Dust Bowl: General Description

From 1909 to 1929, farmers on the Great Plains, many of them desperate to make a living as agricultural-commodity prices fell, plowed up for the first time some 32 million acres of sod. Immediately after that transformation of the land, in the 1930s the Plains set new records for heat, drought, and wind. The hardest hit region was made up of western Kansas, southeastern Colorado, and the panhandles of Texas and Oklahoma, the center of what came to be called "the Dust Bowl." In many parts of the region, 1934 through 1936 witnessed the most intense drought ever recorded. These conditions created wind erosion of topsoil never seen before or since.[1] "The wind lifted the surface powder into the skies, creating towering eight-thousand-foot waves known as 'black blizzards."[2] By 1938, at least ten million acres had lost five inches of topsoil. An additional thirteen million acres had lost at least two inches.[3]

Notes

[1] Donald Worster, Dust Bowl: The Southern Plains in the 1930s (New York: Oxford University Press, 1979), 30; Donald A. Wilhite, "Dust Bowl," EOHC, 1:424-25. 

[2] David M. Kennedy, Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929-1945 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 194.

[3] Wilhite, "Dust Bowl," 425.

Moving Beyond Female Ministers and Missionaries

Much of what has been written about women in American religious history has featured those relatively few who were evangelists, teachers, and missionaries. The reasons for this emphasis are obvious. Most of this historiography came about as a result of various feminist impulses in America. Those who were looking for religious heroines found them in those women who aspired to the pulpit, or to at least to some greater public role in the life of the church.[1] Essentially, historians of women and religion have imitated an older, traditional way, one that emphasized leading men, great events, and turning points.

Meanwhile, religious historians who come from conservative and traditional circles have typically ignored the stories of female preachers from the past. This has left them with not as much to say about women, at least not much that was obvious.[2] Consequently, only some writers have told us only some of the stories of those women who represent just a tiny fraction of the devout in American history.

A better understanding of the significance of women in American religious history will require an approach that more closely examines the lives that almost all of them lived, the sorts of contributions they typically made. Along this line, one unexplored avenue is the role women have played in the establishment of new congregations. An overview of Stone-Campbell church planting in Indian Territory from 1888 until Oklahoma statehood in 1907 reveals that several new congregations began with the efforts of women. For example, the church at Ardmore in present-day Carter County was formed in 1888 when "Mrs. Sophia Simpson, the Cook sisters, and Mr. and Mrs. R. W. Campbell" began meeting each Sunday to study the Bible and observe the Lord's Supper.[3] A congregation at Silver City, now a ghost town in present-day Grady County, began in 1889 when Aunie Erwin and new arrival Meta Chestnutt "went to work in earnest, teaching the Bible every Lord's Day." In 1890, "when the Rock Island Railroad came through," the little congregation along with the rest of the town moved about seven miles west to be near the new tracks. This was the beginning of present-day Minco, Oklahoma. There, under the leadership of Chestnutt, who had come to Indian Territory in order to teach school, the church continued to "meet regularly each Lord's Day to study and teach the Word, break bread and contribute of our means to the Lord." By 1895, the church had grown "from two to some fifty or sixty."[4] About eighteen miles to the south of Minco, at Chickasha, a congregation began around 1892 sometime after the arrival of Mrs. Lillian Bohart Welsh, a staunch Disciple who sought out like-minded believers.[5] The Christian Church at McAlester, Oklahoma, was formed in 1893 after "Mrs. W. S. Ambrose and Mrs. Hammond Holler," decided to raise the money they needed in order to bring evangelist J. Harry Barber from Paris, Texas, just south of the Red River, to conduct a revival meeting.[6] A congregation began at Wagoner around 1895, when "Mrs. J. R. Thompson took the first step . . . by organizing a Sunday School in her home." Soon, Mrs. Thompson had twenty students. The Christian Church was organized sometime later when a preacher from Fort Worth, Texas, conducted a series of evangelistic meetings there.[7] A Stone-Campbell congregation began at Poteau in 1900 when a Mrs. McKenna, described as "a loyal Disciple," arranged for a church facility to be built there. The small congregation was not able to pay the mortgage and eventually sold its building to the Episcopal Church. Nevertheless, when evangelist W. S. Deartherage visited Poteau in 1916, he discovered a small group of Disciples. They formed the nucleus of what emerged as a permanent congregation.[8]

What these stories begin to reveal is that for every woman in Stone-Campbell history who preached to a mixed audience there were a thousand or more who established congregations, taught Bible classes, supported preachers and missionaries, and, above all, nurtured the next generation of believers.

Notes

[1] In Stone-Campbell historiography, two good examples are C. Leonard Allen, Distant Voices: Discovering a Forgotten Past for a Changing Church (Abilene, TX: Abilene Christian University Press, 1993), esp. ch. 4, "Your Daughters Shall Prophesy,." See also ch. 17, "The New Woman"; and Bonnie Miller, "Restoration Women Who Responded to the Spirit Before 1900," Leaven 16, no. 1 (2008), accessed February 20, 2021, https://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/leaven/vol16/iss1/5.

[2] Again, in Stone-Campbell historiography, a good example is the website titled The Restoration Movement.com. The site is managed by Scott Harp, a conservative preacher among the Churches of Christ. Although it contains a large number of biographical sketches of male leaders, its page titled "Great Women Of The Restoration Movement" includes a total of six links to biographies of female leaders, accessed February 20, 2021, https://www.therestorationmovement.com/women.htm.

[3] Stephen J. England, Oklahoma Christians: A History of Christian Churches and of the start of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Oklahoma (St. Louis, MO: Bethany Press, 1975), 55.

[4] Meta Chestnutt, "Minco, Ind. Ter.," The American Home Missionary 1 (April 1895), 62. See also England, Oklahoma Christians, 56-57. For a brief history of Silver City, see John W. Morris, Ghost Towns of Oklahoma (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1978), 173-74.

[5] England, Oklahoma Christians, 58.

[6] Ibid., 59. Apparently, the next year, Barber made a follow up visit to McAlester. "Local Mention," South McAlester Capital July 26, 1894, includes the following note: "Rev. J. Harry Barber closed an interesting meeting here last week. He is an entertaining preacher."

[7] England, Oklahoma Christians, 60.

[8] Ibid., 63-64.

Education among the Chickasaws in Indian Territory: Early Beginnings to 1855

Before 1850, public education hardly existed among the Chickasaws in Indian Territory. The tribe received appropriations from the federal government, and part of that money was spent to support students who were attending schools in the Choctaw District, where most Chickasaws lived at the time. But students were few. For example, in 1843 the tribal agent noted that there were not more than seven or eight Chickasaws attending Choctaw schools. At least some of the brightest Chickasaw students were sent to the Choctaw Academy, founded by the Baptist Mission Society at Great Crossings, Kentucky, in 1818. In time, the federal subsidy that provided for those students expired. Afterward, a few attended Plainfield Academy in eastern Connecticut, a school established mainly to prepare young men for future study at Yale College.[1]

The scene changed when Christian missionaries arrived in Indian Territory. Baptists, Roman Catholics, Presbyterians, and, above all, Methodists made up this group. Prior to Chickasaw removal from the southeastern United States, by far the most successful Christian missions among the Chickasaws were conducted by Presbyterians.[2] But during the 1840s and '50s, the most productive missionaries among them were Methodists. Part of their success resulted from a willingness to follow the Indians as they left their settlements in the Choctaw District and moved further west into what would become the territory of the Chickasaw Nation. In 1844, Methodist missionary E. B. Duncan planted a church at Pleasant Grove near Fort Washita. The settlement served as a base of operations for Duncan's circuit-riding mission among the Chickasaws. At the same time, Duncan's wife began a day school where she taught as many as forty children.[3]

Mrs. Duncan's school exemplified a strong tendency among Methodist missionaries to bring education as well as religion to Indian Territory. Early on, Methodist officials began negotiating with Chickasaw leaders regarding the educational needs of the tribe. Their collaboration led to the establishment of a system of schools for both elementary and upper-level students in the Chickasaw District. According to the agreement, the Indians contributed over 80 percent of the cost for these schools; the denominations contributed only a small fraction. The first school in the district was the Chickasaw Manual Labor Academy. An impressive two-story stone building was completed in 1851. The school admitted both girls and boys, with 140 students as early as 1857. Instructors taught a wide variety of subjects, including English, Latin, arithmetic, geometry, music, and religion. They segregated part of the curriculum according to sex: boys learned to perform "agricultural and mechanical arts," while girls learned "house-wifery, needle-work, domestic industry, and child care."[4]

Presbyterian missionaries established an academy among the Chickasaws in 1851, Wapanucka Female Manual Labor School. In 1854 the Methodists added Bloomfield Academy, a school for girls, and Colbert Institute. In 1857 the Chickasaw council approved legislation for the construction of a fifth school in their district, the Burney Academy near Lebanon. From the Chickasaw perspective, antebellum missionary schools in Indian Territory focused on literacy mainly for the sake of Bible reading and conversion to Christianity. To the Indians, those educational goals did not serve the best interests of the tribe. Most Chickasaw leaders understood that schooling was vital to the future of their nation, but they wanted their schools to provide a broad academic foundation. That is, they wanted teachers who would teach, not preach.[5]

Cultural differences between missionary teachers and Chickasaw students created another concern. The differences often resulted in harsh judgments and cruel discipline based on stereotypes. For example, in 1855 at Wapanucka Academy, one schoolmaster publicly whipped a group of girls. He offered the justification that,

These little rogues need something more than mere kindness to manage them. They are full of evil from the crown of their head to the sole of their feet."

Children sometimes ran away from school and did everything they could to keep from being sent back.[6]

Trouble between students and teachers is, of course, an age-old problem. Yet, in many instances white teachers in the Chickasaw Nation interpreted the friction in racial terms. One nonnative principal surmised that stubbornness was "a fundamental characteristic" of especially full-blooded Chickasaws. According to his stereotype, there was also a benefit to being a full-blood: "the higher the percentage of Indian blood the better artists they were."[7]

Notes

[1] Arrell M. Gibson, The Chickasaws (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1971), 231-32. Regarding the Choctaw Academy, see Clara Sue Kidwell, "Choctaw Academy," in The Kentucky Encyclopedia, ed. John E. Kleber (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1992), 184. For more about the Plainfield Academy, see Orwin Bradford Griffin, The Evolution of the Connecticut State School System (New York: Teachers College, Columbia University, 1928), esp. 28, 48, 176-81. See also the following URL:  https://connecticuthistory.org/plainfield-academy-grooming-connecticut-scholars-in-the-18th-and-19th-centuries/

[2] Gibson, The Chickasaws, 106-09.

[3] Ibid., 233-34. Gibson cites the Annual Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs for 1845, 524-26.

[4] Gibson, The Chickasaws, 235.

[5] Wendy St. Jean, Remaining Chickasaw in Indian Territory, 1830s-1907 (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2011), 92. The same sort of tension between Indians and Euro-Americans cropped up at other times and places. See, for example, Linford D. Fisher's discussion of evangelization in eighteenth-century southern New England in The Indian Great Awakening: Religion and the Shaping of Native Cultures of Early America (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), ch. 2.

[6] St. Jean, Remaining Chickasaw in Indian Territory, 91.

[7] Ibid., 95.

A Day in the Western History Collections at OU

I spent Thursday, March 19, 2015 in the Western History Collections, which is a part of the library system at the University of Oklahoma. It was rainy in Norman that day. Students were gone for Spring Break.  The Collections are held on the third floor of the beautiful old School of Law building, Monnet Hall.

Anyone who knows anything about college football knows that the Sooners are a perennial powerhouse. So I wasn't surprised, but was amused to see the note about the hours of operation on game days!

A plaque at the entrance to the building.  . . .

The central reading room for the Western History Collections, an inspiring place to study! . . .

Among the one-of-a-kind items I examined was this 1907 photograph of the First Christian Church in Chickasha, Indian Territory. The photo was taken about eight months before statehood.  . . .

Silver City, Chickasaw Nation, Indian Territory

[page 173]

County: Grady
Location: (a) Sec. 22, T 10 N, R 6 W  (b) 19 miles north, 8 miles east of Chickasha; 3 miles north of Tuttle
Map: Page 219
Post Office: May 29, 1883--June 17 1890

Silver City, located just south of the Canadian River where it was crossed by the Chisholm Trail, was an important stopping point for cattlemen on their way to northern markets. Just when the village had its beginning is obscure. It is known, however, that a Mexican family living nearby sold quirts to cowboys before 1880. The Canadian may have caused the village to be located at its particular site. In the vicinity were three small creeks with good water, and the land between the creeks furnished a grazing area when the river was in flood. Even when the

[page 174]

water in the Canadian was low, quicksand could present a problem. Cattle, once they had started across, had to be kept moving. Most trail bosses preferred to hold the cattle on the south bank if the crossing could not be completed in daylight. With the opening of the Unassigned Lands, the Cheyenne and Arapaho Reservation, and the Cherokee Outlet for settlement, the Chisholm Trail ceased to exist.

In 1890, when the Rock Island extended its tracks south of the river, there was a general movement from Silver City to the new town of Minco. One of the noted pioneers of Silver City was Meta Chestnut [sic], who had organized a subscription school. She also moved to Minco where she started Minco Academy, which later become El Meta Bond College.

The only existing reminder of Silver City is the cemetery. All land formerly occupied by the village and trail is now in agricultural use.

#

Source: John W. Morris, Ghost Towns of Oklahoma (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1978), 173-74.

Note: The Oxford English Dictionary defines "quirt" as "a riding whip with a short handle and a braided leather lash."