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Indian Pioneer History Project for Oklahoma
Date: June 29, 1937
Name: Mr. U. A. Silk
Post Office: Mangum, Oklahoma, R. #2
Residence Address: 2 ¾ miles Ease of Russell
Date of Birth: January 1, 1863
Place of Birth: Summerville, Georgia
Father: John Wesley Silk
Place of Birth: South Carolina
Information on father:
Mother: Tilde Graham
Place of birth: Georgia
Information on mother:
Field Worker: Ruth
Mr. U. A. Silk came to Greer County in August 1887, from Doublin, Texas.
I came with my wife and two children. Johnny Chisum and Mike Murphy, also my
sister and brother-in-law.
We came here for freedom. We had heard of the boom of Greer County and instead
of locating in Wilbarger County as was our intention, we came on to Greer
County locating two miles north of the present site of Victory, built a dugout
and started farming.
I broke out sod and planted a crop in 1888. My corn and cane made good. I also
raised some stock.
I hauled wood from near Mountain Park to burn, and most of our supplies came
from Vernon, and Quanah, Texas.
I dug a well near our dugout and struck plenty of water at fourteen feet.
I brought a turning plow with me when I came to this country and I made a
Georgia stock, that was my farming equipment. We would take a stick and punch
holes in the freshly broken sod and plant the seeds in the holes, rake the
dirt over them with our foot, and we always made a good crop. I sowed my first
seed wheat in 1888 and planted my first cotton in Greer County in 1889. I
planted two acres and it grew tall and had large speckled boles on it but it
never opened. We just thought this was not a good cotton country and never
planted anymore until 1896, when I made two loads. Bill Harris hauled one load
to Quanah and I hauled the other. It brought four and one-half cents per
pound. But the money I received for that cotton bought a lot of supplies. I
brought back a half barrel of syrup and could get fourteen pounds of Arbuckle
Coffee for $1.00. We usually bought supplies enough to last for six months,
and we did not go to town unless we had business.
I grew a huge watermelon crop on two acres of sod on my claim in 1888.
I broke the sod and levelled it down, then punched holes in the sod and
dropped watermelon seeds in the holes. The crop received no cultivation at all
after being planted. Great vines grew on the fertile grounds and they were
covered with big, delicious melons. Cowboys soon spotted the melons and helped
themselves to them when they were ripe. The cowboys knew they were welcome to
the melons, and were mighty nice about getting them. They would get what
melons they wanted to eat, carry them out on the prairie to eat them, and were
careful not to damage the vines.
I sold the first load of watermelons ever hauled out of Greer County. I hauled
a load to Fort Sill and got twenty-five and thirty cents for them, then sold
some at the Red Store where Lawton now is. Then I hauled some to Quanah. The
Indians over at Fort Sill nearly went wild over the melons.
I spent two months of the summer of 1888 at Fort Sill chopping cord wood for
the Government, to get money to buy seed wheat. That was the only time I was
ever away from Greer County except on brief business trips and visits.
I raised eleven hundred bushels of wheat and stored it in a pole pen. I
remember we had a prairie fire which destroyed my neighbor's wheat that he
had stored in a pole pen. But when I saw the fire coming we drew water from
our well and wet the grass around the pen and my wheat was saved. The fire
came by my dugout. I sold this wheat for thirty-five cents per bushel at
Quanah.
One year our wheat was ready to cut and high water had been over the wheat
ground leaving it slick so the binder wheel would not turn, but would only
drag. We took a turning plow and plowed a furrow for the bull wheel to run in
and saved the wheat crop.
John Walker and I bought the first binder in the country and cut all of the
wheat in the country.
When we arrived here in Greer County Mr. And Mrs. Chisum knew the Sweet family
who had previously located at Mangum. The 15th day of August, we went down to
the Sweet's dugout. They were expecting a storm and insisted on our staying
in the dugout, but four of us men went up on the hill to stake out our horses,
and we decided we would just camp out there and let the old folks stay at the
dugout. Well, sure enough the storm came, a hard wind, hail and rain. It took
all four of us to hold the wagon sheet on the wagon.
I remember the date we arrived here quite distinctly by the storm which
greeted us the first night we were here.
Wild turkeys were plentiful, sometimes, we would kill fourteen at a time with
a shot gun. Hunters got fourteen cents a pound for buffalo hides, and the
settlers picked up the bones and sold them for $14.00 per ton.
One of the hardest tasks we had to encounter was getting rid of the prairie
dogs, which were destroying our crops. We tried making traps to catch them,
one kind of trap we made by fastening a fish hook to a board and extending it
down into their holes so when they ran down they would hang themselves. Then
we used arsenic to poison them by putting it into the holes and packing mud on
the opening. All the settlers fought them until they began to leave. I have
seen them swim the streams going west.
The people were honest in those days. We never thought of locking our dugouts
when we went away for we knew that everything would be safe.
If a settler or cowboy was traveling and came upon a dugout and found everyone
gone, if it was meal time or he wanted to stay all night he would stay,
prepare his meals and leave everything very much the same way that he found
them. When the owner arrived, maybe he would say, “well we've had company
while we were gone”.
On one occasion John Walker and I went over near Mountain Park for some wood.
We camped at Signal Mountain and there we found where a wagon and team had
burned. One of our mules got loose and ran off and early the next morning we
were hunting the mule when we came upon an Indian camp. The Indians kept
saying, “where go John, where go John,” and John Walker said, “How did
they know my name was John?”
One time I went pecan hunting on Cache Creek and met Quanah Parker, Comanche
Chief. He pointed out his seven wives to me. Each one lived in a tepee and was
not permitted in the beautiful home which he had built north of Cache.
The Kiowa and Comanche Indians would often come over here and camp. Oftentimes
there would be from two hundred to five hundred in a bunch. They never
bothered us only they would beg for different things.
They usually had large herds of horses, and when they got ready to travel they
would pack as much of their supplies as they could on their pack horses backs,
then fasten two long poles to them and on the end of these poles they had
strips of rawhide to hold them together and they usually put their bedding on
these poles and dragged them behind their horses.
When the time arrived for the drawings for the Indians at the Red Store, there
would sometimes be fifteen hundred camped and they would stay for three or
four days. They would have horse races. Sometimes the white men would race
with them.
Rattlesnakes were another pest we had to fight and when anyone got bitten
oftentimes they died. Two of our neighbor's children were bitten by
rattlesnakes and both of them died.
One time our cattle drifted off near Doan's Store. We started hunting them,
and came upon an empty dugout and decided we would stay all night. About a
hundred antelope came near the dugout.
In those days fish were plentiful in the streams. A bunch of settlers went
fishing on Turkey Creek and caught two tubs full of fish in a short ime (sic)
with a seine.
We took the fish home and heated some water in a large wash-kettle and made a
strong salt brine, dipped the fish in it and strung them up to eat.
These old cattle trails were a quarter of a mile wide. There were no roads or
bridges and the freight wagons had to follow these trails and in bad wet
weather sometimes the wagons could not follow the old ruts for fear of bogging
down so they would make a new trail. The old Chisholm Trail crossed the Red
River at Doan's Store and went on the east side of the county and crossed
the river near Carter.
The settlers in the Victory community met in front of my dugout in 1889 and
organized the first school district in the country. Bill Harris, Doc Simpson,
and Jim Gray were elected trustees. The settlers made up money to buy lumber
to build a school house and went to Vernon to get lumber, then built the house
themselves.
The school was named Valley View. Miss Kitty Fullerton was the first teacher.
The Salt Fork and Turkey Creek flood of June, 1891, stands out in my memory as
one of my most exciting experiences.
It had been raining all day, but about 4 o'clock in the afternoon a
cloudburst fell. Water poured into our dugout until the beds flooted (sic)
around and we had to wade out.
The thriving town of Frazier, down the river a few miles, was washed away.
Three people were drowned by the raging water of Turkey Creek and I helped
hunt the missing bodies.
I never worked on the range in Greer County, although I sometimes helped with
the neighborhood roundups and would help drive small herds to Mangum.
I moved to Mangum in 1908, buying a farm one mile southeast of town. I ran a
livery stable in Mangum eight years, first at the present site of the Nazarene
Church, then at the present site of the Cicero-Smith Lumber Yard, then at the
present location of the Blalock Grocery, and finally at the present site of
Walter Cheek's Garage.
I sold my Victory farm and the one near Mangum in 1917 with the intention of
leaving Greer County and moving to Texas but my family refused to leave and I
stayed too.
I bought a farm on “Russell Hollow”, near the Central View School where I
still reside.
Transcribed by Deborah Sweet dssweet@okstate.edu July 2003. Submitted to
OKGenWeb by Frank Rippel, riptron@hotmail.com Aug 2003.Mr. U. A. Silk came to
Greer County in August 1887, from Doublin, Texas. I came with my wife and two
children. Johnny Chisum and Mike Murphy, also my sister and brother-in-law.
We came here for freedom. We had heard of the boom of Greer County and instead
of locating in Wilbarger County as was our intention, we came on to Greer
County locating two miles north of the present site of Victory, built a dugout
and started farming.
I broke out sod and planted a crop in 1888. My corn and cane made good. I also
raised some stock.
I hauled wood from near Mountain Park to burn, and most of our supplies came
from Vernon, and Quanah, Texas.
I dug a well near our dugout and struck plenty of water at fourteen feet.
I brought a turning plow with me when I came to this country and I made a
Georgia stock, that was my farming equipment. We would take a stick and punch
holes in the freshly broken sod and plant the seeds in the holes, rake the
dirt over them with our foot, and we always made a good crop. I sowed my first
seed wheat in 1888 and planted my first cotton in Greer County in 1889. I
planted two acres and it grew tall and had large speckled boles on it but it
never opened. We just thought this was not a good cotton country and never
planted anymore until 1896, when I made two loads. Bill Harris hauled one load
to Quanah and I hauled the other. It brought four and one-half cents per
pound. But the money I received for that cotton bought a lot of supplies. I
brought back a half barrel of syrup and could get fourteen pounds of Arbuckle
Coffee for $1.00. We usually bought supplies enough to last for six months,
and we did not go to town unless we had business.
I grew a huge watermelon crop on two acres of sod on my claim in 1888.
I broke the sod and levelled it down, then punched holes in the sod and
dropped watermelon seeds in the holes. The crop received no cultivation at all
after being planted. Great vines grew on the fertile grounds and they were
covered with big, delicious melons. Cowboys soon spotted the melons and helped
themselves to them when they were ripe. The cowboys knew they were welcome to
the melons, and were mighty nice about getting them. They would get what
melons they wanted to eat, carry them out on the prairie to eat them, and were
careful not to damage the vines.
I sold the first load of watermelons ever hauled out of Greer County. I hauled
a load to Fort Sill and got twenty-five and thirty cents for them, then sold
some at the Red Store where Lawton now is. Then I hauled some to Quanah. The
Indians over at Fort Sill nearly went wild over the melons.
I spent two months of the summer of 1888 at Fort Sill chopping cord wood for
the Government, to get money to buy seed wheat. That was the only time I was
ever away from Greer County except on brief business trips and visits.
I raised eleven hundred bushels of wheat and stored it in a pole pen. I
remember we had a prairie fire which destroyed my neighbor's wheat that he
had stored in a pole pen. But when I saw the fire coming we drew water from
our well and wet the grass around the pen and my wheat was saved. The fire
came by my dugout. I sold this wheat for thirty-five cents per bushel at
Quanah.
One year our wheat was ready to cut and high water had been over the wheat
ground leaving it slick so the binder wheel would not turn, but would only
drag. We took a turning plow and plowed a furrow for the bull wheel to run in
and saved the wheat crop.
John Walker and I bought the first binder in the country and cut all of the
wheat in the country.
When we arrived here in Greer County Mr. And Mrs. Chisum knew the Sweet family
who had previously located at Mangum. The 15th day of August, we went down to
the Sweet's dugout. They were expecting a storm and insisted on our staying
in the dugout, but four of us men went up on the hill to stake out our horses,
and we decided we would just camp out there and let the old folks stay at the
dugout. Well, sure enough the storm came, a hard wind, hail and rain. It took
all four of us to hold the wagon sheet on the wagon.
I remember the date we arrived here quite distinctly by the storm which
greeted us the first night we were here.
Wild turkeys were plentiful, sometimes, we would kill fourteen at a time with
a shot gun. Hunters got fourteen cents a pound for buffalo hides, and the
settlers picked up the bones and sold them for $14.00 per ton.
One of the hardest tasks we had to encounter was getting rid of the prairie
dogs, which were destroying our crops. We tried making traps to catch them,
one kind of trap we made by fastening a fish hook to a board and extending it
down into their holes so when they ran down they would hang themselves. Then
we used arsenic to poison them by putting it into the holes and packing mud on
the opening. All the settlers fought them until they began to leave. I have
seen them swim the streams going west.
The people were honest in those days. We never thought of locking our dugouts
when we went away for we knew that everything would be safe.
If a settler or cowboy was traveling and came upon a dugout and found everyone
gone, if it was meal time or he wanted to stay all night he would stay,
prepare his meals and leave everything very much the same way that he found
them. When the owner arrived, maybe he would say, “well we've had company
while we were gone”.
On one occasion John Walker and I went over near Mountain Park for some wood.
We camped at Signal Mountain and there we found where a wagon and team had
burned. One of our mules got loose and ran off and early the next morning we
were hunting the mule when we came upon an Indian camp. The Indians kept
saying, “where go John, where go John,” and John Walker said, “How did
they know my name was John?”
One time I went pecan hunting on Cache Creek and met Quanah Parker, Comanche
Chief. He pointed out his seven wives to me. Each one lived in a tepee and was
not permitted in the beautiful home which he had built north of Cache.
The Kiowa and Comanche Indians would often come over here and camp. Oftentimes
there would be from two hundred to five hundred in a bunch. They never
bothered us only they would beg for different things.
They usually had large herds of horses, and when they got ready to travel they
would pack as much of their supplies as they could on their pack horses backs,
then fasten two long poles to them and on the end of these poles they had
strips of rawhide to hold them together and they usually put their bedding on
these poles and dragged them behind their horses.
When the time arrived for the drawings for the Indians at the Red Store, there
would sometimes be fifteen hundred camped and they would stay for three or
four days. They would have horse races. Sometimes the white men would race
with them.
Rattlesnakes were another pest we had to fight and when anyone got bitten
oftentimes they died. Two of our neighbor's children were bitten by
rattlesnakes and both of them died.
One time our cattle drifted off near Doan's Store. We started hunting them,
and came upon an empty dugout and decided we would stay all night. About a
hundred antelope came near the dugout.
In those days fish were plentiful in the streams. A bunch of settlers went
fishing on Turkey Creek and caught two tubs full of fish in a short ime (sic)
with a seine.
We took the fish home and heated some water in a large wash-kettle and made a
strong salt brine, dipped the fish in it and strung them up to eat.
These old cattle trails were a quarter of a mile wide. There were no roads or
bridges and the freight wagons had to follow these trails and in bad wet
weather sometimes the wagons could not follow the old ruts for fear of bogging
down so they would make a new trail. The old Chisholm Trail crossed the Red
River at Doan's Store and went on the east side of the county and crossed
the river near Carter.
The settlers in the Victory community met in front of my dugout in 1889 and
organized the first school district in the country. Bill Harris, Doc Simpson,
and Jim Gray were elected trustees. The settlers made up money to buy lumber
to build a school house and went to Vernon to get lumber, then built the house
themselves.
The school was named Valley View. Miss Kitty Fullerton was the first teacher.
The Salt Fork and Turkey Creek flood of June, 1891, stands out in my memory as
one of my most exciting experiences.
It had been raining all day, but about 4 o'clock in the afternoon a
cloudburst fell. Water poured into our dugout until the beds flooted (sic)
around and we had to wade out.
The thriving town of Frazier, down the river a few miles, was washed away.
Three people were drowned by the raging water of Turkey Creek and I helped
hunt the missing bodies.
I never worked on the range in Greer County, although I sometimes helped with
the neighborhood roundups and would help drive small herds to Mangum.
I moved to Mangum in 1908, buying a farm one mile southeast of town. I ran a
livery stable in Mangum eight years, first at the present site of the Nazarene
Church, then at the present site of the Cicero-Smith Lumber Yard, then at the
present location of the Blalock Grocery, and finally at the present site of
Walter Cheek's Garage.
I sold my Victory farm and the one near Mangum in 1917 with the intention of
leaving Greer County and moving to Texas but my family refused to leave and I
stayed too.
I bought a farm on “Russell Hollow”, near the Central View School where I
still reside.
Transcribed by Deborah Sweet dssweet@okstate.edu
July 2003. Submitted to OKGenWeb by Frank Rippel, riptron@hotmail.com
Aug 2003.
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