This and That Newsletter
A Weekly Publication

www.OklahomaHistory.net

Vol 17  Issue 839      Circulation 5,000       February 21, 2013

PO Box 2

Ardmore, Oklahoma 73402

email address:  butchbridges@oklahomahistory.net

580-657-8616


Oklahoma's greatest radio and TV broadcaster, and a legend in his own time, passed away this week in Oklahoma City. One of my first memories of Danny Williams was watching him on our black and white TV when he did his 3-D Danny kid's show.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YdxWJKOCHI

And I will never forget his antics when Danny was the announcer for his Live Wrestling Show from the stockyards coliseum in OKC in the 60s. I searched the internet trying to find one of those old episodes, but couldn't find any online.

Below is a great information site on Danny Williams and his career starting in the 40s.

http://www.dddynamo.com/main.html

Below is a link to Danny's guest on his last day on the air, John Bennett.  Most of you will remember Oklahoma Chef John Bennett sharing his fruit and nut cake recipe last November.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xklM3LikLfw

Danny's last broadcast after 61 years in the business was on August 28, 2008.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lc2jimUZQ78

The following is a link to an interview Danny Williams did just a couple years before his death. This interview is about an hour long, but it is the most interesting interview you'll ever listen to, as he answers questions his about his start in broadcasting and continuing to present day, some very serious, and some comical with a laugh or two. I got several chuckles out of Danny's interview, and felt like I was right there with him. I really loved this interview.

http://www.voicesofoklahoma.com/danny_williams.html

Family members said friends and fans are welcome to attend a special memorial service at 2 p.m. Sunday at the Oklahoma Historical Society to celebrate his life and career.

I had a request from California from someone trying to reach a family member of Buster Ned. He has a video taken at a stomp dance in the 80s to share with the family. If anyone knows an email address of an family member, let me know.
http://www.oklahomahistory.net/photos/buster.jpg

If anyone has some old timey clay bricks, not the newer kind with 3 holes through the center, and would like to get rid of a few, let me know. I am going to try my luck again at sandblasting letters on them. The newer bricks also have small aggregate mixed in to make them stronger but sure not good for sandblasting. Anyway, I'm on the look out of "old" bricks.

Back in 2006 I sandblasted some bricks for my Sulphur friend, Bill Uhles (now deceased) that turned out pretty good. Kenneth Samples, Otis Shields, and Noveline Norton was his school friends.

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos6a/BillUhlesBrick.jpg

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos6a/KennethSamplesBrick.jpg

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos6a/OtisShieldsBrick.jpg

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos6a/NovelineNortonBrick.jpg

But the brick I'm proudest to have made in 2006 was one I made for former Carter County Commissioner Bill McLaughlin (now retired). His first year as chairman of the Board of Commissioners was in 2006. I sure miss that man.

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos13a/McLaughlinBrick2006.jpg

Here is a neat website to look at a certain bygone year's 12 month calendar. When you get to browsing around this website, there are plenty more neat time related links.

http://www.timeanddate.com/calendar/info.html

From my April 6, 2006 archives: "The building you are asking about appears to have been located on the SW corner of Main & Washington streets. The tornado that struck Ardmore on Feb. 13, 1946 destroyed a building that was located on that corner which was often called the "Champion Building". The picture shown here appears to be located in that exact location and may be the building that was known as the Champion Building. I am basing my opinion on the fact that I carried a paper route in that area in the 1930's." -Ernest Martin

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos6a/SimpsonBldg1918.jpg

From my April 6, 2006 archives: A Reader wrote in this week and mentioned the concrete hitching posts usually have a ring near the top of them, but the pic I had in last week's T&T did not have a ring. Here is a close up the top of the hitching post at C and 7th NW showing the holes where the ring used to be fastened. I guess someone pulled them out years ago as a memento. Sad people vandalize history.

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos6a/HitchingPost6b.jpg

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos6a/HitchingPost6a.jpg

I was over at Troy Loard's house the other day. I worked with Troy back around 1970 when he and I worked at the ambulance service. Troy had been working there about 2 years before I went to work, and he continued working there a couple more years, when he left to work at the new Uniroyal Tire Plant (now Michelin). In his later years Troy started a hobby of tinkering and repairing old windmills. He'd find them all over southern Oklahoma in disrepair, and take and make them like new. Troy has a really nice windmill in his backyard, so I had to snap this pic.

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos13a/LoardWindmill.jpg

We hear often on the national news where large commercial and government computer networks receive hack attacks from foreign countries (primarily DoS attacks). But is not just the big networks, these hackers are trying to get into any network in the country. Just this morning at 4:10am I see on the one of our router logs where a hacker in China tried 54 times to hack into a secretaries' workstation computer at the courthouse, but failed. And this onslaught of hack attempts from countries outside this country goes on 24/7.

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos13a/ChinaNEThacker1.jpg

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos13a/ChinaNEThacker2.jpg

I was able to pinpoint the this morning's 4am hacker attempt to about 25 miles southeast of Lanzhou, China.

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos13a/ChinaHackerMap1.jpg

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos13a/ChinaHackerMap2.jpg

On Thursday February 28th from 2:00pm to 4:00pm there will be a Come and Go Reception for retiring Carter County Treasurer, LaDonna Wilkerson. The event will be held in the Annex I Building next door to the courthouse. LaDonna served this as county treasurer from 1993 to 2013. Hope as many of you as can who live nearby can make it by Thursday the 28th. She will be missed by all of us at work. Enjoy your retirement days LaDonna!

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos13a/LaDonna022813.jpg

Imagine around 1500 A.D. how crazy friends and neighbors of Nicolaus Copernicus thought he was when he starting saying the sun was the center of our solar system and not the earth?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolaus_Copernicus

Q.  In 1910, a group made a "midnight run" to get the Oklahoma state seal from Guthrie and move it to Oklahoma City. What then-Governor led the way?
A.  Charles Haskell, first Governor of Oklahoma

Q. How many famous singers can you name from Oklahoma?
A.  (answer in next week's T&T)

From This and That newsletter archives of February 25, 2000:

Last December I visited a Choctaw Indian lady west of Davis, Oklahoma who has the original bell from the old Presbyterian church of Davis in her front yard. How she came upon the bell, was the church and property belongs to her and when the church closed down many years ago, she moved the bell to her house near Camp Classen.
http://www.oklahomahistory.net/bellphotos/presbell.jpg
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Here's a pic of the old scales Key Feed and Seed used to weight things in their store. It's an oldie all right.
http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos13a/KeyScales1999.jpg

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The old Colston Building here in Ardmore was built in 1917 at the southeast corner of Main and "A" street SW. It's where the Citizen's Bank is currently located in the lobby. When built there was a humongous steam driven electric turbine installed in the basement to provide electricity for the building. Here's a pic of that monstrosity of a machine.
http://www.oklahomahistory.net/ttphotos13a/ColstonBuildingEngine.jpg

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Gas prices today in the Ardmore area......

http://www.oklahomagasprices.com/index.aspx?mss=152754

Check gas prices by town or zip code anywhere in U.S.

http://www.kmov.com/traffic/gas-buddy

Some mail from this week's MAILBAG.....

"Reading about all the different chili's in T&T this week made me salivate over Davis chili, made in the grocery store at 213 C NW then next door in the new building at 207 C NW in the 40's & 50's. I have the recipe which makes 50 pounds of product beginning with medium lean beef and pork. The second ingredient is kidney suet (tallow). Kidney suet is the richest white fat in the mammal as it insulates the tender kidney organ. When the store received a beef kidney to sell, the suet would still be surrounding the organ and would be carved away and saved to be used in making the chili. It would be placed in the chili pot, which was a cast iron pot, 3 ft. high, and 3 ft. in diameter, tapering to the bottom and setting on a gas burner. The suet would be melted and stirred with a boat paddle. The course ground meat would be added and seared to a gray color, stirring with the boat paddle. The seasoning ingredients would be added, chili powder, garlic, oregano, onion, ground camino seed (cumin), accent powder (MSG), tomato paste, and liquid. This would cook for a couple of hours at which time a mixture of mesa flower and water would be added to "tighten" the mixture. It would then be poured into bread tins which weighed 5#, and put into the walk in cooler. You could buy the entire 5# or any portion you wanted. After cooling there would be a skim of fat on the top about a half inch thick. It could be cut off or mixed into the chili making it the best heart attack on the rock. Back then we didn't know any better. I'm sure there are a few folks left in Carter County that remember Davis Chili."  -George Davis-AHS 1960
"A number of writers have made the claim that Cecil Creswell, who homesteaded south of Winslow, Arizona, was the only 20th-century female cattle rustler. With your interest in western history I thought you might know of others. They were probably rare even in frontier days."  -Scott
http://www.azjournal.com/2011/02/25/cecil-creswell/
 
"Butch, last week's edition contains an error. Turner Turnpike is I-44, not I-40. No part of I-40 in Oklahoma is a toll road.  The only interstate highway in Oklahoma with a toll is I-44. Actually, I-44 has three turnpikes - Will Rogers (from the Missouri border near Miami to Tulsa), Turner (Tulsa to OKC), and H.E. Bailey (Newcastle to Lawton). The other turnpikes in Oklahoma are not part of the interstate highway system."
"The same thing is true in Tulsa, where the Turner Turnpike goes west and the Will Rogers Turnpike goes east. Also I-44 in both cases. (I would also quibble that it's not the direction of travel, it's where they go [or come] from.) ."
Q. "Butch: Have you ever heard of Henry House Falls or seen it?" -Scott, Sherman, TX
A. Henry House Falls is on Henry House Creek, on the old Fitzgerald Ranch, west of Springer.

http://www.oklahomahistory.net/maps/HenryHouseFallsMap.jpg
Here is an interesting piece of history about Runway Able. It's a small island, less than 40 square miles, a flat green dot in the vastness of Pacific blue. Fly over it and you notice a slash across its north end of uninhabited bush, a long thin line that looks like an overgrown dirt runway. If you didn't know what it was, you wouldn't give it a second glance out your airplane window.
http://www.fourwinds10.net/siterun_data/history/world/news.php?q=1292870620
The 10 Cheapest Cities In The US.
http://www.businessinsider.com/the-cheapest-cities-to-live-in-the-us-2013-2#4-ardmore-oklahoma-7
ANOTHER FABULOUS FAMILY SHOW COMING TO THE WASHINGTON THEATRE MARCH 14
Be sure to round up ALL the KIDS for this spectacular performance
A NIGHT OF MAGIC
Rob Lake International Magician of the Year!
Washington Theatre, Ardmore, Oklahoma


"Sometimes our light goes out but is blown into flame by another human being. Each of us owes deepest thanks to those who have rekindled this light." -Albert Schweitzer, 1875 - 1965

See everyone next week!
Butch and Jill Bridges

PO Box 2
Lone Grove, Oklahoma 73443

Save on long distance calls, just a couple cents a minute!
http://www.CheapLongDistance.org
Ardmore High School Criterions Online
http://www.ardmorecriterion.com/
Oklahoma Bells: http://www.OklahomaHistory.net/bellpage.html
American Flyers Memorial Fund - Administration Webpage
http://www.OklahomaHistory.net/crash66.html
Official American Flyers Memorial Website
http://www.brightok.net/~wwwafm
Ardmore Army Air Field/Ardmore Air Force Base Website
http://www.brightok.net/~gsimmons
Mirror Site of the Ardmore Army Air Field/Ardmore Air Force Website
http://www.OklahomaHistory.net/airbase/
Carter county schools, past and present
http://community.webshots.com/user/oklahomahistory
Carter County Government Website
http://www.brightok.net/cartercounty/
Ardmore School Criterions
http://www.ArdmoreCriterion.com

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