The Daily Ardmoreite
April 13, 1934
Lost Silver Mine Located, He Says
Claiming to know of unusual mineral deposits in the Arbuckle mountains, S. M. McKay, who lives one mile east of Woodford, is seeking parties to take on excursions of the Southern Oklahoma hills, it was stated Friday.
McKay says he has found numerous minerals in the Arbuckles and that he knows of a long lost silver mine, worked by the Chickasaw Indians 90 years ago. “It was closed long before white men came to this country,” McKay says, “but from old timers I piece the story together and recently located the shaft to the mine. I’d be glad to show anyone interested in developing the mine its location.”
The Daily Ardmoreite
June 8, 1910
Silver Mine Was Indian’s Secret
Full blood Euchee (also Yuchi tribe) takes his life rather than reveal hidden mine.
Muskogee Oklahoma – Jess McDermott, official interpreter for the Creek Nation, and the commissioner of the five civilized tribes, tells a strange story of the knowledge certain Indians had on a rich deposit of silver in the northwestern part of the Creek Nation, near Sapulpa.
Timmy Fife, a half breed Creek, who has absorbed enough of the white man civilization to have a desire for money, went to a old full-blooded Euchee Indian tribe whom he had reason to believe knew the whereabouts of the silver deposit and try to get from him the secret. This old Indian admitted that there was a rich silver mine. He said that his father had discovered it. But the discoverer had no use for the silver and he hated white men and their ways and would never tell where the silver was hidden away. On his death bed he revealed the secret to his son, but made him swear that he would never reveal to any other person and to use it only when driven to do so, even for his own use. The old Euchee to whom Fife made his appeal had never touched the silver and said the secret of the location would be buried with him in his grace.
Below is an up-to-date listing of the veterans interred at the state veterans cemetery at South Commerce and Myall in Ardmore. The cemetery received it’s first vet in June 2022. Since then 53 veterans have been interred.
Q. What was the name of the little BBQ place that was nextdoor to Button’s Electric at Commerce and West Broadway?
A. Young’s Smokehouse BBQ
The Mailbag
“Strange question but does anyone remember back around 1958-1960 an advice column personality (??) came to Ardmore and at Lake Murray Lodge set up and interviewed local teens. I remember it vaguely. Who was she? What was the outcome? Thanks.” -Butch McClure class of 62.
Well Butch, you remind me of one of the best times of my life when I played for the Ardmore Indians in 1951 with the name of Ernie Klein, we lost the last playoff against McAlester 4 games to 2. They used to belong to the NY Yankees. Was a great series and I will never forget our great Ardmore Team, thank you very much and thank The city of Ardmore for being so great. -Ernesto Wallerstein in NJ
Below is the proposed new Sulphur High School gym. -Mary Lou Heltzel
There’s hardly a week that goes by without Ventures’ music popping up on my music rotation. I got to see them once at Knott’s Berry Farm in the 80s. This recording is Junior Brown doing his SURF MEDLEY. He was the guitar player for a band I heard in the 1970s in a club in a little village outside of Albuquerque. I didn’t hear him again until 1990 when he recorded his first solo album. We would go see him anytime he appeared in Houston and we have seen him in Montana and on one of our cruises. He does the best version of GHOST RIDERS IN THE SKY I have ever heard. As this song shows, he also does some songs everyone will recognize. -Monroe Cameron in MT
Below are pictures of the Healdton Oil Field Days parade held Saturday August 26, 2023. -Dwane Stevens
Butch, Just an FYI concerning your photo of the Ardmore icon Miller’s
Dairy Freeze, or Dairy Queen as it was originally named. The location
shown in the photo was not the original location. The photo address
is 705 W. Broadway, due to the business being moved from down the
street. The original location was 425 W. Broadway, and it had always
been called Miller’s Dairy Queen. The name change was due to the
folks at DQ taking exception to the Miller’s using that name.
The Millers were some of Ardmore’s favorite people. They were most
gracious, and well liked far & wide. They were world travelers, and
loved to talk about their travels. Old time Ardmoreites remember well
the daily stops at Miller’s coming home from school. Not to forget
those regular summer stops to cool down with a soft-serve cone. Every
spare nickel or dime burnin’ a hole in a youngster’s pocket would end
up at Miller’s. They would always remember a youngster’s name and
parents.
The Millers, good people who sadly have disappeared from our once
quiet landscape, where everybody knew your name, and front porches
were still a social focal point. -Steve Miller
HAM Radio Talk KC5JVT via EchoLink
I’ve made a couple new contacts via HAM radio using Echolink the past week.
I’ve talked several HAMs this week that I had previously talked to but I did make the contacts below this week….
08/29/23 8:45pm KC3WKG Ash in North Potomac, Maryland
https://www.qrz.com/db/KC3WKG
08/30/23 9:45pm KI7OL Ken in Sebring, FL
https://www.qrz.com/db/KI7OL
Below is from my Vol 4 Issue 176 September 2, 2000 newsletter:
The court clerks office here received a couple of donations of Elvis collection items to go in their Elvis Room collection. This first item was graciously provided by Marietta attorney Kenneth Delashaw.
And the next item was given to the court clerks office by Ardmoreite Dean Earhart.
In Healdton, Oklahoma is a Department of Corrections Work Center. One of the inmates there is an artist in tooling leather. Here is a leather notebook he made for the police chief, John Canoe (1944-2019), of Kingston, Oklahoma
Note: John Canoe may hold the record of the longest sitting chief of one police department in Oklahoma – 30 years
“Thought you might like a copy of Palacine Oil Company. Picture dated l929 or 39, not clear on back. Palacine Oil Company was located at 310 West Main, Ardmore. The man on the left is Ira Butler.”
I wonder how many of your readers remember the little passenger train we all called the “Dinky.” I believe it ran to Durant and back. If I’m right, it was the first diesel engine train in Ardmore. It sounded different than the big Locomotives and it was dependable. Every morning around 08:00am you would hear its strange sounding whistle as it started its run. Also, I wonder how many remember where the old old Hwy 70 east was located. I’m not speaking of what is now Okla 199 east, which was Hwy 70 east until the new Hwy 70 east, south of town was built. The old old Hwy 70 east was just north of where Okla.199 out of Ardmore is now and ran right close to the San A Fe railroad and a large pond called by the same name.
“I was Carter County births and deaths Registrar from 1961 to 1997 and have many memories regarding that 1966 American Flyers fatal crash. I had to issue burial permits/removal permits for all the deceased and helped with some of the death certificates also, I will never forget going to the Civic Auditorium and seeing all the bodies and writing until my hand cramped filling out all the paper work. My brother went on ambulance runs with Joel Bettes and he also was a volunteer deputy. He was one of the first persons at the crash site and helped with transporting some of the bodies but was finally asked by one of the law personnel to help direct traffic. The traffic was miles and miles long and hindered the rescue and recovery units. He worked for over 36 hours without sleep before he went home to sleep a few hours and go to his job.” -Pat Upchurch
“Hi Butch Saw the inquiry about the Coca Cola sign on the mountain and thought I would pass this information along. We have been told in the 20’s, when the ranch was owned by Cal Washburn, the rocks did indeed spell out Coca Cola. Then the company decided not to renew and the rocks were used to form the now famous Lazy S Ranch sign. The sign measures 70 ft. high x 100 feet wide although that area doubles when it’s time to repaint. HA! If your readers have any more questions about the Lazy S Ranch we would be more than happy to answer them. Keep up the good work with the newsletter.” -Tommy Rankin in Springer
“Mr. Bridges: I copied the picture of Lee Evers’ bell and your comments and sent them USPS to my long time Ft. Smith, Arkansas friend, Charles Winters (1930-2010), who now lives in Kansas City. He only has Juno e-mail and can’t receive pictures off the Internet. I think what Mr. Lee Evers may have is a bell off a streetcar. The motorman could operate it with his foot and the loudness would be consistent with the requirements of a streetcar. Charles will know because he had one on an old 1940s era Chrysler that he inherited from his father. If I remember correctly the bell came off a Ft Smith Light and Traction Co car. Service was abandoned in 1934. Now our only problem is getting an answer from him. He has e-mail, but won’t use it. I’ll probably have to call him in a couple weeks to see what he has to say about the bell. BTW, Charles is a walking encyclopedia of railroad and Ft Smith, Arkansas history. There aren’t too many question he can’t answer about the two subjects. He is working on a book about the history of the Fort Smith & Western Ry. The FS&W ran from Ft. Smith to Guthrie and Oklahoma City and was abandoned in 1938. Hopefully, he will have it published soon. I’ll let you know what I find out about the bermuda bell.”
The link below is a webpage of 19 locomotive pictures by Charles E. Winters.
https://legacy-westhist.libraries.ou.edu/locations/docs/westhist/winters/index.html
“Hello from Amarillo. There was a bell on the north east corner of the Berwyn School, now the Gene Autry Museum, I remember Buster Dillion ringing it on the first day of school when I was in the first grade. They took the clapper off and hid it so we could not ring the bell on Halloween, but we found it in the basement and rang in the halloween at midnight, god we were bad back then.”
“The road to a friend’s house is never long.” –Danish Proverb
See everyone next week!
Butch and Jill Bridges
Ardmore, OK
580-490-6823