AboutSharonsPlace

Last Updated on 1/25/2004
By Sharon McAllister
Email:
[email protected]

Sharon's Place

What's New?

Luther Oklahoma's Heart & Hand Site

Ceil's Corner

Maps & More

RootsWeb
RootsWeb

Centered on present-day Luther, OK. Featuring families living in northeastern Oklahoma Co., southeastern Logan Co. and western Lincoln Co. when this was still part of Oklahoma Territory.
This section has been moved to Ceil's Corner because it covers all of the families of the area, not just the COLEs, but for the convenience of return visitors I've left this page and its overview of the project in place with new quick links. 

You are our 466th visitor since October 3, 1999 -- thanks for stopping by!

 

Founding Families

Luther is a still a relatively small town, the sole survivor of the early communities in Luther Township, Oklahoma County, Oklahoma. Its Founding Families include not just those who lived within the boundaries of the original town plat, or even in the township itself, but also many people who actually resided in one of the surrounding townships.

On this site, a Founding Family of Luther is defined as one whose members were living in the area before the end of World War I and:

 

Attended school in Luther or any of the small schools that were consolidated with Luther;

 

Received mail through the Luther Post Office or any of the small offices that were absorbed by the Luther office; or

 

Married into one of the above families, even though they lived in one of the surrounding townships.

Many of these families also meet the criteria for First Families of the Twin Territories, which requires proof that they lived in the area in Territorial days. My criteria for Founding Families is somewhat looser, because I often have found evidence that a family lived in the area during or before World War I but don't know whether they actually arrived before statehood.

Some charts for Luther's Founding Families were contributed to the OKGenWeb project before I set up my own site and are still available through the link listed in the chart below. I'm now correcting reported errors and adding more charts to my new site, linking some to other area studies that trace these families back to their former homes. 

What is "Sharon's Place"?

Marti Graham coined the name and set up the original "Sharon's Place" on the Oklahoma County GenWeb site to house all the "stuff" I was sending her about the families of Deep Fork, Dewey, Luther, and Springer Townships. To me, it's a place where oral traditions meet history, geography, and genealogy.

If you are familiar with the old-timers of the Luther area, it's the on-line presence of what I call "Ceil's Circle".

If you aren't.... Ceil is my mother and this circle of friends consists of people who grew up in the area, who belong to some of the "old families", and who know a lot about their family's friends. Most are now in their 80s & 90s. Collectively, they have helped me piece together a great deal about Luther's Founding Families.

For people who are researching the genealogy of families in the area, it's a place to connect with distant relatives and learn more about their ancestors from family friends. For others, it's a demonstration of what can be accomplished by tapping a variety of sources then comparing their information and resolving any apparent discrepancies.

Where is "Sharon's Place"?

Geographically, it's represented by the red dot on the map above. It's still centered on Luther Township, which is in the northeastern corner of Oklahoma - but has now been expanded from Marti's original concept to include the adjacent Townships in Lincoln and Logan Counties.

Its place in time – Territorial days. It focuses on the Founding Families of the area, whether homesteaders, early settlers who leased compensatory school land, or townsfolk.

History & Geography of the Area

Present-day Luther, Oklahoma is in the northeastern corner of Oklahoma County, roughly 3 miles west of the Lincoln Co. line and 4 miles south of the Logan Co. line. Lands within a five-mile radius were opened by three different Land Runs in a little over six years. The area changed rapidly in Territorial days. Communities blossomed and died as both Post Offices and Schools were established, then consolidated.

This study is centered on Luther Township and the families I've been able to document as living within its 36 square miles during Territorial days, but also includes many families who lived in the surrounding 8 Townships.

The Unassigned Lands that had been opened in 1889 were on its western border. Many of the original homesteaders had ties to the families who had already settled there in Oklahoma County's Springer and Deep Fork Townships or Logan County's Springvale Township.

The Iowa Lands, which were opened for homesteading in 1891, were to the east of the Unassigned Lands and to the north and west of Deep Fork. The northwestern part of Luther Township was included, along with all of Logan County's Iowa Township, all Lincoln County's Tohee Township and the northern part of Lincoln County's Wellston Township.

The rest of Luther and Wellston Townships, along with all of Oklahoma County's Dewey Township and Lincoln County's Bryan Township, were part of the Kickapoo Lands that were opened in 1895.

Of the many small communities that once existed in these nine townships, only Arcadia, Jones, Luther, and Wellston still have their own schools and Post Offices. Fallis has a few families left, but is essentially a Ghost Town. Captain Creek, Coon Creek, Douglas, Garden, Garnettville, Glaze, Hibsaw, Jackson, Kickapoo, Ludlow, Mishak, Poole, Servado, Tohee - and probably others I haven't found yet - have disappeared. Some seem to have done so without leaving a trace, but for others you can still find some ruins with the help of the right local guide.

How'd She Do That?

Like most genealogy projects, it started with a simple family tree. This difference is that this one just kept growing… and growing… and growing….

By the time I'd found all of the pages of the Federal Land Tract Records that pertained to my own families of homesteaders, I had covered over half of two townships – but I still didn't have all of the collateral lines, and my mother kept asking about family friends so the simplest answer seemed to be getting copies of the rest….

The result: lists of the successful homesteaders in Deep Fork and Luther Townships. Lots of long-distance chats reminiscing with their descendants – and the discovery that many we thought had homesteaded had actually acquired set-aside school lands.

Land Ownership maps filled in some of the blanks. Then came the 1900 Census. With naïve optimism, I'd volunteered to transcribe it – but was overwhelmed when I saw what I was up against. Not just old handwriting, but large portions so faded as to be unreadable. Among the relatively few entries that were clearly readable, I did recognize some Heads of Household as the original, successful homesteaders and some as the surviving spouse or children of the original homesteader. Some homesteaders, of course, I knew to have moved to town after Luther was founded – so they would not be found living on their farms. Studying those faded images, I recognized others as early businessmen or farmers who leased the set-aside school lands. So I determined to make the best use I could of the clearly readable portions of the census by comparing them with other available information.

I started by plotting the locations of homesteaders' dwellings on a Township map and used that to determine an approximate area covered by each page of the census. With an average of 11-12 families per page, that brought the possibilities to be explored down to a manageable level. Using my annotated map as a guide, I found I could decipher even more entries by comparing the census page with land records. At this point, the map began to show both the census taker's route and some intriguing gaps in coverage.

With a list of landowners from 1907, a map showing dwellings of the era – plus the help of Ceil's Circle – I was able to fill in quite a few of those gaps. We already had extensive data for many of them, so it was simply a matter of cross-checking the database entry for the suggested candidate against the census itself to bring something I could only say was "T or F or H ~~~~~" into focus as "Thomas".

Thus, the List of Dwellings (giving Heads of Household in the order in which the census was taken) and the one giving Heads of Household (in alphabetical order) were born. In assembling these, I did not start fresh but added the dwelling # from the census to a copy of my table of homesteaders. Faster, easier, and an automatic cross-check of my mapping procedure. I had intended to remove any homesteaders I couldn't account for, but noticed that when a homesteader was living somewhere else in 1900 there was usually a story behind it – so I kept those entries and added their tidbits. Some blanks do remain. We're still trying to link homesteaders with those who occupied their farms in 1900 – whether the farm was passed to a family member, rented, or sold to an outsider.

Adding information from a canvas of the Valley View / Luther Cemetery, I was able to determine when some of the original homesteaders died. Finally, I combined all of this to get a narrative for each tract of land and was at last able to make a reasonable guess at the surname of almost every Head of Household.

Which brings us to the end product: the family reports. They vary greatly in both scope and reliability. Some are extensive and have been provided by traditional genealogists who have documented every piece of information. Some are sparse, based on a single source like the 1900 census. Still others are primarily anecdotal, spawned by something like tombstone inscriptions or newspaper tidbits and fleshed out from interviews with friends of the family. All have one thing in common – they are the best available at this time.

If you want to know the source of a specific piece of data – like a date, place, or maiden name…. If you have more information about one of these families… If you'd like me to set a link to your e-mail address or web site…. Please write to me.

 


© 1996-2004 Sharon McAllister