GABRISON, GARRJSTT.. INTERVIEW U614
C&RRBTT. Fora A-(S-149) BIOGRAPHY FORM WOKKS. PROGRESS ADMINISTRATION Indian-Pioneer History Project for Oklahoma I Field W^rkfir f s name Nannie Lee Burns This report made on (date) aprii. April J.O 15 193 8 193 1. Name Garrett Garrison 2. Post Office Address Gon> Del. Comnerce, Oklahoma- 3, Residence address (or location) 4. DATE OF BIRTH: Month January- Day 5 Year 1B67 5. Plaoe of birth ^ Near Burlington, Iowa 6. Name of Father Jonathan Garrison Place of birth Indiana Other information about father 7. Name of Mother Jane Garrison nee Walker Place of Mrth Virginia Other information about mother Notes or complete narrative by the field worker dealing with the life and story of the person interviewed. Refer to Manual for suggested subjects and questions. Continue on blank sheets if necessary and attach firmly t( this form. Number of sheets attached Q «
GARRISON, GARRETT. INTERVIEW. 13614 Nannie Lee Burns Investigator April 15, 1938 Interview with Garrett Garrison, General Delivery, Commerce, Oklahoma. My parents were Jonathan Garrison, who was a native of Indiana and Jane Garrison^nee V.alker,. who was born in Virginia and came'to Indiana with her parents when a girl. Ifter their marriage they drifted west crossed^the Mississippi and settled in Iowa where 1 was born about three miles from the present city of Burlington, January 5, -1867. There was lots of new country in those days ana always there was a story of the new and virgin lands so rich that it would be better to live there rather than where you were living and where land*" was so cheap and there was the wide open range and then, too,in those days many of the adventurous souls did not establish permanent homes but lived in a transient way always ready to sell th«tr few effects and move to the new country just ahead. When I was ten years old my parents moved to Missouri where after a few year-s when the newness had worn off.father saw a chance to oetter his condition in Lansas so to Kansas we went and lived until I was about twenty and we had a small herd of cattle and^learn-
GARRISON GARRETT. INTERVIEW ing of the wonderful grazing lands here.he decided that he would come to this country. Fortunately we children had attended the rural schools in Missouri and Kansas and so we were not deprived of the advantages of school as were many of the children of the earlier settlers. when we came here we settled near ^ennison 4 a small connunity that, after the establishing of the post office there, was named Kennison after its principal citizen. Then when tr&veling about all that we would see besides the cattle was an Indian, a dog and an occasional white man. Father found after coming here that he could not own cattle and graze them on the range and this changed his plans but we were here and had to make the best of it. i/e obtained a lease and 1 helped hew the logs to build a house. It was at first one sixteen foot room with a. roost under the roof for the toys to sleep. We chinked it the first year and daubed it the " second year and it was the third year before we had any floor except the dirt one* We were very poor and sixteen of us lived in this one room. We had to get a permit to work in this country and this we obtained from Mr. Kennison and paid him 50 cents per month for it.
1UHRIS0N, GARRETT. ' INTER7IEW ' 13614 For four years, I dug coal there and received a royalty of 1 oent per bushel for digging it* Sometimes we had to wait for our money until they sold the ooal in the fall. I did not have even a horse then and I have walked and carried a sack of flour on my back for three miles. After we had been here a while, we began to learn how the other fellow did things. We learned how they would get some citizen to claim the ownership of the cattle and to run them on the range under his name for the real owner. In this way Bill Farmer grazed several thousand head of cattle on the range during these years for people living outside of the Territory. In other words the Indians would go down to Tahlequah and make the laws and then come back and tell us how to break them. Before we came there had been quite a bit of trouble..caused along this line as there were men appointed by the Cherokee Government to keep tab on the cattle on the range and their ownership, to collect the grazing permits, etc. Also there had been much trouble with cattle rustling and a claim was made that one of the Oherokees, who had been employed by a oattle owner, had been stealing the cattle and that he had taken a small number and had sold them. This man was branded as a cattle thief and to this day many of the people do not know
, G&RRETT., INTERVIEW. : 242.. 4. 4 led 4he difference* Shi a /^ nis having a bad name and everything that he did after that time was misunderstood and he is classed as one of our early bad nen. Another man, Ned Christie was also killed about this time and during tha seven days previous to his killing fourteen men were killed before they got Ifim. Christie killed three. After four years of digging coal, I went to take care of a bunch of cattle west of the Kennison District for H&german and I enjoyed it for I liked best of^all to ride broncho* and here I had many opportunities for riding them and breaking them on the range. Those were happy o&re<-free days to me when I was riding the prairies learing my broad brimmed white hat with a rope abound my saddlehorn. I had a good saddle and my horse "Old Preas 1^ a gray one, was. a good lorse. I have ridden him thirty-fite miles to a dance. In those ;ays any x&att Ofco had a new wagon and* 5 team could go with any of the In those days there were lots of negroes who had settled on Big Timbered Hill which is in Craig County and then there was a lettlement in what we called Half Timbered Eill in Ottawa County which is about half way between Miami and Welch. Big Timbered Eill which is near Bluejacket was once called "Negro Hill 1 *. They had a
243 GAHHETT. INTERVIEW. 13614 church and school-building there and would have great picnics there to which they would bring their dinners and stay all day end in the summer time would hold a protracted meeting there and negroes would come and stay with them for weeks and attend the meeting which was held in a brush arbor. We white folks, especially the young men,liked ta go and listen to the negroes sing* Then,too,in the Goose Neck Bend on the Verdigris there were lots of negroes and here they* would have a big celebrationeach August* When the McGhee Brothers began to fence their land that they intended, to settle on at Half Timbered. Hill the negroes tried to hold possession of it and the negroes who had settled there whose names were Harris resisted them and they had a fight in which T. H. McGhee was injured* by a lick over the head with/rail in the hands of. 0A0 of them* The negroes were finally put off this land through the efforts of the ^Indian Police Officers* ' There were no negroes on the east side of the Neosho River and warn these negroes were forced off, it caused them to begin to leave here in order to live nearer to each other and for many, many years Ottawa County has not had even one negro living thare..* * *
244.V, G&BHETT. INTERVIEW. 13614 The negroes were numerous at Big Timbered Hill and several took their allotments there and there was a negro settlement there t for several years but they have gradually been bought out until today there are no negroes living there and those.people who bought them out have transformed that section into one of the best fruit growing regions in Oklahoma. Realizing that this was a new country and that there was going to come a time when there would have to be lots of building, I learned the carpenter trade and quit the range. In those days we had to haul our pine lumber from the sawmills on Grand River. It would take thre*e days to make the trip and we had no bridges over the streams and the roads over the hills and up the banks of the streams had not been out down and worked so when we came to a hill or a hard pull we had to double team to make the grade with the load of lumber* In the summer time the green -headed flies were so bad that we had to travel at night and we also had to plough corn at night. During my life I have built thirteen schoolhouses in this part of the state and I helped build the town of Welch in raig County. Young and restless, 1 went to Missouri near Appleton Cdty and remained there four years and while 1 wts there the country seemed
CABR1SDN, GARHETT. INTERVIEW. -... " 13614 7. 'to spring up all at once. One time the folks wrote to me that from thei-r door they could see five new houses being built. After four years of carpentering here I returned to the same home in Kennison. December 26, 1894, I married Mamie Morgan who had come to 6. this country with her parents when she was fifteen years old and had 'settled between the Twin Hills west of Welch.. In the spring when the grass was three or four inches high and the prairie was covered with the bright spring flowers, I used to stand and look at it and think that it was the prettiest country that I ever saw. We went to housekeeping on Big Cabin Creek and that year, we had the chills, I lost my wheat crop, the hairs came out of my hogs, a storm blew my oats down and I lost my corn crop so thinking that I was not a farmer, I quit and went to work carpentering and since then I have followed that trade excepting for two short periods, Once I worked for 3. Starr near Adair for a year. He had two thousand cattle to take care of and feed,and once after our return from Colorado where I had worked for the Santa Fe in La ' Junta, Colorado for four years. I returned to this country and one of my brothers, Jim had stuck to this country aal now was a
, CARHETT. INTERVIEW.. ' 13614 8 substantial farmer, so I tried farming again near him but it did not last long for me. Jim, who is patient has always remained here and began first to lease land for 15 cents per acre and later as he had the opportunity he would buy a piece of land until he is now one of the large landowners of this county* However he does r not go into the cattle business on a large scale any more. He now keep8 only about seventy-five head of stock. I have built buildings cnrerthis part of the state for many years but once in a while I would take a notion and we would,go somewhere else but after a while we would raturn and in this way we have lived in Iowa, Kansas City, and Colorado but twenty-nine years ago we returned to this state the last time and have been in this section «ver since. I have been active in building until recently wfcen I had a partial stroke but I am getting better and would like to feel a hammer in my hands again but my age will not permit me to get the.work that I used to get.