So far today (10:00am), Thursday, we’ve had 1/2 inch of rain here in south central Oklahoma. it’s so badly needed too as we’ve not had any rain since before Halloween. More rain predicted, bring it on!
Springer, Oklahoma Post Office – 1959
Simon Westheimer store in Marietta, Oklahoma 1905
Some mail from this week’s MAILBAG….
Butch, In the late 50’s, the Ardmoreite took a bold step. I was host of “Sock Hop”, a live TV show that ran for a half hour on Monday through Friday about PM on KVSO-TV, channel 12. But on Mondays, it was all black. A talented young black man was host on Mondays. I stayed home and watched. But I never met him. And I don’t know how it even happened that the decision-makers at KVSO-TV made that choice. Pretty bold for 1957! Anybody know where I might reach him? Or anyone who knows how that all happened. Kindness,
James Lewis
Oklahoma City
646-386-6474
NOTE: KVSO-TV (historical): This was the former call sign for the station that is now KXII-TV, a CBS affiliate serving the Ardmore/Ada, Oklahoma, and Sherman, Texas areas. KXII-TV is owned by Gray Television.
I’m looking for Marie (Marsh) Robinson & Aaron “Russell” Robinson. They lived in OKC. He passed in 1985. I’m not sure what year she passed. -Kari Kenana Smart
HAM Radio Talk By Butch Bridges KC5JVT
Allstar node # 58735 – Echolink # 101960 – HamsOverIP # 103010
“Elmer” is a slang term in amateur radio for a mentor who helps guide newcomers through the hobby. The term originated in a 1971 QST magazine column by Rod Newkirk, W9BRD, who wrote about losing interest in radio after his mentor, a ham named Elmer, moved away. Newkirk’s article used the name to highlight the importance of having a mentor in the hobby, and it became a widely used term.
Below is from my newsletter archives
Oct 2001 – Last September I told about the Heartland Share program operating in Ardmore and that anyone was eligible to buy “shares” and take part in this wonderful service. The only thing the program asks in return is you do 2 hours of some kind of community service per month. The program started in 1983 and is already established in many states with distribution points in cities all across America.
Oct 2001 – “Hi Butch, Regarding the article about Fairview school and the dinky steam train. I called my mother, who will be seventy four in a few days this year and asked her if there was ever a train that ran between Davis and Sulphur. For I am fifty six now, and never heard of it. She was born just west up the hill from Sandy creek bridge, directly south across the hi-way and cross the railroad tracks, from Midway Grocery Store. The old house she was born in, was torn down or moved and new house built there. At around the age of 8 to 10, she remembers the steam train of about three to four freight cars, traveled at about the speed as her father’s T-Model truck, but would eventually gain ahead of you. She remembers the train whistle, as she road in her father’s T-Model truck, the engineer would blow the whistle for you, which all the kids, bout five of them, riding on the back of the flat bed truck, enjoyed immensely. She remembers the tracks use to be where the Arbuckle Hospital is now. She said if you look at the south side of the hi-way 7, you might can still see the grade here and there, that the tracks were on. Her memory gets a bit fuzzy, but she thinks the tracks went across Rock Creek, past the Sulphur High School, to a cotton gin, later the Farmer’s Co-op feed store. She can not remember the route the tracks took to get to the gin from the west side of Sulphur, maybe someone else might remember.”
“She remembers the Fairview School, tho she did not attend it, she said she took me to church there one Sunday. Her father moved near the old school around 1944, then she married and I came along. While my Dad was off to war, she said she had taken me to church there in 1946. Her younger brother and sisters were going to school when her father moved near the school building in/about 1944. She said they had a choice of going to Fairview School, but did not want to, instead, elected to ride the school bus to Davis school. She does not remember when it burnt, but remembers talk about it.”
Below is a photo of the Dinky Train at Madill Oklahoma courtesy The Madill Record. Here is a link to a comprehensive news article on the Dinky by the Madill Record newspaper. CLICK HERE
“Butch, That Freedom Train was a traveling museum that went from town to town. It contained, as the brochure stated, copies of 100 of the documents we associate with our freedom: The Declaration of Independence, The Constitution, The Bill of Rights, etc. There have been a few of those trains since then, too.” –Donna Boyd in windy Culpeper, VA.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_Train
“Also want to thank you for the detailed account of the Jake Hamon murder scandal. My deceased husband, Bob Milner, was the grandson of R. L. Randol who was the proprietor of the Randol Hotel on Main Street in Ardmore. Have always heard scraps of the story, but never such a detailed account. Bob and I were alumni of the 1945 high school class and were fortunate enough to attend the fiftieth anniversary reunion before Bob died in 1997. I have a few mementoes of the hotel, but am still a novice on the computer so don’t know how to transmit them. I have two sons, Bob, Jr., of Dallas, and Tom, of New Orleans. They both grew up in Ardmore, and Tom receives your newsletter.” –Laura Sue Sullivan Milner
“I may have told you this before when you were writing about Cecil Button (Button’s Auto Electric), but when I saw his name again, I thought I would write to you. I really don’t remember writing it before. Anyway during WWII sometime about 1944 I was looking at patient charts…. I was a Chief Pharmacist Mate in charge of the department selecting transportation of patients who their physicians wanted to send back to Hawaii for treatment or to the US for treatment or discharge. I was very popular with patients who always opted for air transportation over a slow ship, especially if going home. Another chief, not so popular was in charge of sending patients back to duty, if their health permitted. This was in Base Hospital 18. Guam, M.I. Anyway, I ran across the medical chart of Cecil Button of Ardmore, Oklahoma. Can you imagine the thrill? I had to jump up right then and rush to the ward where he was a patient. We really had a great visit, reminiscing about home etc. After the war, I would always have a chat with Cecil Button when I had a chance, and would we visit. He was a great fellow, and I do miss him.”
“I really enjoyed the comments about Bitter Enders. Evidently there are more entrances to the cave than were thought. While growing up in Davis, we tried to explore as many of the caves in the area as possible and I remember going through the two that your reader mentioned in his response but was unaware that they were also called Bitter Enders. One of the caves east of Turner Falls proved to be tragic for a couple of explorers in the late 50’s early 60’s as they became trapped in the cave when a torrential rain came and brought the water level up to where they became disoriented. I can remember radio announcements being made that if anyone was around who had experience with the cave please go to Turner Falls and help the emergency folks on site on how the cave was designed and where they might think the trapped people might be. As it turned out, they had gone deep enough into the cave that they were using diving equipment and had become wedged into one of the narrow passage ways and could not get out before their oxygen ran out. Keep up the good work – the information you provide is extremely interesting and brings back fond and bad memories as well.”
“….the old Daube Ranch South of Mill Creek, Oklahoma. It sold the ranch to TXI out of Dallas. There is one old house on the ranch that you might be interested in researching. It’s called the Dodson House. I don’t think you can get there until the ground dries out a bit. But this old house is built next to a spring. Whoever Mr. Dodson was, he was quite creative and inventive. He build a custom water wheel out of a car differential to pump water into the rest of his house, but he built a flume direct from the spring which runs through the kitchen area of the house.”
“Hi Butch, After Fairview School burned down, about 1937/38, I skipped second grade, and my family moved to the big city (Sulphur), where I attended Washington School for third and fourth grades. My best buddy was a red headed kid, a lot like Mayberry’s Opie, whose family later moved to Ardmore. His stepfather, Fount Duston was killed in a refinery explosion in/near Ardmore in the early forties. My friend, Jack Moorehead, went to high school in Ardmore, joined the navy, and after his discharge went to O.S.U. ( I believe ) and got a degree in journalism. That little redheaded kid is now, and has been for several years, the owner/editor/publisher of California’s oldest running newspaper, The Grass Valley Union, and last I heard is doing great. Maybe his high school classmates (class of 47) would be interested in this little bit of info.” -Bob Elliston
I’m still planning to stop sending out my WEEKLY newsletter at the end of this year. But I will be posting it from time to time in 2026, God willing.
Oklahoma, where the wind comes sweepin’ down the plain. –Oscar Hammerstein II
See everyone next week!
Butch and Jill Bridges
Ardmore Oklahoma
580-490-6823
https://oklahomahistory.net