Kelly Poland - Oklahoma Prairie Tales: Mostly True Stories My Grandma Told Me

Oklahoma Prairie Tales

Mostly True Stories
My Grandma Told Me

Kelly Poland

Copyright 2016 by Kelly Poland.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015921196

ISBN: Hardcover 978-1-5144-3793-3

Softcover 978-1-5144-3792-6

eBook 978-1-5144-3791-9

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted
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Rev. date: 01/05/2016

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

For Mike and Jeanie. Suzi and I miss you! Say Hi to Grandma for us.

Without the encouragement of Stephanie Ursini-Bennett and the guidance of Steve Marsh, these stories would still be in my dusty cassette tape player. Thank you both!

Krystal Hays, what a wonderful book cover. It is perfect! Thank you.

I would also like to thank my cousins Suzi and Joe for helping make this book possible by having the foresight to interview Grandma and tape these stories, but most of all, I want to thank my Grandma for telling the stories to us over the y ears.

Are you ready for an old-fashioned 'buckboard' ride? Just close your eyes and pretend we're sitting on an old-time buckboard. The buckboard is being pulled by a couple of big, ornery mules, and we're bouncing along a lane of hard-packed dirt, way back in my Grandma's time.

Let's pretend Grandma's sitting beside us as we rumble along. The ride is kind of bumpy but that's how it was, back when Grandma was a little girl. She's ready to tell us stories from long ago. The stories she has to share are about her life, when she was a little girl, and about her parents, who were part of settling the land of the Oklahoma Territory.

Now we call it the State of Oklahoma. Do you know the difference between Oklahoma being a "territory" and Oklahoma being called a "state"? They called it a "territory" before it became an official part of the United "States" of America. When it became official, Oklahoma was then called a "state."

The old Oklahoma Territory was part of what we call the "Wild West." Things were pretty wild, alright. There were cowboys and cattle drives. There were outlaws and wagon trains. Buffalo roamed the land. Have you ever seen a buffalo? Back then, there were so many buffalo they looked like dark clouds over the green hills and valleys. The Indians followed the buffalo and newcomers followed the Indians, but that's another story.

One day, the U.S. government fired a cannon-shot over the prairie and newcomers started rushing across Oklahoma. They came by the hundreds, hoping to stake claims for free land. The people who did would settle down and raise their families, and they came from places like England and Ireland, from Germany and Italy. They knew how to farm and raise cattle, and some of those very same people are the 'ancestors' of people living in Oklahoma today.

Do you know what it means to be an "ancestor"? Well, that's the word for someone who lived long ago, someone who might be part of your family. Anyhow, the ancestors of modern Oklahomans built farms and railroads, ranches and towns. Some of those towns grew into big cities like Tulsa and Oklahoma City. But some towns just kept on being nice, friendly towns, where neighbors know one another and raise their families, and help each other get along. The town of Jones, Oklahoma, is one of those towns. I live in Jones, my family has always lived in Jones, and so did Grandma.

My family has lived in this area for generations and that's part of the story, too. My Grandma and her Mama and Daddy moved around a lot back then, but they always lived nearby. They were here long before us, and Grandma is about to tell you what it was like back then, in the "wild west."

My Grandma was born in the Year 1911, when there were very few cars. Like most young girls at that time in rural Oklahoma, she lived way out in the country where people rode horses. They rode horses to the store, or to work - wherever they went they rode horses. Or, they rode in horse-drawn buggies, or in buckboards led by mules. What a very different place it was in Oklahoma, just after statehood, way back in Grandma's time. But in many ways, she wasn't too different than you and me. How was she the same? How was her life different than ours, today? Let's find out.

I am going to share some of the stories Grandma shared with us, when I was a little girl. Her stories are about cowboys and cattle drives, the way it was in the old Oklahoma Territory, when it was still the Wild West, and her life when Oklahoma was a young state. Her stories tell us about the games children played and other things people did for fun, too.

She talks about a time before there were Walmart stores, or even many grocery stores for that matter! What do you suppose people did to put dinner on the table every night? Can you imagine a time without telephones, TVs, or electric lights? Imagine that!

Can you imagine going to school every day in a bumpy old "buckboard," in the winter time, on a dirt road full of holes and ruts? By now, some of you might want to know what a "buckboard is all about. Well, the buckboard had no roof. It had almost no walls, or very low walls. It had no windows to keep out the wind, rain or snow. The buckboard was basically a flat, wooden board on big iron wheels. It had a seat for two people up front. Everybody else had to sit in the back and hang on! It was very easy to fall out if it went too fast...and that could happen if it was being pulled by a great, big mule or two.

Have you ever stood next to a real, live mule? They look like horses, in a way, but a mule is a different animal. A mule is generally bigger than a horse. Mules have long, pointy ears and they can be more ornery than horses. Two mules standing side-by-side are almost as big as a pickup truck, which is okay, until you consider one problem: An ornery old mule might have a mind of its own !

Back in Grandma's day, this could present something of a problem, especially if a big, ornery mule went bonkers pulling a wagon with Grandma and her Mama on top! That's just one of the stories Grandma shares with us in this book.

Grandma also talks about her Daddy, who just happened to be a real, live cowboy . I'm not talking about a Hollywood movie-type cowboy. Grandma's Daddy was the real thing. He was tough and strong, and brave enough to ride his horse into town one day chasing a crazy cow and...well, just wait until you find out what happened next!

Grandma was born not long after a great event in American history. Remember what I just told you about people rushing into Oklahoma to settle down? Well, today they call it the "Great Oklahoma Land Run." The first Land Run started in April, 1889, when an estimated crowd of 50,000 people lined up in covered wagons, and on horses, and in horse-drawn buggies, and on foot. On a signal, they all took off across the prairie, shouting and whooping. Some of them shot guns in the air because they were so excited about getting a new home for free! By the end of the day, there were enough people around to start a city. They would call it "Oklahoma City." And the last Oklahoma "land run" was held in 1895, only 16 years before Grandma was born. That's when the government put 8 million acres of free land in Oklahoma up for grabs. No wonder people wanted to run out and get it!