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J. R. SMITH, the assistant cashier of the Maud State Bank, is popular and well known in both the business and social life of this community and a young man worthy of note in the history of his town and county. He has been prominently identified with the interests of Pottawatomie since his arrival here in 1905, and he is a native son of Tennessee, born in Madison county in 1874, a son of E. E. and Virginia (Lewis) Smith, natives respectively of Tennessee and Virginia, and members of prominent old southern families. The father, of Scotch-Irish ancestry, was a lifelong tiller of the soil, and was a worthy member of the Baptist church. Mrs. Smith died at the age of sixty-seven, after becoming the mother of thirteen children, and seven of this once large family, five sons and two daughters are yet living.
    On a farm in Tennessee J. R. Smith attained to manhood's estate, in the meantime receiving a good education in its public schools and in the Robertson Christian College at Hudson. For three years after the completion of his education he taught in the schools of Oklahoma, two years near Tecumseh and the remainder of the time east of Shawnee. During eight months he also served as the assistant cashier of the Maud State Bank, one of the reliable financial institutions of Pottawatomie county. In his official capacity he is accommodating, genial and pleasant, and is popular both with the patrons of the bank and its officers. He is a member of the Woodmen of the World and the Christian church.

GEORGE R. BOGGS was born April 5th, 1869, at Boonesboro, Iowa. His parents moved to Nebraska when he was an infant, the family locating on a homestead near Blair, in Washington county, in which George G. spent his early life and where he lived until 1893. His parents were John W. Boggs and Carrie S. Boggs, whose early lives were spent in Clairon county, Pennsylvania. His mother's maiden name was Carrie S. Gardner. John W. Boggs was a soldier of the Civil war, being a member of the Seventieth Illinois Infantry. In later years he served as sheriff of Washington county, Nebraska, for four years and was postmaster at Blair during the administration of President Benjamin Harrison.
    George G. Boggs was educated in the public schools of Blair, graduating from the high school in 1888. He then attended Doane College at Crete, Nebraska for two years and afterwards the law department of the Iowa State University and in 1892 was admitted to the bar. In 1893 Mr. Boggs was married to Carrie A. Lawson, of Blair. They have one son, Logan E. Boggs, who was born in Shawnee, Oklahoma, in March 1897, to which place his parents had removed in 1895.
    It was in Shawnee that the most thrilling and perhaps important events in the life of Mr. Boggs occurred. Mr. Boggs had been active in Republican politics and upon the election of the late President McKinley was appointed postmaster at Shawnee. After serving but a few months several valuable registered letters disappeared from his office and could not be found. Investigations were made but with no results and the matter appeared to be dropped. The community was shocked one day in the following spring by the announcement that their postmaster had been arrested, charged with the crime of embezzling registered letters. After several months Mr. Boggs was removed from office and tried in the Federal court at Tecumseh, Oklahoma, and convicted upon the testimony of handwriting experts, hand-writing being the point upon which the Government based the prosecution. Upon conviction Mr. Boggs was sentenced to serve four years in the Federal prison at Ft. Leavenworth,

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Kansas. The case was appealed to the higher courts and Mr. Boggs was again defeated. When all recourse to the courts had been exhausted and it looked as though there was no hope of Mr. Bogg's avoiding serving a term in prison, a young man who had been a clerk in the postoffice at Tecumseh, Oklahoma, at the time the letters were lost, went to the postoffice authorities and confessed that the letters had been sent to his office by mistake and that he had stolen them. Upon this confession Mr. Boggs was at once released from bonds and the charge against him dismissed. The long drawn out trials in court had impoverished Mr. Boggs but he had many good friends who were anxious to aid him and as a result he, in a very short time, organized the Asher State Bank, at Asher, Oklahoma, of which bank Mr. Boggs became president and which he made one of the most prosperous and solid in Oklahoma. This was in the fall of 1901. Mr. Boggs remained in Asher until the fall of 1906, when he removed to McLoud, Oklahoma, and became president of the Bank of Commerce there. Through all Mr. Boggs' fortunes, good and bad, he has had the support and advice of a true and good wife, who during the four years that he was in court supported the family by acting as bookkeeper in the Shawnee National Bank at Shawnee, Oklahoma, she having qualified herself for such work in early life. Through Mr. Boggs trials and delays in court he had many friends in position to aid him, especially among the officials of the courts, who believed him innocent, and he was never deprived of his liberty, even at times when there was no provision for giving bonds.
    Mr. Boggs has two brothers and one sister. The two brothers are E. E. Boggs, a passenger conductor on the Rock Island Railroad, residing at Shawnee, and Frank W. Boggs, an attorney, who also resides at Shawnee. The sister, Miss Jo E. Boggs, resides with her parents at Longbeach, California. Mr. Boggs and his wife are members of the Presbyterian church. Mr. Boggs is a member of the Masonic fraternity and Mrs. Boggs of the Order of Eastern Star, and is the Worth Matron of the chapter.

MOSES M. HENDERSON.   Throughout nearly his entire identification with the interests of Oklahoma, Moses M. Henderson has been connected with journalism, and is now at the head of two of the leading papers of Pottawatomie county. Shortly after his arrival in Tecumseh he organized and launched the Tecumseh Standard, an independent paper which has done muck towards purifying politics and fighting grafts and ring rule. Mr. Henderson is a stanch and true Prohibitionist, and during the last election had charge of that movement in the county, making by voice and pen a vigorous campaign and contributing much to the success of the cause. He has never desired the honors of emoluments of office, but stands for right and the public good. Mr. Henderson also owns the Wanette Winner, which is conducted on the same independent lines as the Standard, and is edited by his son Lewis, who is only a boy of nineteen, but who has already displayed journalistic ability which gives promise of a brilliant future.
    Mr. Henderson was born in Tennessee, near Chattanooga, September 20, 1861, a son of J. W. C. and Mary (Clift) Henderson, both of whom were born in Tennessee. The father was a member of an old Scotch-Irish family of that commonwealth. After completing his education in the public schools the son Moses studied law for a time, finally abandoning it to engage in a mercantile capacity. He continued in that business for ten years, and in 1901 came to Oklahoma City, and six months later to Tecumseh. He married, in 1889, Miss Emma Ragsdale, a daughter of Frank and Emily (McMillen) Ragsdale, of Chattanooga, Tennessee, and their two children are Frank and Mary. The family are Presbyterians.

GEORGE L. ROSE.   Although young in years, George L. Rose may be rightfully termed one of the pioneers of Oklahoma, for he came to Tecumseh the day it was opened for settlement, in September, 1891. If a complete account of the events which form the history of Tecumseh and its vicinity

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were written the name of George L. Rose would appear frequently and prominently in connection with the leading events. His first work here was as an educator, teaching in the public schools four years. He held the third first grade teacher's certificate issued in Pottawatomie county. During the two years following his educational labor he was manager for a mercantile firm. He then drifted into the abstract, farm loan and insurance business, with which he is still identified.
    In 1903 he organized the Bank of Wanette and was made its president. This bank and the First National Bank of Wanette later consolidated. In 1903 he was also made president of the First National Bank of Holdenville, and in 1905 he was elected president of the First National Bank of Tecumseh, the oldest bank in Pottawatomie county. The banks with which he is connected have been very successful. Mr. Rose is a strong believer in good agricultural lands for safe and remunerative investments, and has become the owner of considerable good farming land in several counties in the state.
    Mr. Rose represents an old southern family originally from Virginia, from whence they removed to Kentucky, the birth place of Granville P. and Josephine (Stephens) Rose and their son, George L., who was born February 1, 1873. He is a prominent Mason, affiliating with the blue lodge of Tecumseh and with the Shrine of Oklahoma City. He married, in 1899, Jimmie L. Strain, a native of Texas and daughter of D. W. Strain. They have two daughters, Addie and Josephine, born respectively on the 1st of January, 1903, and the 15th of June, 1906.

REV. HILDEBRAND ZOELLER, O. S. B.   Under the pastorate of the Rev. Hildebrand Zoeller, O. S. B., the church at Shawnee has made notable progress and improvement, both in membership and material betterment and also in the widening of its sphere of useful and uplifting influences. Father Zoeller took charge of the church at Shawnee in 1905, and since that year has had the satisfaction of seeing a new church edifice built for his congregation. A scholarly land broad-minded man, he is popular with all classes of citizens in Shawnee, and his work has met with the kindly co-operation of many outside the membership of his church.
    Father Zoeller was born in Germany in 1873, son of Martin and Mary Zoeller, who emigrated from the fatherland to the United States in 1888, and after living a few years in Maryland moved to Oklahoma Territory in 1892, so that the family have been identified with this new state almost from its first years. Hildebrand was educated in the public schools and the Sacred Heart College. At the St. John's University in Minnesota he graduated with the degree of B. S., and was ordained to the ministry in that state in 1900. Before engaging in parish work he taught for a time in St. John's University, and was then in charge of several parishes in Minnesota before he removed to Oklahoma and began the work in Shawnee, which has been blessed so abundantly. He is in complete sympathy with the movements undertaken for the civic welfare of this growing city, and is a public-spirited citizen as well as a priest devoted to furthering the interests of his own sect.

VERNON H. GEE  has been identified with the mercantile life of Shawnee since 1901, and is the active managing partner in the firm of Madden, Jarrel & Gee, dry goods merchants. He is a well known business man, the treasurer of the Chamber of Commerce, and active in all interests for the upbuilding and advancement of Shawnee.
    Mr. Gee was born in Granville, Texas, January 21, 1874, where his father, Dr. J. C. Gee, was a practicing physician for a number of years, having removed to Texas from his native commonwealth of Virginia. During the Civil war he served as a surgeon in the Confederate army, and his death occurred in 1881, aged fifty-five years. Mrs. Gee, nee Agnes Lewis, was a native daughter of Tennessee.
    After completeing [completing] his educational training in the public school of Texas, Vernon H. Gee entered upon his business career as a clerk in a dry goods store in Greenville, but leaving that city in 1896 he was for three

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years the proprietor of a store in Denison, Texas, and going thence to Vinita, Indian Territory, he formed a partnership with J. W. Madden of Denison, and A. J. Jarrel, of Temple, Texas, in the dry goods business. They were actively identified with the business life of that city until the firm of Madden, Jarrel & Gee transferred their interests to Shawnee in 1901 and have since been leading merchants in this city.
    In 1898 Mr. Gee married Miss Delle Yocom, a daughter of J. D. Yocom and a native of Denison, this state. Their only child is a little daughter, Dorothy, born September 14, 1900. Mr. Gee is popular in the business, political and social circles of Shawnee, and is a member of the B. P. O. E.

HARRY V. FOSTER.   Since 1892 Oklahoma and Tecumseh have claimed Harry V. Foster among their influential residents, prominent in the business, political and social life. But he is perhaps best known in connection with journalistic interests, as the editor and proprietor of the Democrat, one of the leading papers of Oklahoma. He is a native son of the west, born in Blue Earth county, Minnesota, April 4, 1869, a son of F. Anson and Henrietta (Van Brent) Foster, both natives of the state of New York. The mother represented an old Holland Dutch family, the grandfather having owned the ground on which Trinity church now stands and valuable property on Wall street, New York. F. Anson Foster moved when a young man to Wisconsin, and after the Civil war went to Minnesota and embarked in a mercantile business. He was an active politician, and his home is now in California.
    After attending the public schools in Mankato, Minnesota, and a college at Janesville, Wisconsin, Harry V. Foster was engaged in the insurance business for a time. On the 3d of July, 1892, he arrived in Tecumseh, Oklahoma, and soon afterward launched the Democrat, an influential paper. He is a popular journalist, an active factor in politics, having served his city as a member of its council, and has been president of the Farmers Bank since in June, 1907. He has been connected with this institution since its organization, first as its vice-president.
    On the 12th of May, 1900, Mr. Foster married Miss Mattie Metcalf, a native of Missouri, and their only son, Max H., was born in 1906. Mr. Foster has membership relations with Lodge No. 13, A. F. & A. M., Lodge No. 211, I. O. O. F., and with the Sons of the American Revolution.

B. C. HANSON has gained a wide reputation through his connection with the Union Co-Operative Company, of which he is the ex-secretary. The institution is strictly co-operative and of state-wide operation, and its special feature is that only members of unions can hold stock. Mr. Hanson was born in Germany, June 18, 1869, a son of H. N. and I. (Anderson) Hanson, both of whom were also natives of the father-land. In 1882, when but a boy of thirteen, B. C. Hanson came to the United States and to Iowa. At that time he could not speak a word of English, and he first attended school and farmed. By selling books and other occupations he saved enough money to enable him to pursue a three years' course in the Iowa Wesleyan University, where he studied for the ministry, but on leaving the university he studied engineering and for two years was connected with the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad at Burlington, Iowa. For several years he also traveled over the country as a civil engineer, finally, in 1892, drifting to Galveston, Texas, where he farmed in the southern part of the state for eight years and was also the deputy sheriff of Walla county. At the outbreak of the Spanish-American war he enlisted in Company I, First Texas Infantry, and served through the entire conflict. Returning at its close to Galveston, he was in that city during the memorable storm, in which he lost all his possessions, and in June, 1901, he went to Elgin, Texas. In 1902 he went to Durant, Indian Territory, where he farmed until his removal to Colgate, that state, in 1905, and while there was elected the state secretary and treasurer of the Farmer's Union. From that city he came to Shawnee in 1906, and is now prominently connected with the Union Cooperative Company.

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    In 1893 Mr. Hanson married M. M. Schaeper, a native of Texas, and of German parentage. Their two sons are Edward, born on the 4th of August, 1899, and Charles, born January 8, 1905. The family are members of the German Lutheran church, and Mr. Hanson is also identified with the fraternal orders of Knights of Pythias, Odd Fellows and Eagles.

SAM ELZO, the proprietor of the Elzo Gin at McLoud, was born in Detroit, Michigan, in 1870, a son of Ed and Sarah (Wheeler) Elzo, the former born in Yorkshire, England, in 1833, and the latter near Dublin, Ireland, in 1844, and they are now living at the Isle of Pines on the coast of Cuba. The mother's parents, however, were Germans, who were visiting near Dublin at the time of their daughter's birth. The father was reared on the coast of Cuba, and coming to the United States became a real estate dealer in Memphis, Tennessee. They were married in Pennsylvania, near Pittsburg, and became the parents of five children, two sons and three duaghters, but only four are now living—Sam, Anna, Hetty and William, the latter with his parents in Cuba.
    During the Spanish-American war, on the 17th of March, 1898, Sam Elzo enlisted for service in the Third Tennessee Infantry, Company I, and served until the 28th of February, 1899, in the meantime taking part in the battle of San Juan. After his honorable discharge from the service he returned to Memphis, Tennessee, and from there came to Oklahoma and purchased, in 1902, the gin which he now owns. This mill was built by the Craddock Brothers in 1891, but new machinery has since been installed throughout, being now operated by the Smith & Munger gin outfit, including a sixty-five horse power engine, which was put in in 1903. The gin has a capacity of thirty bales of cotton a day of ten hours, and during the season of 1907 it ginned and baled 2,042 bales of cotton, an amount equal to three ordinary gins. Its proprietor, Sam Elzo, is one of hte best known business men of Pottawatomie county.
    He was married in Shawnee, Oklahoma, in 1903, to Pearl Taylor, who was born in Sabetha, Kansas, and she was educated both in that state and in Oklahoma, a duaghter of Joseph Taylor, who was born in England, and coming to the United States moved from Iowa to Kansas. Mr. and Mrs. Elzo have one son, Neal Ed, three years of age. Mr. Elzo is both an Odd Fellow and a Mason.

SAMUEL DAVID DODSON, M. D.   Among the leading medical practitioners of Pottawatomie county is Dr. Samuel D. Dodson, who was born in Rockford, Tennessee, in 1855, a son of William F. and Amanda (Forest) Dodson, both of whom were also born in that state. The father was a Tennessee farmer and a Union soldier of the Civil war, and his death occurred at Marshalfield, Missouri, at the advanced age of eighty-six. His wife yet survives him and has reached the age of seventy-eight, a worthy member of the Christian church.
    Dr. Dodson, the fifth born of their eight children, went with his parents to Polk county, Missouri, in his early life, and he received his literary training principally at Bolivar, that state. From Missouri he came to Indian Territory, locating at Eastman, where he began the study of medicine under the preceptorship of Dr. D. J. Farmer, a prominent and successful physician there at that time. Passing from his instructions to the University of Tennessee, Dr. Dodson graduated from that well known institution with the class of 1895, and for two years thereafter he was in practice at Eastman. He was later in practice at Remus and at Maud, until finally, in the spring of 1908, he located at Sacred Heart, where he is rapidly building up a large and remunerative practice.
    At Paul's Valley, in the early seventies, the Doctor married Sena Hilbrant, who at her death left two children, Elvas and Esley, and for his second wife he married in 1882 Martha C. Wood, who died after becoming the mother of four children—Amanda, Ben, Martha and Ruth. On the 17th of June, 1902, at Paul's Valley, Dr. Dodson wedded Eufallia Chambers, a daughter of D. R. and Tennie (Rowe) Chambers. Mrs. Dodson was reared and educated in Texas. The Doctor and his (p.548) wife hold membership relations with the Odd Fellows and the Rebekahs, and he is also a Mason and a member of the Baptist church. In connection with his profession he is a member of the Medical Association of Oklahoma.

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O. F. SHAW, the police judge of McLoud, was born in Saratoga county, New York, the 4th of June, 1839. His father, Edwin Madison Shaw, was born in Ireland of Scotch-Irish parents, and coming to America he became a noted criminal lawyer of his day in Saratoga. Going later to Butler county, Iowa, he was one of the pioneers of that state, and his death occurred there at the age of sixty-four years, dying in the faith of the Methodist Episcopal church. His wife, who was before her marriage Elizabeth Whitford, was born in Massachusetts, and she was a granddaughter of a Revolutionary soldier, Abel Hatfield. Her death occurred at the age of seventy-five, after becoming the mother of four sons and four daughters, but of this once large family only three are now living, a son and two daughters in Iowa.
    O. F. Shaw, one of the three surviving members of this family, was a young man of seventeen at the time of the removal of the family from New York to Butler county, Iowa, and from there in 1873 he went to Harlan county, Nebraska, where he secured a government homestead and also a tree claim, pre-empting in all about fur hundred and eighty acres. For many years he continued his residence there, prominently engaged in farming and the cattle business, and during those early days in that state he was also a noted buffalo hunter, and killed many of those animals for their hides. But on account of the ill health of his wife he decided to locate in Oklahoma, an din 1895 made the overland journey with team and wagon from Nebraska to Black Beaver, now known as Morrison, where he traded his team for a claim in the Kickapoo county in Lincoln county, and which is now occupied by his son. During the past eight years he has lived in Pottawatomie county, and is now the police judge of McLoud.
    During his residence in Butler county, Iowa, Mr. Shaw was united in marriage to Elizabeth Jaquis, who was born in New York, a daughter of Ben H. and Fanny (Lashbrook) Jaquis, the former a native of Vermont and the latter of Exeter, England. The mother died in Harlan county, Nebraska, when sixty-four years of age, and the father was drowned at sea while making the return voyage from California in 1866, dying at the age of sixty-six years. Mr. and Mrs. Shaw have had seven children, namely: Cora Morrill, whose home is in Custer county, Nebraska; Hattie Meyer, deceased; Minnie Griffith, a resident of Denver, Colorado; Ed whose home is in Lincoln county, Oklahoma; Olive Lyle; and Abbie, a popular and successful teacher. Mrs. Meyer, the second daughter, died in 1896, in Custer county, Nebraska, leaving a son and a daughter, J. O. and Cora A. The son is is a resident of Colorado, and the daughter is with her grandfather, Mr. Shaw.
    During the Civil war Mr. Shaw enlisted for service in the Forty-fourth Iowa Infantry, Company E, and he was honorably discharged on the 15th of September, 1864, with a good record as a soldier for the Union cause.

J. E. McNAIR.   During the past eighteen years Oklahoma has been the home of J. E. McNair, and during the past three years of that time he has been an earnest and faithful employe [employee] of the U. S. government, receiving his appointment as a rural free delivery carrier on the 15th of April, 1905. His route lies west nine miles and south three miles of McComb, covering a distance of twenty-six and a half miles, and the roads over which he travels are rough and hilly. He has done faithful and efficient service, and is popular on his route.
    Born near Ringgold, Georgia, in 1874, a son of Whitly and Mary McNair, who died respectively in Oklahoma and Texas, J. E. McNair was reared in both Oklahoma and Texas, receiving a public school education, which was supplemented by study at home. At the age of nineteen he engaged in teaching, from which he later turned his attention to bookkeeping, and he was for eight

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years in that occupation in Ardmore and McComb. He was married at the former place, in 1897, to Bertha War, who died leaving one son, Homer, and for his second wife Mr. McNair wedded Anna Edwards, of McComb, by whom he had two children, Granville, and a younger one who died in infancy.
    Mr. McNair is a member of the Odd Fellows fraternity, Lodge No. 207, and is also a Master Mason, holding membership with the lodge at Tecumseh. Both he and his wife are members of the Baptist church.

VOLNEY SMITH.   Among those who came as pioneers to Pottawatomie county is numbered Volney Smith, who arrived here on the 22d of September, 1891. He succeeded in securing one of the claims of the county, but after partially improving it and residing thereon for two years he lost the land through contest. He has since, however, become the owner of a rich and fertile farm in Earlsboro township, near the town of Tecumseh, a homestead of one hundred and twenty acres, known as the Smith Creek Farm. It contains mostly rich bottom land, admirably adapted to the raising of cotton, and he annually raises about one and a half bales to the acre of that commodity.
    Mr. Smith was born in Sanilac county, Michigan, near Watertown, in 1867, a member of one of the pioneer families there, to which they moved from Syracuse, Onondaga county, New York. His father, Tilton E. Smith, was a Civil war soldier in the Union army for three years, and he died at his old home in Michigan when fifty years of age. He was by trade a cabinet maker and an excellent workman, and he was a member of the Grand Army of the Republic and of the Masonic fraternity. The mother still survives and is a resident of Michigan, having reached the age of three score years and ten. Of her six children, five sons and a daughter, Volney is the only one residing in Oklahoma. Four reside in Detroit, Michigan, and a son, H. W., is a prominent attorney of that state.
    The state in which he was born continued as the boyhood home of Volney Smith and until he had attained the age of maturity, attending its public schools, and there under his father's able instructions he learned the cabinet maker's trade and later worked as a carpenter. In 1889 he went to Denver, Colorado, where some of his relatives resided, and there he followed his trade of carpentering. From Colorado he came to Oklahoma in 1891 to establish a home for himself and family in the new southwest. He has been successful in his efforts here and is now numbered among the leading agriculturists of Earlsboro township.
    In 1893 Mr. Smith was married to Jane Delaware, a member of the Delaware and Shawnee Indians, and they have six children—Grace, Mark, Ollie, John, Ada and Willie. The four eldest are in the government school at Shawnee. Mr. Smith gives his political support to the Republican party.

REV. WILLIAM A. DOUGHITT holds and merits a place among the successful Christian workers of Oklahoma, a minister of the Methodist Episcopal church. He was licensed to preach the gospel in 1880, and has filled several charges in Arkansas and Oklahoma, a fluent and ready speaker and an earnest worker in the Master's cause. He now has a charge in Beaver county, Oklahoma, and also has a fine estate, known as Cove Farm, in Bales township, Pottawatomie county. It is rich cotton land, fertile and well improved, and especially adapted to the raising of alfalfa and cotton. Rev. Mr. Doughitt was one of the first to locate in Shawnee, and throughout the intervening years he has been prominent in its public life, having been the first street commissioner appointed in the town, and he also had charge of the clearing of the park for the 4th of July celebration in 1895, the first ever held in Shawnee.
    A native son of Washington county, Arkansas, Rev. William A. Doughitt was born on the 5th of November, 1848, a year made memorable by the finding of gold in California. He is a grandson of a Mexican war soldier, Abraham Doughitt, and of a Revolutionary soldier, Henry Alburty, who was also on e of the first settlers of Arkansas, locating there before its admission into the Union. Mr. Alburty lived to the remarkable

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age of ninety-nine years, dying in 1856, and his grandson remembers him well. Rev. Mr. Doughitt is a son of Thomas and Sarah (Alburty) Doughitt, the former of whom was born in Davie county, North Carolina, and after a life devoted to the work of the farm he died in his seventy-eighth year. He was an earnest Christian gentleman, a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, and for thirty years he served his church as a class leader. His wife died at the age of seventy-seven, after becoming the mother of six children, four sons and two daughters, and a daughter, Mrs. Jobe, also lives in Pottawatomie county.
    One of the four sons, Rev. William A. Doughitt, was reared on a farm in his native county of Washington, Arkansas, and in the meantime he completed his education in the Evansville Academy. From the age of twenty he taught school for three years. At the time of the opening of Oklahoma to settlement he joined the tide of emigration and was successful in his race for government homestead land, arriving at noon on the 22d of May, 1895, at the Sac and Fox lines, two miles east of his present home. After some little trouble he secured the deed to his land, and he now has a valuable and well cultivated homestead.
    In Polk county, Arkansas, November 12, 1872, he married Belle Bowdon, a daughter of one of the prominent residents of that state, the Hon. John S. Bowdon, for years a member of the state legislature. Their children are William B., John Thomas, Lizzie, Lulu R., George Franklin, Ben Harrison, Jennie C. and Pearl May. The fifth child, Maudie Ann, died at the age of ten years. Rev. Doughitt is a stanch advocate of Prohibition principles, and has served his party as a delegate to conventions.

ELI TASIER, of Earlsboro township, owns and resides on a splendid farm three miles southwest of Tecumseh. He was born in Pottawatomie county, Kansas, in 1874, a son of Anthony Tasier, whose native soil was Canada, but he afterward became one of the early pioneers of Kansas. He was of French parentage, and was a Catholic in religion. The mother, Catherine Bourbona, was a member of the Pottawatomie tribe of Indians, and was educated in Buchanan county and St. Joseph, Missouri. Their son Eli was but a small boy when the family came to Pottawatomie county, Oklahoma, their home being on a farm four miles west of Shawnee, and there the father spent the remainder of his life and died at the age of seventy-two years. His widow yet resides on the old home farm there.
    Eli Tasier was early inured to the work of the farm, and his educational training was received in the Chiloco government school in Indian Territory. He was married in 1905 to Belle Grimmett, who was born in Michigan but was reared and educated in Indiana, and by her marriage she has become the mother of one child, Glin. The family reside on a valuable and well cultivated farm of eighty acres, the most of which is rich valley land and annually returns to its owner abundant returns. It is improved with a pleasant four-room cottage, barns and other out buildings and also has a large orchard.
    Mr. Tasier was reared in the faith of the Catholic church, and his wife is a member of the Methodist Episcopal denomination.

ALLEN BELL, M. D.   The medical fraternity of Pottawatomie county numbers among its representatives Dr. Allen Bell, a physician and surgeon of Maud. He became identified with the professional life of Oklahoma in 1904, and has since been engaged in practice here, a prominent and well known physician and a graduate of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Cincinnati, Ohio, with the class of 1886, of the N. N. Polyclinic Medical College of 1898 and a post graduate of the same institution in 1903.
    Dr. Bell was born in Preble county, Ohio, near Eaton, August 3, 1857, a member of one of the oldest and best known families of that part of Ohio. His paternal grandfather established his home there as early as 1820, moving from Kentucky, but he was originally from Pennsylvania. John Bell, his son, was born on the old farm which his father cleared from the woods in Preble county, and died at the age of sixty years, a farmer all his life. He gave

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his political support to the Democratic party, and was reared in the faith of the Christian church, man honored and respected by all who knew him, a faithful friend, a kind husband and father and an excellent neighbor. His wife was Mary Thompson, and she was also born and reared in Ohio, her parents coming from Virginia, and she died when fifty-five, a member of the same church as her husband.
    It was on his parents' old home farm in Preble county that Allen Bell attained to a sturdy and useful manhood, attending meanwhile the common and high schools of West Alexandria. He laid the foundation of his professional career by study under the able instructions of Dr. F. N. Michael in 1883, and in the following year he entered the medical department of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. After a thorough medical training, including a course and post graduate course in the N. N. Polyclinic Medical College, he began practice in Freeport, Kansas, in Harper county, where after fourteen years of successful professional work he moved to Salisaw, Indian Territory. After four years there, in 1904, he came to Maud, Oklahoma, where he has since been in active practice. He is a member of the County, State and American Medical Societies, and supports the principles of the Democratic party.
    In 1886 Dr. Bell married Flora D. Bunch, who was born and reared near Canton, Ohio, a daughter of T. J. and _________ (Potter) Bunch, of Canton. She died soon after her marriage, on the 5th of March, 1887, when but twenty-two years of age.

HENRY C. CRAIG, who is farming in Davis township, Pottawatomie county, bears an honored record for service in the Civil war, and is the grandson of a Revolutionary officer, Captain James Craig, who served with George Washington. He was born at sea near the island of Jamaica of Scotch-Irish parents. Absalom Craig, his son, was born and reared near Baltimore, Maryland, but his wife Matilda Silvers, was from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and both are now deceased, the former dying in Morgan county, Ohio, when but forty-two years old, and the latter was forty-eight at the time of her death. They were Presbyterians, and he followed the calling of a blacksmith and voted with the Whig party. Of their seven children, five sons and two daughters, one son, John, was with General Sherman on his famous march to the sea during the Civl war, going from Rock Island, Illinois, as a member of the Fourth Illinois Cavalry.
    Another of the sons who valiantly fought for his country in the strife between the north and the south, Henry C. Craig, was born in Morgan county, Ohio, May 30, 1833, and in his boyhood days he attended the old pioneer schools there, the school which he attended having been a little log structure furnished with slab seats resting on pegs, and his teachers were particularly dexterous in the use of the long supple switches. At the call of Lincoln for thirty thousand volunteers in 1861 he left his old home in Morgan county to join an Ohio cavalry company, but as it was not accepted by the governor, Mr. Craig transferred to the Second West Virginia Cavalry, Company E, under Captain Andrew Scott and Colonel Bales, and he saw much hard fighting in the Old Dominion state. For three years and three months he continued as a brave and loyal soldier, in that time participating in many of the memorable battles of the war, including those of the Shenandoah valley and the engagement at Winchester, where his comrades fell on every side and his own horse was killed. Receiving his honorable discharge at Wheeling, West Virginia, in December, 1864, as a commissary sergeant, he returned to his home and to his former occupation of farming, but shortly afterward, in 1865, he wen to Brownsville, Missouri, where he farmed until his removal to Oklahoma in 1897. He was among the first to establish his home in Pottawatomie county, where he purchased one hundred and sixty acres for eleven hundred and fifty dollars, and later he paid six hundred and seventy dollars for a tract of forty acres. The Roosevelt Farm, as his homestead is known, is one of the best farms in Davis township and lies four and a half miles north of Shawnee. It is mostly

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creek bottom land, well adapted to the raising of alfalfa and other products of the southwest, and the rich and fertile land is under an excellent state of cultivation.
    Mr. Craig has been twice married, wedding first, in 1855, Lee Ann Coburn, who was born in Morgan county, Ohio, and died in 1861, when but twenty-six years of age. She left three sons, but only two are now living, Simon and Willie, the former residing in California and the latter on the old Silvers homestead in Morgan county, Ohio. On the 15th of August, 1870, Mr. Craig married Nancy E. Caton, who was born and reared in Cooper county, Missouri, but her parents, Thomas and Elizabeth (Lowrey) Caton, were from Virginia. They became farming people in Missouri, and the father died in that state at the age of sixty years, the mother surviving until her seventy-sixth year. They were Methodists in their religious belief, and of their family of seven children four are living at the present time. Among those who have passed away were two Union soldiers, Nathaniel and Ben, the latter dying in Arkansas. Of the nine children born to Mr. and Mrs. Craig five are living; Ben W., engaged in railroad work; Minnie May, a stenographer; Henry C. Jr., Mary Gertrude and C. Raymond, at home. A son, John D., died when a young man of twenty-six, and a daughter, Melissa, lived to the age of thirty. The other two died in childhood. Mr. Craig is a Republican, as was also his father, and is a stanch and true supporter of such principles and a strong Roosevelt man. He is one of Davis township's best known and valued citizens.

MENDIOUS PLATZ has been numbered among the agriculturists of Pottawatomie county for a number of years, and during three years he served his township of First as its trustee, a stanch and true Republican. He came to the territory of Oklahoma in 1893, at the opening of the Cherokee Strip, and nine years ago he became a resident of Pottawatomie county.
    Mr. Platz was born in LaGrange county, Indiana, near LaGrange Center, in 1857, a son of an Indiana farmer, Phillip Platz, who was born, however, in Pennsylvania, but became one of the early residents of LaGrange county, and from there after many years he went to Kansas, dying in Douglas county, near Lawrence, of that state. His wife, nee Catherine Sipe, yet survives him, and has now reached the advanced age of eighty-two years, residing in Douglas County. Mendious Platz was one of their nine children, three sons and six daughters, and when a lad of eleven, in 1868, he accompanied his parents on their removal to the Sun Flower state, completing his education and attaining to mature years in Douglas county. During all these years he also assisted his father in the work of the farm. In 1893, with his wife and family, he came to Oklahoma, and in First township, Pottawatomie county, he now has a valuable farm of seventy-five acres, devoted to the raising of many varieties of fruit, and the place is known as the Hoosier Fruit Farm.
    Just after attaining the age of maturity Mr. Platz married Margaret Waner, who was born in Montgomery county, Indiana, and they had eleven living children, three sons and eight daughters, namely: Howard, Bessie, Pearl, Nellie, Sylvia, Lola, Ora, Ollie, Gladys and Fern. One son, Leslie, was killed on the railroad when twenty-two years old. He was a young man of great promise, loved by all who knew him, and his sudden death was a terrible affliction to his family. Mr. Platz is a member of the fraternal order of Odd Fellows, Lodge No. 24.

J. D. GILLILAND, an agriculturist in Eason township, was born in Barren county, Kentucky, in 1859, and his parents, David and Fribie (Mingard) Gilliland were also natives of that commonwealth, and there they spent their lives and died. In their family were five children, four sons and one daughter.
    J. D. Gilliland spent the first seventeen years of his life on the home farm in Kentucky, and then went to Wright county, Missouri, from whence he later went to Webster county, that state, and from there to Texas, where he rode the range as a cowboy for some time. From Texas he became one of the early pioneers of Indian Territory, locating there as early as 1882,

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and after living for a time at Leon he went to Burneyville and from there to McGee. In 1897 he came to Pottawatomie county, Oklahoma, and in Eason township he now owns a well cultivated and valuable homestead farm, one of its principal features being its large and well bearing orchard of twenty acres, in which he raises all the standard varieties of fruits grown in this section, including many varieties of apples.
    During his residence in Indian Territory, in 1886, Mr. Gilliland wedded Nancy Butram, who was born in Arkansas, but was reared and attended school in Indian Territory, and they have had six children, namely: Margie, John, Buford, Zeland, Ruby and J. D., Jr., Mr. Gilliland's politics are Democratic, and during three years he served his township as a trustee with an excellent record. He is a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and of the Christian church.

M. P. HATCH, manager of the Blue Ribbon Creamery, at Shawnee, Oklahoma, was born in Chenango county, Illinois, in 1870, son of T. O. Hatch, a native of Ohio, who was a soldier in the Civil war, being a member of an Illinois regiment and making an excellent military record. After the close of the war he went to western Kansas, locating a homestead in Finney county. There in the wilds of the plains west, which but a few years before had been indicated on the maps of the common schools as "The Great American Desert," he set out to make for himself a home. Notwithstanding the hot winds, dry seasons, grasshoppers, and occasional cyclones, he had the courage to brave all, and finally succeeded in securing his homestead and some school lands which became valuable. He married Mary Moffat, a native of Pennsylvania, who made for him a most true and worthy helpmate, and did her full share in the early homestead days in Kansas. They were the parents of five children—two sons and three daughters.
    He of whom this sketch is especially written, M. P. Hatch, was reared to farm labor on the homestead taken up by his father and attended the public schools, whenever opportunity afforded the chance. Subsequently he went to Hutchinson, Reno county, Kansas, where he served a seven-year apprenticeship learning the trade of a baker, together with the art of making ice cream and kindred delicacies, and mastered all the details of this business. In 1901 he established an ice cream business at Shawnee and three years later his present extensive plant was founded. This is in the south part of the city; it is conducted in a building thirty-six by sixty feet and two stories high. Here he handles milk, cream and ice cream, the milk being brought in many miles from the surrounding country by the farmers, as well as by train. The amount of milk purchased in the season of such work is upon an average of five thousand pounds a day, which makes a monthly business of three thousand dollars, paid out for milk and cream. All of the latest methods known to modern sanitary science is here employed. The trade is an extensive one, and is handled on excellent business principles. When Mr. Hatch came to Shawnee he was involved in debts amounting to more than five hundred dollars, but through his enterprise and hard work has cleared himself from the debt and is now well-to-do, owning a good home and lucrative business.
    He was married in Finney county, Kansas, in March, 1904, to Matilda Johorum, a native of Iowa, but reared and educated in Kansas. The five children born of this union are: Raymond O., Alma L., Reginald, Majorie, Theodore L. The parents are both connected with the Methodist Episcopal church and number their friends in the vicinity of Shawnee by the hundreds.

CHARLES M. TAYLOR.   Of the railroad officials of the great trunk lines in Oklahoma, several are located at Shawnee, which, though fifteen years ago without a railroad, is now one of the principal centers of the state. This being the division point of the Choctaw Division of the Rock Island System, one of the leading railroad men with office in this city is Charles M. Taylor, who, on April 1, 1907, was promoted to the position of superintendent of motive power for the division. He is a capable and experienced railroad man, and in the mechanical department has worked his way up from the bottom. Born in Baltimore, Maryland, May 25, 1860, son

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of Edward and Mary (Sowers) Taylor, both natives of the same state, he accompanied the family to St. Louis, Missouri, when he was seven years old, and was reared in that city, receiving his education in the public schools. He began the work which has finally led to the promotion above mentioned, when he was seventeen years old, in the shops of the Iron Mountain Railroad at St. Louis, and during the following years was employed by various railroad companies and in capacities of increasing responsibility. Beginning with the Santa Fe in April, 1886, as machinist, he finally reached the position of mechanical superintendent of the western grand division at La Junta, Colorado. December 15, 1906, he was led to accept the position of master mechanic of the Choctaw Division for the Rock Island, and a few weeks later was promoted to his present position. Since coming to Shawnee he has identified himself as closely as his duties permit with the active citizenship of the city. In Masonry he is a Knight Templar and a Shriner. In 1888 he was married to Miss Edna Herndon, a native of Missouri, and they have two daughters, Fay and Lucile.

REV. LINDSAY C. WOLFE.   At Shawnee the Baptist church is presided over by the Rev. Lindsay C. Wolfe, one of the most energetic and effective workers for the church in the new state. The splendid new church building in Shawnee, nearing completion at this writing, is a monument to his leadership and the growth and zeal of the Baptist congregation of this city. During the recent campaign the cause of prohibition had one of its most able advocates in the pastor of this church, who urged the principles from the public platform and also did yeoman's service in directing public opinion to the desired decision on this question. He was an untiring worker and contributed not a little to the final triumph. Rev. Mr. Wolfe has been in charge of the Baptist church at Shawnee since 1904. He has done the work of missionary and organizer here, and has increased his church membership from 236 to 760 in 1907. His ability in the pioneer work of the church has gained him a place on the territorial or state board of missions, on which he has served six years, and at the present time is chairman of the Baptist educational committee of the state for the purpose of developing the educational interests. It is also part of the plan of the committee to locate a Baptist university in the new state.
    Rev. L. C. Wolfe is a minister of varied interests and ability, and as a young man has made a large success of the profession to which he devoted himself. Of an old southern family of broad culture and social prominence, he was born at Mount Sterling, Montgomery county, Kentucky, April 14, 1873. His grandfather, Ezra M. Wolfe, had at one time been a prominent dry goods merchant of Charlottesville, Virginia. At the old university town last mentioned was born the only son of this merchant, J. B. Wolfe, who was a physician, a university graduate, and a man of unusual ability. He died June 20, 1906. His wife, who before her marriage was Sarah Horton Wilson, was also of an old Virginia family, but she herself was reared in Tennessee. She is still living. Lindsay C. Wolfe was educated largely at home, under his father's direction, and later graduated from the law department of Richmond College in 18991 and for eight years was a successful practicing lawyer in Giles county, Virginia. It was at the end of this time that he felt called to preach and in preparation for the work attended the Southern Baptist Seminary at Louisville three years. His first charge as pastor was at Vinita in Indian Territory, where he continued until his acceptance of the post at Shawnee. Rev. Mr. Wolfe was married, December 30, 1891, to Miss Cynthia E. Shumate, a daughter of Kenley Shumate, one of the old residents of Giles county, Virginia, and a veteran of the Civil war. Mrs. Wolfe is a graduate of a well known school in Virginia, and a woman of culture who has co-operated heartily with her husband in his work. They have two children, Joseph Roger, born June 24, 1893, and Ira Clay, born February 24, 1895. Rev. Mr. Wolfe is affiliated with the Masonic lodge, the oldest lodge of the state of Virginia, and is now a member of the lodge at Vinita.