Four and one-half miles east of Foyil : on State Highway 28-A is a one-acre i site known as Ed Galloway Park. In i it stand several of the most unusual : structures in our state. Although i specific dates are available for only a : few, Ed Galloway completed all of

i i : i i

i i : i :

' READER FAVORITE

SklAU MUSEUM If you combine woods, lakes and rocks, what do you get? If your answer is ORMoma, you're wrong. The state may have all of the above, but only a small part of it has the right combination. Woolaroc, whose name comes from the first letters of the three Oklahoma staples, is the right answer to this question and the favorite small museum of many of our readers.

Frank Phillips dreamed of a place that would show the development of man in the southwestern U.S., and Woolaroc is the realization of that dream. The museum building sits amid 4,000 acres of wilderness with more than 1,000wild animals roaming through it. In the museum are more than 55,000 exhibits.

The building housing this treasure trove, which is located 14 miles southwest of Bartlesville, is constructed of native sandstone cut from cliffs on the original ranch. Inside, the rooms are arranged chronologically from earliest man in the New World to the present.

Among the most interesting of the holdings is the group of all 12 models that were submitted as possibles for Ponca City's Pioneer Woman Statue. After passing by a large . . selection of Remingtons, Russells and Leighs in the five

an amalgamation of everything from an early tractor to priceless Chinese artifacts to a stuffed and mounted bongo, the rarest of African antelopes.

The museum is open Tues- day through Sunday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. -0. Duane Chancellor, Shawnee -

Y .

3 2 : I 11 !!;$ :

m .

,

them before 1962. They include, among others, an 11-sided, single-story fiddle house with interior and exterior walls extensively carved and painted with landscape scenes; a carved and painted tree; a carved 12-foot arrowhead.

The pike de htaance, however, is a 60-foot-tall totem pole with five floors, the interior and exterior of which are carved and painted. Built in an elongated tipi shape, the totem pole is 30 feet in circumference at the base. Bas-relief carvings of flora, fauna and Indian heads in profile wearing full headdresses cover the exterior. The interior walls of the first floor are plastered and painted with landscape scenes, and circling the wall at waist level are carved medallions shaped like shields. The walls of the other four levels, which are accessible by a ladder that extends through openings in the center of

each ceilingMoor, are plastered and painted but not carved. MOSTIMPO@lWTROCJY The winner of this title is set in a pasture about six miles west of Davis. It's a 54 x 18-x 18-inch sandstone slab set in a pile of stones 6 feet in diameter and 3 feet high. Carved on its west side are the letters 1.P. Carved on its east side are I d . Mer. and on its north, 1870. From this rock, called "Initial Point," the legal

KLAPER FAVORITE 1 m

PLACE FOR BIRDWATCHING Although the state offers several acclaimed nature centers, readers, like Doro-thy in lie Wizard of Oz, believe "There's no place like home." That's right. The favorite place for noticing a northern cardinal or for peeking at a pine siskin seems to be in your own backyards.

Recognizing this before our poll, the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation's Non-game Wildlife Program has produced a booklet entitled "Attracting Birds" that tells you exactly how to make your backyard a friendly "island of habitat" in a hostile urban sea.

The booklet explains how to provide the three basic requirements for survival that will convince those just passing over to drop in. The proper combination of food, cover and water will do the trick. With only a short time invested in reading, you can find out that the juncos are fond of seeds, while the woodpeckers lean more toward suet. By following the guidelines for landscaping and building shelters, you can create your own backyard aviary in no time.

For the interested, the following are the most common backyard birds in Oklahoma: - ~ m . Gladys C. inc cede, CIaremore

red-bellied woodpecker American goldfinch' blue jay* CamLa chickadee Mted titmouse white-breasted nuthatch northern cardinal* Harris sparrow# dark-eyed junco purple finch

*Most common of all #Winter only fSummer only I

: descriptions of most Oklahoma i property are determined. Its full, i legal name is "The Indian Base Line : and Meridian," and it was set in i 1870. i From this point, where the east-: west Base Line intersects the north-: south Indian Meridian, a grid of : some 2,000 36-square-mile townships

I

': spreads out to include all the state ! except the Panhandle. - ~ iw- OKC

FIRST E A W S -ED FOR RE- IN SUE In a project that's a national as well as a state first, the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation successfully hatched 13 of 18 eagle eggs removed from nests in the wilds of Florida. Working in cooperation with the George Miksch Sutton Avian Research Center and OSU, the conservationists placed six eaglets in the Sequoyah National Wildlife Refuge in late March of

i 1985when thesix were about 10 weeks : old. The point of this project is to i encourage nesting in the state. We i won't know if the six will return to : Oklahoma to nest for about four or five i years, since they won't reach sexual i maturity until then. The 1985 count of : bald eagles showed 600, down from: a record of 794 the year before. i However, none of them nests here. : The six born and bred as Okies will,i we hope, change all that.

: IWSTUNlBUt m F E S l M A L i Gate draws this honor, metacarpals : down. Annually since 1976, this i Panhandle town has sponsored a i Bone Pickin' Festival, complete with a : bone pickin' competition. In this,:' contestants line up about 50 feet from a i big line of cattle bones gathered : from local pastures. When the clock i starts, participants race to gather upi an armload of bones, suiving to get as : close to 10 pounds as possible. Each i must gather up at least that much to i qualify. Time is a hctor, since each : second involved in getting the armload i counts as an ounce. So, if someone : gathers up 10 pounds and 3 ounces of

44 Oklahoma TODAY

RHNIC F E r n A L OR POW wow By a wide margin the American Indian Exposition held every August in Anadarko took this category. It's no wonder, because it's the biggest and most colorful party thrown by any ethnic group in the state. This August will see the 55th exposition at the Caddo County Fairgrounds, and like all the others this one will draw participants and observers from all over the U. S.

Approximately 10,000 Plains Indians from 14 different tribes travel from all over the country to attend. The tribes represented are the Apache, Arapaho, Caddo, Cheyenne, Comanche, Delaware, Fort Sill Apache, Iowa, Kiowa, Osage, Otoe Missouria, Pawnee, Ponca and Wichita.

Although the American Indian Exposition began in 1931, it wasn't officially called that until 1935. What began as a general fair and farming exhibition has grown now to a beautiful renewal of tribal customs and rituals, which non-Indians are privileged to see. The highlight of the exposition is the World Championship Fancy War Dance Finals, but for six days all kinds of goings-on make a visit well worth your while.

An annual pageant presenting the history of the Plains Indian, horse and greyhound racing, a carnival midway with rides and arts and crafts exhibits presenting the finest in Indian jewelry, featherwork, sculpture and painting are all available. In addition, visitors can watch war dances, the Apache fire dance, the Plains Friendships Dance and the Kiowa Eagle Dance.

For 1986 exposition dates and a schedule of events call the Oklahoma Tourism and Recreation Department Literature Distribution Center at (405) 521-2409 Or toll free at 1-800-652-6552. -Fred Schmidt, Brooklyn,New York

bones and takes 20 seconds to do it, i homesteaders who made a living in his or her total would be 11 pounds and : No Man's Land by taking a wagonload 7 ounces. The 20 seconds would of cattle and buffalo bones to Dodge translate to 1 pound and 4 ounces, you i City and selling them to buy food. see. Enthusiastic townspeople are : When times were tough, bone trying now to find another town to i selling provided the only income for compete against. i many in the area.

This sounds real.!^ bizarre until : you understand why Gate does it; then i it sounds just sliQt4 bizarre. The : BESWEP~SECRET event is meant to honor the : Even though Hoyt Axton blabbed it

I;Senamu thatappear0thend of some stdo., Jlubine, vicc president of corporate wmmunicacior-

of hii anick acRnowkd& maah who sent h and business development, Union Equity Cooperative Exchange; John Cochrane, state statistician, Dept. of

h h in. In swa/ instoma, mom &+an one Agriculfun, Rick Conner, manager, Statistical Dept. of &sent in de same &;defint &who Oil & Gas Conservation; EUen Cooter, Oklahoma Cli-

matological Survey; Don Driscoll, Depr of Wnldlife wmk? in iiI&&. Conservation; Mary M. Evans, reference librarian, ECU; Connie Golden, publisher, and Linda Dunning, rcscarch editor, S ' a s c magazine; Joan Graham,

~)MOIM Depr of Wddlife Conservation; Ma~y Grimm, McAles- ZUDN would like m h o w l e d g e the following m s for their help with Fmts, Bests& Favor- ter, Mehrina Hirsh, Oklahoma Historical Society; Jack ites: K a y L. Bmwn, author, lie Itok in 0kMom.z; Jungmth, Wahoma Horse Council; Guy Logsdon, Uni- Don Burgess. Severr Storms Center, N a n q Calhoon, versity of Tulsa; h m l Magee, director, HankThomp executive director, Beaver Chamber of Commerce; F n d son School of Country Music, Rogers State College; Causky. Agriculture Information Center, OSU; I M ~ Ematine Maphet, postmistress, Gate, OK; Carl Miller,


in his television commercial for pizza, most people still don't know that Oklahoma i the cultural center of the universe. Theatre Tulsa, a national award winning group, has been around for 63 years. T-Town also boasts the

: Tulsa Opera and the Tulsa Ballet i Theatre, the latter of which made a i successful New York City debut in : 1983. In Oklahoma City, there's the i Oklahoma Symphony, one of the finest i orchestras in the Southwest, and : both the Lyric Theater and the i Oklahoma Theater Center offer up

a variety of high-class productions each : year. In addition, Ballet Oklahoma i in OKC is growing rapidly under the i artistic direction of Edward Villella. : We also have much to brag on in many i of our smaller towns and cities; i Bartlesville and Enid, for example, : both have their own highly i respected symphonies. : Gaining fame rapidly, too, is the i Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute,i which brings nationally known : professional artists in all areas to Quartz i Mountain every summer. Amid a i starkly beautiful setting, they teach : approximately 200 teen-agers who i have won the honor through i competitive audition. In the fill, the : institute offers the same calibre of i instruction to adults. Because of all i this activity and much more, the i National Endowment for the Arts : has awarded the State Arts Council of i Oklahoma a challenge grant of i $200,000. T o receive such a grant, the : organization must "demonsaate a i high level of artistic excellence that : reaches out to a regional or national i audience." Oklahoma's doing both.

assistant planning director, Depr of Transportation; Henryk Orlowski, urban forester, Dept of Agriculture; Hamld Plam, assistant bridge engineer. Dept. of Trans- portation; Laura PoUard, Non-game Wddlife Pmgram, Depr of Wildlife Conservation; Jan D. Rogers. public information director, State Am Cwncil of Oklahoma; Jim Rogers, assistant pmfessor of geology, CSU;Kent Ruth, author, 0,Moma T m I H a n h a k , W i d m s on lrL Past;Gcorge Shirk's 0)MomaP k Namu: Mrs. Galen R. Smith and Ttuman Tucker, Kenton: Mark Teders, naturalist, Lake Murray; Billy Tels, state biologist, Soil Conservation Service; Blym Todd, park manager, Lake Murray Resort; C. W. "Dub" West, author, Omb in Okhhoma; Carl W~lkins, National Weather Service; Mel- ba Wyatt, correspondent, Wioiba Fak h r d @ 7imu.

45

In Oklahoma, there's more to

winter than sleet and snow.

The colors of the season shade

from the white of window

frost to the greens of pasture

cedars and winter wheat, from

the grays in Illinois River

bluffs to the crimson in cliffs

W I N T E R

FCLIO at Red Rock Canyon, from

the shaggy browns of a buffa-

lo's hide to the rainbow sheen

of a mallard's feathers. From a

rich collection sent in by many

of our favorite photographers,

we've chosen images that

show off the shapes and colors

of an Oklahoma winter.

J R Toland Skylne Drive vista

Oklahoma TODAY 46

BELOW Syh.ia and Lloyd Brockus Mallard Great SaIf Wains

-Oklahoma TODAY 48

ABOVE. Joseph Grzybowski

Mnter tree, Grady Counfy


Oklahoma TODAY 50

Larry D. Brown Dee< Boiling Springs gate Pcrrk

o m m PAGE S@a and Lloyd Brockus cedar waxwing, AIva

-- 'adiner, thoMetm

A BOOK E X C E R P T

HERE WE REST

By Kent Ruth Photographs by Jim Argo

Oklahoma TODAY 54

H agpily, the appmnt trend in this country toward d-in cem&es has not yet ap-

pmhed &E chmal degree d'emaaded in Sweden. Thew, offidly mated lo-d f m a & n a w ~ i & m ~ i a c h t h e d m and a0;bioaing d gcavestones. Yes, and those same officials determine the decomtive touches and even epitaphs to be &wed thereon. Doves were mm~d down ia w e casebecause &at ditional C h d i b symbol was "too mcimend aard sweet." Hm Rdaw O.A. (the cho-sea epitaphofh u d '&I Andemm) was &bed, presumably as wo frivobus, in d4wa of more p&c Him fie3

O.A. Still, W&om acquired formal Gem-

d m at least a cearug too late to be ahk to dfer latterday visiws the free- wheelins Wdiv'iduality of New England's m y ancient not to say quaint, burying punds. A k , nowheze can we hiid the d e d ftgmllmess d chis 1837 stone in

Ahye. An e i e of a h m d mder,&it ow &orated 9pmdnp $rn@lI stojus into aggt cmwt, pats found in && Gary Gemmy in B b i ~ e Ca~ne.

But Whomams ~leednot be sold short. They showed imagination and in- genuity,as Sooners, ellee many of them would never have been sucoessfuI in get-ting a daim or in making a living an it after ahey did. And those m e tdrs are o h n ~ f i din what might be called, for lack of a better term3 "tomlsstone art."

Many Oklahomans have, for instance, ukcn their jobs with them to heirg m -sites. Consider the massive granite bench in Guthrie's Summix-View Gem-teqr memorializing Charles O. Smith, Oklahoma jurist. For another vocational

marker Sulphur offers rhe long-time &-~ h a wman whose stone carries the c b eled likeness of-what else?-a &phone. Aad Lee Way m k e r EI-ay-den M. Smdiier, his IXUIE inscribed in an open book and doves on hand to guard the course af fris Lee Way rig, is JUSTONANOYKER 7W.P.

In ComeNille Cemeteryv in Johnston aunty, a poem & p h rhe image. It

lack a bit of die uninhibited punch of some New England tombsmne verse:

At least k has an earthy, eastern flavor:

Hwiiq, &rraram~rb&~~~gclrsmQ& o o e r l h @ m e s i $ ~ b a s ~ f b f c O ~*. 222 tfoblmirg sdpzum m kd-wmcd p w f of dkr O~~g.%bnna&r

amtors-mrd of rib &J moaq 1czt pound in Lt fng & 2920s.

stone is etched widl a p ~ r r y hscene and this tender ~ r i a dmibum

A Farmer

Now give him to d e cad, Wid whom he was most

intimaks Lay his tired body in d e

soil He kntw so well in /$e.

Avmaiam are ofken refbmd as well. Qn his smne in Cbrnanche"~ Faitiawn G m SFix& Bowen is idbntifkd ss BIRD HUNTER. And the elaborawly carved hunting a n e i k a m s flushed bircls and his bid dog emsing a stream CM~.a log. P J d y is the equally: impres- she double stone of Jaek H. Miller and his wife, Wanda. Scenes on the back d w h 1-e na doubt as to h i r inmres6s. R8d and mel, a pond, trees, quail? a gun leaning agwinst a feace, along with a windmill a d a buIldmrj adom his. On

hers are a p b with o l d - b h i d stoall antique phonopph, ald clack and a spitssling wh@d.

Still in Fairlam Philip Lelan H d e y seems ut ham had two primary loves, m judge from the tombstone art on his grave marker: his pickup ttuek and his banjo. And v o c a h blends with mas-tion, one suspects, on Joe F. Smith's somber stone: a saddled, ridedm h a e tied to8 hitching past and the d e a x d s umdorned 7wtde brand. Then &efeP'e's the H a m Counry grave e e r ~f & Sifdlong 0031- of p e ~ f l e d w d - adorned wih his c o h ~ o ~

C u l d hdra&ie plays a &, m. Grave houses are srill ta be found in Chrnootw ad Creek Indian mm af east-ern OWoma. TmditbnaUy, they shel-tered food, pips, t o b c w and other iterrrs desigwd a make the deceased pemm'3 journey into the byond mo~e enjoyable. To the brash question as to whm rke d-aed might awaken m smoke his pipe, the old Indm is sup-

posed ta have replied: 'When your , white man awakens to smell his flowm." As h y age, these s b g 4 4 shelfem Hl inu, pictuque nth.In ht+ er years h y h e h e n replaced by mate bag-lasting, but less eye-pleasing, conmete s h d m * cemplets with metal ventilator grilles.

But gmesmw art is liimifed only by the imaginaion of he deceased or his next of kin-or hy their f l & re sources. Handsom am the lllamive buri-al vaults with their etmic ml-, brass doom, st-ahed~ass windows and ather esnbeI l ibna dnat only money a n p d d e . But aften he most poignant gixlw m k w s am thase designed sad &brimredby griednt yet obviously Im-puIliotls, laved ones.

Rare indeed is the cemetery &at does not eonah sne ar more of t h e cY~Ilt ma'markets. Zn F m ,it's a strikingly eded chunk of limestone on which a name plate kasbeen bolted. hGeary, ir is a we~l-formeddab ~f com6gncree into

!if3 OWehomi TODAY

1

which, before it hardened, colorful stone and bits of glass were pressed for decora- tion. Often the inscription is "written" with bits of stone or rock in wet concrete.

Most poignant of all, perhaps, are those home made markers where sim- plicity of materials and crudity of design are combined with the still-to-be-achieved literacy of an emigrant family. Like the inscription stenciled into the still-soft concrete of a hand-crafted marker in the Czechoslovakian National Cemetery in Oklahoma City: AT REST OUR MOTHER ANNA RUBIS B 7 24 1848 DIED 7 16 1933 OK CITY CON BUT NOT COTON.

Decorative motifs display bewildering variety. Most of them are stylized, highly symbolic. Among the more traditional, and found in most cemeteries, are: the open Bible; gates ajar; hands, often fold- ed in prayer, sometimes pointing upward to a crown and at times in a firm hand- shake as if with a welcoming St. Peter;

palm leaves and fern fronds; the scroll, representing eternal life; potted plants, symbolizing rebirth; and doves for peace and innocence.

More symbolic than decorative is the cut-off tree trunk to represent untimely death-as if any death were timely. But it was adopted, not invented, by the Woodmen of the World. Almost as common is the lamb, nearly always on older gravestones. Today medical science is reducing infant mortality drastically and, with it, the need for this most touching symbol of untimely death.

Then there are angels, fittingly small angels hovering over the grave of the infant Mary Keen in Newkirk Cemetery, and heroic angels soaring over the ornate monuments of proud Osages in Hom- iny's Albert Joseph Powell Cemetery. Of fine Carrara marble, well sculpted in a variety of poses and well-nigh overpow- ering to the first-time visitor, they attest to the great respect with which the Osag- es regard their ancestors and to the tre-

mendous oil wealth of the 1920s that allowed them to express that respect so magnificently.

Styles in "tombstone art" do indeed change. Yet it is not so much change as a coming in, going out and coming in again. Plus ca change, p l u c'at kz meme chose-the more these styles change, the more they remain essentially the same. Grief and sorrow do not change. Nor do confidence and hope. The massive crypt has FAREWELL carved above its door- way. Beside it the tiny lamb-topped stone gets by with the simple piety: Bud-didon Ear& to Bloom in H e m . But both reflect the same sense of loss that death brings, and the same assurance that what follows will somehow make it right. Bl

Kent Ruth's and Jim Aqo's most recent collaboration h Here We Rest, a guide to famous-or just fascinating-Oklahoma b u d sita. Thz? am'cle z? adaptedfrom that book, which is being published $ the Oklahoma Hhtorical Sociery .

Opposite page. Creek burial houses like these near Wetumka trdtonal /y Some men wish to be mcalledfof the jobs the?r did-just contained food and tobacco to comfort the spirit of the dtpaaed. like jurist Charles 0. Smith and trucker Hayden Standife.


'f A R T E X H I B I T S

JANUARY 1-5 Holidays at Gilcrease, Gilcrease Museum, Tulsa 1-28 Paintings by Scott Tigert, Pottery by Paul

Rodgers, Kirkpatrick Gallery for Oklahoma Artists, Kirkpatrick Center, OKC

1-31 Western Art Show, Pioneer Museum &Art Center, Woodward

I-Feb 28 Paintings by Shamn Ahtone-Ha jo, Kiowa Tribal Museum, Carnegie

3-31 Selections from the Mabee-Gerrer Collection Storeroom, Mabee-Gerrer Museum, Shawnee

5-Feb. 16 The Lamar Series: Paintings by Don Coen, Battlett Center, OSU, Stillwater

5-Feb. 23 Paintings by Joseph Fleck, OK Art Center, OKC 8 Great Bronze Age of China, OCCC, OKC

9-Feb. 5 "Watercolor USA 1984," Student Union, OSU, Stillwater

12-Feb. 16 'James Surls' Visions: 1974-1984", Museum of Art, OU, Norman

12- "The Beaded Picture Show," narrative beadwork, Feb.19 Southern Plains Indian Museum, Anadarko

26-March 9 "Grant Wood & Marvin Cone: An American Tradition," Philbrook Art Center, Tulsa

29-March 12 Paintings by Brunel Fams, Kirkpatrick Gallery for OK Artists, Kirkpatrick Center, OKC

FEBRUARY 3-23 "Shogun," Japanese Art Exhibition, OCCC, OKC 3-27 Four Oklahoma Potters: Hoke, Sweeney,

Lovelace & Briscoe, Mabee-Cerrer Museum, Shawnee

D R A M A

JANUARY 10-26 '"The Ria,"Carpenter Square Theatre, OKC 10-Feb. 1 "ButteAies Are Free," Gaslight Dinner Theatre,

Tulsa 17-19, 24-25 "Lion in Winter," Ponca Playhouse, Ponca City

17-26 "A Thousand Clowns," Theatre Tulsa, Delaware Playhouse, Tulsa

18,19,25,26 "Step on a Crack," Children's Theatre, Stage Feb. 1.2 Center, OKC

28-Feb. 1 "Lil' Abner," American Indian Theater Co., Williams Theatre, Performing A r t s Center, Tulsa

30-Feb. 1 'Ten Nights in a Barmm," Bartlesville Theatre Guild, Community Center, Bartlesville

30-31, Feb. 1, 7-8, "Inherit the Wind," Gaslight Theatre, Enid 14-15

31-Feb. 15 "Strange Snow," American Theatre Co., Brook Theatre, OKC

FEBRUARY 6 "Great Expectations," Guthrie Theatre of Minneapolis, Seretean Center. OSU, Stillwater

6-9 "Come Blow Your Horn," Shortgrass Playhouse, Hobart

6-9.13-16 "Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You," The Mummers of OKC, Stage Center, OKC

7-15 "Uncle Vanya," Tulsa Alliance for Classical Theatre, Phoenix Theatre, Tulsa

/-March 8 "Mary, Mary," Gaslight Dinner Theatre, Tulsa 12-16 "El Grande de Coca Cola," OU School of Drama,

Studio Theatre, OU, Norman 13-16 "Last of the Red Hot Lovers," Theatre Norman,

Sheraton Norman Horel-Dinner Theatre, Norman 13-22 "Foxfire," Shawnee Little Theatre, Shawnee

13-15,20-22 "An Evening with Noel Coward," Muskogee Little Theatre, Muskogee

13-16,20-22 "Gypsy," Southwest Playhouse, Clinton 13-16,19-23 "Crimes of the Heart," Town & Gown Theatre,

Stillwater 13-16,20-23,27-28 ''The Wizard of 02," Cabaret Supper Theatre,

Fort Sill 14-22 " Fifth of July," TU, Chapman Theatre, Tulsa 14-23 "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof," Theatre Tulsa,

Delaware Playhouse, Tulsa 14-15,21-23 "Night Watch," Guymon Community Theatre,

Guymon 14-March 2 "Pump Boys and Dinettes," Carpenter Square

Theatre, OKC 17-22 "Carousel," Ardmore Little Theatre, Ardmore 19-23 "Amadeus," OU School of Drama, Rupel Jones

Theatre, OU, Norman 20-22 "The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wilde," SEOSU,

Durant 20-22 "Something's Afoot," NSU, Tahlequah 20-22 "Foxfire," Woodward Community Theatre,

Woodward 20-March 9 "Godspell," Jewel Box Theatre, OKC

20-23,27, March 1 "HMS Pinafore," Cameron U. Theatre, L a w n 21-22,27-28, "The Miss Firecracker Contest,"

March 1, 6-8 Actors Theatre, Phoenix Theatre, Tulsa 22.23, March "Beauty and B. East," Stage Center, Arena 1,2,8,9,15,16 Theatre, OKC

26-March 2 "Henrietta," OU School of Drama, Studio Theatre, OU, Norman

26-March 2 "Extra," OU School of Drama, Rupel Jones Theatre, Norman

Oklahoma TODAY 58

27-March 1 "HMS Pinafore," Theatre Arts, Cameron U., Lawton

27-March 1 "The Lady's Not for Burning," University Theatre, Burg Theatre, OCU, OKC

27-March 2 "The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas," Seretean Center, OSU, Stillwater

28-March 1 "A Murder Has Been Arranged," Tahlequah Community Playhouse, Tahlequah

JANUARY 16-18 Winter Bluegrass Festival, Western Hills Guest Ranch, Wagoner

31-Feb. 1 "Wintertales," Storytelling Festival, Stage Center, OKC

FEBRUARY 8 Chocolate Festival, Firehouse Art Center, Norman 25 Annual Green Counuy Jazz Festival, NSU,

JANUARY 9 Liona Boyd, classical guitarist, Stage Center, OKC 10 Liona Boyd, Performing Arts Center, Tulsa 11 The New American Ragtime Ensemble, Phillips

U., Enid 11 Lawton Philharmonic, Alois Hochstrasser guest

conductor, McMahon Aud., Lawton 11-12 1986 Children's Show, Prairie Dance Theatre,

Stage Center, OKC 12,14 OK Symphony with pianist Jorg Demus & English

hornist Helen Baumganner, Civic Center, OKC 17 Natalie Hinderas, pianist, Union Performing Arts

Center, Tulsa 17 Celtic Music Group Scartaglen, Williams Theatre,

Performing Arts Center, Tulsa 17-18 Roberta Flack, OK Symphony, Civic Center, OKC

18 "Hansel & Gretel," Cimarron Circuit Opera, Stage Center. OKC

18 Me1 Tome , Banlesville Symphony, Community Center, Bartlesville

18 Tulsa Ballet, Charles B. Goddard Center, Ardmore 19 Musical Tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.,

Oral Roberts U. Music Department, Brady Theatre, Tulsa

20 Issac Stem, Holmberg Hall, OU, Norman 24 Foggy Mountain Boys, Civic Center, Muskogee

24-25 DanceTalk with Edward Villella, ''The Romantic Ballet," Ballet OK, Stage Center, OKC

26,28 OK Symphony Classics Concert, Civic Center, OKC

29,31, Prairie Dance Theatre's Children's Shows, ~ e b .5,7,21 Kirkpatrick Center Theatre, OKC

31 OK Symphony Cabaret Concert with Irv Wagner & Floyd "Red" Rice, Myriad, OKC

FEBRUARY 1 Peter Nero & Trio, Tulsa Philharmonic, Performing Arts Center, Tulsa

1 OK Symphony & Ambassadors Concert Choir, "American Salute 11," St. John Missionary Baptist Church, OKC

7-9 Scenes from Great Operas, OU School of Music, Holmberg Hall, OU, Norman

8 Phillips-Enid Symphony, Phillips U., Enid 8-9 "Paganini," Tulsa Ballet Theatre, Performing Arts

Center, Tulsa 9 Haydn TrioNienna, Williams Theatre, Performing

Arts Center, Tulsa 9-11 OK Symphony with Amanda McLaq , violinist.

Civic Center, OKC 14 Candice Earley, OK Sinfonia, Brady Theatre,

Tulsa 14-15 Neil Sedaka, OK Symphony, Civic Center, OKC 1416 "The Marriage of Figaro," OK Opera & Music

Theatre Co., OCU, OKC 15 Recreation of Paul Whiteman's 1924 Orchestra,

Union Performing Arts Center, Tulsa 15 Lawton Philharmonic, McMahon Aud., Lawton 16 OSU Brass Band Concert, Seretean Center, OSU,

Stillwater 18 Zagreb Philharmonic, Seretean Center, OSU,

Stillwater 20 Ida Kavafian, Tulsa Philharmonic, Performing Arts

Center, Tulsa 21 Los Angeles Piano Quartet, Fee Theatre, Casady

School, OKC 21,22 Alvin Ailey American Dance Co., Performing Arts

Center, Tulsa 22-23 "Reflections of Romanticism," Ballet OK & the

OK Symphony, Civic Center, OKC 25 OSU Symphony, Seretean Center, OSU, Stillwater 28 Los Angeles Piano Quartet, Charles B. Goddard

Center, Ardmore -R O D E O

H O R S E E V E N T S

JANUARY 16-19 International Finals Rodeo, Convention Center, Tulsa

18-21 Cinderella Classic Appaloosa Horse Show, Expo Square, Shawnee

JANUARY 4,11,18 Muzzle Loading Rifle Workshop, J. M. Davis Gun Museum, Claremore

7-11 Shrine Classic Basketball Tournament, Civic Center Arena, Muskogee

11-April 30 "Return of Halley's Comet 11," Kirkpatrick Planetarium, OKC

26-31 Midwest Boat Show, State Fairgrounds OKC 29-Feb. 2 Tulsa Boat, Sport & Travel Show, Exposition

Center, Tulsa FEBRUARY 1-15 "Flowers for Valentine's Day," Green Arcade

Greenhouse, Kirkpatrick Center, OKC 3-7 Black American Heritage Week, OCCC, OKC

14-16 Divison 11, Region VIII, Championship Swim Meet, YMCA, Stillwater

22-23 African Violet Society of Greater Tulsa Show & Sale, Tulsa Garden Center, Tulsa

27 14th Annual Symposium on the American Indian, NSU, Tahlequah

27-March 1 OSSAA Regional Basketball Tournament, Civic Center Arena, Muskogee


oklahoma today january-february 1986 volume 36 no.1

Documents