THE MEMOIRS OF SAMUEL GRANT KENNEDY

PIONEER PHYSICIAN OF TULSA, OKLAHOMA

I was the sixth of the family of twelve children born upon my father's homestead near Stockton, Missouri, June 9,1865.

My father was of Scotch lineage, and my mother of Irish. My father was born in Tennessee in 1824, then a pioneer Country, and my mother was born in Kentucky, at the time of her birth, almost equally pioneer.

Father came to Missouri in 1830, then as frontier as Tennessee was at the time of his birth, and my mother in the early fifties, the part which she came, then as pioneer as Kentucky at the time of her birth there.

Father's ancestors came from the Highlands of Scotland, through Ireland, North Carolina, Kentucky and Tennessee, to Missouri, while mother's greatgrandfather came from Ireland, through Virginia to Kentucky, where she was born. Both families were pioneers among the early settlers of Southwest Missouri. My grandfather's family were all pioneers in Tennessee, settling in other different States, namely, Indiana, Illinois, Texas and Missouri, all having large families of boys among their girls.

My father had four brothers. They all homesteaded and settled, for convenience, where there were springs, rivers, hills, timber and plenty of game and range. The country being sparsely settled, they found such places on the streams of Sac River, Bear Creek, and Silver Creek, where my father took his homestead, the place where I was born. Upon selecting their sites or locations, they homesteaded their lands, and built their log cabins near some spring, and began to clear and break their lands for cultivation.

They needed but little grain for their stock, as the open range furnished feed for them most of the year. The open range also had plenty of deer, wild turkey, prairie chicken, quail, and many fur bearing animals, for food and clothing.

All their homes and barns were built of logs, and their fences of rails. Their gardens were found fenced with wood pickets, and, by methods used, the country was very slowly improved in that section of the Ozarks, and the farms were increased by a small patch yearly added. Even in my early boyhood days, I helped clear up the land, and add to my father's farm as the family grew larger. I helped to cut the timber and make the rails to fence the new additional land on the old homestead. I helped to plow the stumpy land, and hoe the corn, and cut the sprouts, for the several years, in my boyhood days that I was reared on the farm. I have helped to cut the corn into shocks, and cut the wheat with a cradle in the old way. I stacked the wheat, cut the bundles at thrashing machine, and carried the wheat to the water mill for grinding, and brought the flour and bran back home to the kitchen after the toll was taken out.

During the winter, our big task was cutting the wood for cooking and for three big fireplaces to keep our large family warm. Early in the morning and late in the evening, we were kept busy shucking corn, and carrying fodder and feeding our stock, cattle, horses, sheep and hogs. I remember many a cold snowy morning, when a small boy, having this errand to do.

Our spare time was spent attending school, three or four months term a year in a log cabin school house. We all kept healthy, and we children kept growing, as Mother, a Kentucky woman, was a good cook, and Father was a good feeder of homemade grub. Mother being a good spinner and knitter, also a good seamstress, we children had good warm clothes and socks.

Father, coming from the Cumberland Mountains of Tennessee, learned to be a good woodsman and artisan in woods, and a good cobbler, as called in those days. He made our chairs and bedsteads, in fact, most all of the furniture we had in the house.

He also made plow beams and handles and bull tongues or yokes, most of his farm implements, and also made and repaired wagon wheels. He could do stone work, build chimneys and plaster houses, as the saying was, being "a jack of all trades." Before the Civil War, he replaced the old log house with a large frame house, with four large rooms and three large chimneys. He did it mostly himself with the assistance of his wife and children. He was many months in building the old home, as it was done in piecemeals. He hued the sills from logs; he mortised the studding and cross beams together; he planed and smoothed the native walnut lumber on the outside; he split the shingles, and shaved them with a drawing knife, use for covering the house. He also burned the lime that he used in plastering. In fact, he performed all the carpenter work, and made the old fashioned latch on each door with the string hanging outside. This house lasted many years, serving him for his lifetime. He lived in this house more than sixty years, and it was known by all the community, for miles around, as the "Uncle Allen Kennedy Place".

As I said before, the children all kept growing, and, with such a large family, Father managed things pretty well in those crude and early days. Early in the settling of his homestead, he set out a large orchard of fruit trees, consisting of summer and winter apples, a variety of peaches and cherries, and these we dried and canned, which furnished plenty of fruit for our large family. The woods hills and bottoms furnished plenty of sassafras for spring use.

We always began to store in the Autumn, and prepare for winter. Some of us would be making sorghum, while others would be cutting and drying peaches and apples, and canning cherries, making barrels of kraut from our large cabbage patch, and kegs of pickles from the cucumber patch. Our garden would be filled with mounds of apples, turnips and cabbage buried in the ground for the winter storage and use. The smokehouse was filled with plenty of bacon, lard and dried beef hanging from the joist, with a barrel of pickled pork in the corner. All kinds of canned fruit, and plenty of wheat in the bin for the mill, and plenty of corn, we all had plenty to eat, and were ready in the spring of the year to begin all over again. Thus the entire family grew into womanhood and manhood.

My boyhood hardships, and feeling the sting of poverty, were perhaps my greatest assets in shaping my life. Father, who was a cripple, with a large family to support, could not furnish any aid to any of his children in the way of an education, as all his means were used in feeding and clothing the large family.

When a lad of twelve or thirteen years old, I remember working in the hot cornfield in July and August for my neighbors at thirtyfive cents per day, in order to buy my school books to attend winter school in our log school house with wooden benches.

Earning my books by the sweat of my brow, I learned and finished them well, as I grew older, I earned more wages, which enabled me to attend school longer. My father's good standing and credit enabled me to borrow to continue school. Having developed a strong constitution on the farm, and being very ambitious to learn, I was able to do more and harder study than other students, and passed them very quickly. I simply studied harder, longer and kept my whole mind on my work, determined to get an education, and attend college some day.

After finishing my High School at Stockton, Missouri, securing a teacher's certificate, I was able to teach school in the rural districts. I soon got a contract for three months in an outlawed district to teach an unfinished term. I wish to say that I taught and finished that term, in that "Hillbilly" district with honor and quite a reputation, enabling me to get a better school and greater wages thereafter. I continued to teach and attend college at Southwest Baptist College at Boliver, Missouri, and Ozark College at Springfield, Missouri, from 1884 to 1887.

With my college education and ability to teach school my success to my mind was assured and poverty began to vanish. I often think until this day, sometimes what a great blessing to many it is to have experienced poverty as a boy.

While teaching I gave a part of my earnings to help my parents to support the family and better conditions at home for the rest of the family. After teaching school for three or four years I stayed in the office of my uncle, Dr. Gilmore, a very able and eminent physician at Adrian, Missouri studying medicine for one year. He was a great anatomist and I spent most of the time studying the human system. By hard work studying most of the day and night for a year, I became quite well acquainted and efficient in anatomy, when I entered the Medical College and was soon made "quiz" master in anatomy over all the students and held that position for three years until I graduated.

Finishing my academic education, I then began turning my attention to further shaping my career for my chosen profession, the practice of medicine. I had an uncle, Dr. E. E. Gilmore, my mother's brother, a hardy pioneer from Warren County, Kentucky, who had established himself in the practice of medicine in Bates County, Missouri, a little to the North and West of my own native county of Cedar, in 1867. He and my mother were a very devoted brother and sister, and I grew up from childhood with an intimate acquaintance and relationship with him, existing during his entire life. He always insisted to my father, mother and me that I was not to remain on the farm, but was to launch into some profession. He seemed to know and catch the rhythm of my own ambition, and I early determined to enter the practice of medicine in the first stage of my career in my early manhood. I passed a part of the time in this preparation with my uncle in his office, and under his tutorage, and attended and completed my medicine education at the Kansas City Medical College, where he had been taking a postgraduate course in 1878. In the meantime, I had made the famous run on the opening of Oklahoma Territory, in 1889, prior to coming to Tulsa in 1891. Then, fully equipped for the practice of medicine, I reached my new pioneer home to become my permanent habitation as I completed the struggles and achievements of my manhood days.

KANSAS EXPERIENCES

My experience in the early days of homesteading in Kansas in the boom days of Wichita and Dodge City, in the rush for homesteads in Western Kansas in 1887, I now give.

In the early Spring of March, 1887, at this time having spent two or three years as a Country School Teacher, and studying medicine, on hearing of the many homesteaders, and many friends and boyhood associates, and their stories, who had gone to Kansas, securing good farms, and making money out of their claims, and returning to our neighborhood, singing the song of the Sod Shanty on the Claim, the lure struck me.

This old Sod Shanty Song was sung by many that returned, attracted my attention and my mind towards Western Kansas. The homesteaders, had at this time, passed beyond Wichita, and had extended as far as Kingman and Pratt Counties near Dodge City, Ingalls, Cimmaron and Meade Counties, all East of where Garden City now stands.

All around these little towns, north and south, for many miles, were homesteads that could be had in the scramble for claims. Having friends who had settled in and around Ingalls and Meade Center, that was our objective point when starting from home as Kansas "Boomers". Buying a new Bayne Wagon, a new set of harnesses, and a good team of horses, (not feeling safe, fearing something might happen to one of our horses, we took along an extra one for reserve), our covered wagon filled with bacon from Father's smokehouse, and several sacks of flour from the kitchen, and plenty of fruit from Mother's cellar, and plenty of blankets and bed clothes, and a stove in front of our wagon, making a snug place to sleep, my brother, A. P. Kennedy, and I bade goodbye to our dear old Father and Mother, and the rest of the family, and joined the Kansas "Boomers," headed westward to grow up with the country.

Inheriting from our Father the spirit that belongs to the pioneer family, we were happy in that covered wagon.

Our grandfather had pioneered in Tennessee and emigrated to Missouri in 1830, my father at that time being only six years old, having been born in 1824, and was an early settler in the Ozarks north of Springfield, Missouri.

After leaving the wooded hills and clear streams of the Ozarks, our old home in Cedar County, Missouri, and arriving on the prairies of Eastern Kansas in March, 1887, facing the cold Western winds of Kansas, we found our wagon cover too loose, and it was necessary to take up the slack in order to move westward.

Our many experiences in facing these sandstorms of Kansas, I shall always remember. When we encountered these sandstorms, we could not drive on, but staked our wagon to the ground, waiting until the storm and wind subsided, then we moved on west.

After driving many days, we reached Wichita in its early boom days of 1887. Wichita, at this time, was at her peak, and we, having been raised in the quiet community of the Ozarks, Wichita seemed to us a "wonder", as well as a tragic place.

The great rush, and the fabulous prices paid for property, were unbelievable. They seemed to be crazy mad, and they were building a city and homes in cornfields.

My experience in the boom days of Wichita, I shall never forget, as it was then such a contrast with the quietude of the Ozarks. We found at this place that all the grafters, sports, and gamblers, from the West, Colorado and California, had assembled in Wichita, which was very exciting to an Ozark "Hillbilly".

We remained there for a few weeks, seeing the sights, and learning much of western life, which was very fascinating and all so different to us. All this time, having in mind the lure of the reward of a homestead further west, we left the Boom Town of Wichita behind, traveling days and weeks in the covered wagon, facing the Kansas wind and sandstorms, and reached our destination, and found our old friends at Ingalls, Montezuma and Meade Center, this being about the first of April.

We stayed all night with our old friend and neighbor, and I drank milk for breakfast while the rest took coffee. My old friend's cows had been turned out on the buffalo grass the day before, it being early in the Spring, the first growth in buffalo wallows was called "loco weed", and naturally the cows had filled up on this green weed, which was freely given off in their milk, and, in about two hours, I was certainly a "locoed" Kansas Boomer. Being young and stout, and having a good stomach, I recovered.

After recovering and looking over several homesteads in and around these counties, and not forgetting my "loco" experience, I did not feel very kindly towards the Western Kansas homestead, and I decided I did not care to live in a country where you were liable to get "locoed", and we bade farewell to Kansas as a homestead "Boomer".

Hearing of a country that Kansas did not want, and Texas would not have, southwest of Dodge City, called "NoMan'sLand", we departed southward to a point called Beaver City, a sodhouse village on the Cimmaron River, and there joined Dr. Chase's Band, which had taken possession of this strip of land.

There was no state, and so laws, governing this strip of land, which nobody called and claimed, and nobody wanted. On our trip from Dodge City on the old wagon trail, we met many of the freighters, many teams hitched to three or four wagons, and many of their camps encircled with their wagons, enclosing a corral for their teams.

We finally reached the sod house village on the south bank of the Cimmaron, Beaver City. There we made the acquaintance of Dr. Chase, who was, at that time, "King" or "Governor" of the Band. He gladly welcomed us, inviting us to stake or wagon behind his possessions.

After eating our supper, and being very tired and sleepy, we slept rather late in the morning. We awoke to the sound of gunfire the next morning and to find several men lying on the ground, they having been shot by the authority of Dr. Chase's Band, who seemed to be the only law, and had killed these men as cow thieves.

Dr. Chase and his associates assumed governmental authority at that time over "NoMan'sLand". With his assumed authority, and the appearance of the dead men, we did not get a very good impression of "No Man's Land", and, with this condition, and having been "locoed" in Kansas, I realized that going West to grow up with the country was not my idea of a pioneer, and that I had gone too far West, or the West was too far for me and my mind turned at this time towards home, and I decided I had better go East and grow up with the country, and so, hitching up our teams, after staying for two or three days, we started eastward, trying to follow our trail from whence we came.

At the age of twenty three, after teaching school and studying medicine for three years, in April, 1889, when the President issued a proclamation opening up the Territory of Oklahoma for settlement, I joined my neighbor, John Coulter, in covered wagon, en route to the Border to make the run.

After reaching Cabin Creek, near Vinita, Indian Territory, and hearing of the many tales and stories of horse thieves and of criminals in the Indian Territory, and that they would be on the Border, my friend, owning the team and covered wagon, became alarmed, got cold feet, and turned back, saying he would go no further, and was going to get out of the Indian Territory. After stopping and camping at a little station called Afton, Indian Territory, I told him I would not go back, but intended to go on, as I had planned, and so we separated.

With a cheap trunk containing my saddle and blankets, I boarded the first train for Sapulpa, Indian Territory, the end of the Frisco Line at that time. With my trunk, I climbed on a flat car train, as there was no passenger train running on this road at that time. Arriving at Sapulpa after midnight, I slept alone in the depot until morning, and not a single person was around except the agent.

Next day, while waiting until a "Boomer" wagon came along, I hailed a man, and persuaded him to take me and the trunk to the Sac and Fox Agency. I remember his name until this day, Edwin Byrd, who was from near Chelsea, Indian Territory.

Arriving at the Sac and Fox Agency, I purchased a nice roan Indian pony from Chief Keokuk of the Sac and Fox Indians, paying him $35.00, which was a large part of my cash. Taking my saddle and bridle from the trunk, which was practically all I had, and I told Mr. Byrd to leave it there or ship it to Guthrie, where I might call for it later.

Separating from him, I saddled my pony, and bought a rope, and, with my blanket tied behind my saddle, I started for the Border alone, riding all day, west through the Indian Country. A can of salmon, some crackers and a plug of tobacco were my supplies. Night came upon me, alone in the Valley of the North Canadian. I dismounted, ate my supper of salmon and crackers, and washed it down with the water from the creek.

With my pony at one end and my saddle at the other end of my rope, the terra firma my bed, and my blanket my covering, my saddle my pillow, and being very tired, I slept until morning.

Awakening early, I started on my way, and was very much chagrined when I came upon a camp of "Boomers" not more than a mile away.

Dismounting, I had breakfast with them, and feeling very much refreshed, I mounted and rode on, and reached the Border on the Sac and Fox Line about four o'clock the next day. There were thousands of "Boomer" camps on this Border, and after reconnoitering around among them, I luckily came upon my cousin and old neighbor, Robert Kennedy, and family, who were camped. They had a covered wagon and tent. I was taken in, and had a very comfortable place and plenty to eat while waiting on the Border for the Opening.

We made the Run together on the 22nd of April, 1889, but my arrival on the Border was three or four days before the Opening, and the many thousands of people, camped for miles along the Border in all kinds of vehicles, tents and covered wagons, and the many kinds of people assembled, and the many incidents which took place, still will always be fresh in my mind.

In the line, Bob and I, mounted on our steeds, were well prepared for the Run at the crack of the Soldier's guns. With a yell and whoop we were off for Oklahoma City with thousands of others running for either lands or lots.

Coming to the North Canadian River, and there being no ford, we plunged in and out, landing on the opposite bank, wet to the skin, but we continued on with full speed, arriving at Oklahoma City sometime between the firing of the guns, high noon and two o'clock thereafter. We had no watch, so did not know the exact time of our arrival, but we were ahead of the passenger train that was hauling "Boomers" in from Purcell, but, at the same time, there were others ahead of us. I selected a lot north of Main Street on Broadway, near where the Rock Island Depot and the Skirvin Hotel now stand. My running mate, Robert Kennedy, not being satisfied with a lot, as he had a large family, wished to secure or locate a homestead.

So we separated, and he returned to his camp on the Border, and afterwards drifted South, and found a homestead of one hundred and sixty acres about eight miles east of Noble, which he improved, and there raised his family, and lives there yet, and is near eighty years of age.

I made friends with and stayed in the camp with J. B. Weaver, and Captain Couch, who were located on a homestead. I stayed for sometime, watching and guarding my lot. I also met another old neighbor and friend, Tom Masters, and securing a tent, which we put up, and he being a good cook, we stayed together. Neither of us had but little money, so I established a shooting gallery and eating place, Tom doing the cooking and I running the business. We succeeded in making expenses until about the last of June, and then I, hearing of the need of a school teacher down in the Chickasaw Indian Country west of Ardmore at Healdton, one morning to Tom, my partner, I said, "I am going to give you my lot, and go down and teach school." So I bade him "Goodbye" and left him in possession of the two lots, which he afterwards traded for a claim down on the South Canadian River, and finally proved up his claim, and lived there for a number of years. He visited me at Tulsa, on his way back to see his home folks, a very old man, and died during his visit to the old home place.

Arriving on a train at Ardmore, I went by a mail hack to Healdton, where they needed a school teacher and found a post office, a store, an upstairs room for the Masonic Lodge, a blacksmith shop and quite a little settlement. They had subscribed about thirtyfive pupils at $2.00 per month, and, on Monday morning, I opened school and taught one month, after which I collected my tuition, and, on Sunday morning, I departed from Healdton, the pupils and the little school house, for Ardmore, and took a train for Paris, Texas, en route back home, on my way to attend a Medical College at Kansas City, Missouri.

After attending lectures for the terms of 1889, 1890, and 1891, I then returned to the old home, where I was born, for a short visit, on my way back to Oklahoma and Tulsa, Indian Territory, in September, 1891.

TULSA, OKLAHOMA

SEPTEMBER, 1891

After attending the Medical College in Kansas City, Missouri, for the years of 1889, 1890 and 1891, with my brother, JEL. Kennedy, I departed for Oklahoma. Arriving in Tulsa, Indian Territory, on the 20th day of September, 1891. It was a small Indian village then, a station on the Frisco Railroad, just across the line from the Cherokee Nation in the Creek Nation, a little village of less than 350 people at that time.

Our sole possessions were a secondhand buggy, a team of ponies, a medicine case, a pair of saddle bags, and $35.00 at that time.

Storing our team in a small livery barn on Second Street, we proceeded down Main Street across the railroad track to a little wooden hotel, owned and operated by Jane Owen. We passed a drug store and two general merchandise stores on our way to the hotel, carrying our small grips, which contained our wardrobes. We seemed to cause some commotion in the bystanders, a few fellows on the street and on store platforms. We could not keep from noticing their actions and hearing their talk.

After registering and eating our lunch, we inquired as to what seemed to be the trouble, and found that there had been a train robbery on the M. K. & T. Railroad the day before at Pryor Creek Station, Indian Territory, and that they took us to be a part of the gang of robbers, and they thought we had the booty in our grips.

We quickly proceeded to the drug store, and introduced ourselves to the druggist, (J.M. Morrow), and told him we were young M.D.'s looking for a location. News spread quickly, and most of the population were standing around, gazing at us. On being introduced to them, everything was soon calm, and the glad hand of welcome was extended to us.

In less than one hour after this, while talking to the druggist, a man rode up hurriedly, and, dismounting, came into the drug store, saying to the druggist that a ranchman, who lived about five miles from Tulsa, was almost dead, and wanted him to send him some medicine. We both went to see this sick man, we were a little skittish to go alone, and we found a very sick man. We stayed all night, administering and doing all we could to relieve him, and the next morning found him much improved, and he soon made a quick recovery.

This news soon spread far and wide, what wonderful new doctors had located in Tulsa, and that they were able to cure all diseases. From that day on, we enjoyed a very active practice, and all who had ailments, both real and assumed, for miles around, became our patients. There were no nurses, hospitals, nor Specialists, and we had to be not only doctors, but the nurses, and the druggist also, when we went far and near, administering to our patients. Not only the General Practitioner, but we had to be the Specialist in every disease and ailment known to mankind, the surgeon, midwife, disease of children, respiratory and abdominal diseases, throat, nose and ear, and all things that are done today by Specialists. Dentistry being never heard of, we had to extract all the aching teeth for miles around.

Being young and inexperienced Doctors, as we were, with all these conditions to meet, and no one to call in consultation in the many bad cases we had, tried the nerves of one who had gone through such an experience as we had when we first located in Tulsa, we began to practice our profession.

Looking back over the many experiences we had, and the responsibilities of them, I realized what was meant when someone said, "Necessity is the mother of invention," and shall endeavor to describe some of the incidents that happened during those very early days, but, before I do this, I wish to describe the citizenship that constituted our patients, and those we came in contact with here, when we began to practice our profession.

There were the bad men, such as Henry Starr, the Dalton Brothers, the Cook Brothers, Cherokee Bill, Tulsa Jack, Jim French, Israel Carr, Bill Doolin, Al Jennings, the Dunn Boys, Bill Dalton, Bitter Creek, Charley Pierce, Arkansas Tom, Kid Wilson, and Dynamite Jack. Interlaced with them, and hunting for desperadoes, were several noted United States Marshalls. One could not tell, in those days, the desperadoes from the Marshalls, among them were Officers Heck, Thomas, Chapman, Bill Tilgham, Lake, Chadley, Houston, and Dick Speed, assisted by Burr Cox and Sam Childers, who were chasing these outlaws until the battle at Ingalls in 1893.

I shall never forget those exciting days we had from 1891 to 1893. These hectic days were well described by J. Warren Reed, United States Attorney at Fort Smith, Arkansas, in his book describing those times, called "Hell on the Border," This was during the height of Judge Parker's United States Court, which held jurisdiction over the Indian Territory when crime, robbery, murder, and outlawry were at their height.

At this time, Indian Territory was a grazing country, filled with cowmen, ranches, and cowboys, and a great many Indian citizens and squawmen, also a few lessors, and these constituted our citizenship, but with this, we had many old families of fine people and fine characters, that lived in and around Tulsa, such as the Hall Family, Bullette Family, Moore Family, Morrow Family,Hogan Family, Hoots Family, Lombard Family, Yeargen Family, Appleby Family, Harlow Family, Perryman Family, Smilet Family, Owens Family, Lindsey Family, Reeder Family, Lynch Family, Shipman Family, Miller Family, Horner Family, Burgess Family and Jones Family, and many others scattered here and there, and many of them lived to see the magic growth of the little Village of Tulsa.

After describing the little Indian Village and its citizenship, where I started on my professional career on the 20th day of September, 1891, in other articles, I will describe some of the incidents which followed.

EARLY DAY HISTORY OF PRACTICING MEDIACCINEC IN TULSA,

AND EXPERIENCES OF A COUNACTRY DOCTOR

On arriving in Tulsa the 20th day of September, 1891, then a little village in the Creek Nation, and upon securing a M. D. Certificate from the Medical Board as licensed physicians, we started out fully qualified to practice medicine in the Indian Territory.

This Medical Board was created by the Law of the Creek Nation, and upon paying $25.00 a year to the Treasurer of the Creek Board, licensed us to practice medicine at Tulsa, and gave us all the rights that other licensed traders had to do business in the Creek Nation. A licensed physician or trader, under the Creek Law, was the same, and gave us the right of possession, which will be described fully in my article describing the growth of Tulsa. Our license gave us the right to occupy a place of business and place of residence, as the title of all lands was in the Creek Nation.

Having these privileges, and licenses as physicians, we started out as full fledged M.D.'s. On the first day of our arrival, we had saved the life of a ranchman, and the news spread rapidly of the arrival of two new doctors in the village, and we were kept very busy. Our ability at that time to dispense calomel, quinine, blue mass, C.C. Pills, Epsom Salts, and castor oil, met most requirements, as it was then a new country with many lakes, and not drained. There were also many swamps and many mosquitoes, and, it being Autumn, most of the ailments were malaria, chills and fever, commonly called ague. Our remedies acted well, and the patients soon recovered, and this gave us a reputation as each one got well. Being a new country, not infected with so many germs and microbes, or infectious diseases of today, and most of our patients having simple ailments, required only simple remedies for treatment, and so we gained quite a reputation upon our arrival at the beginning.

If a patient came in with a toothache, we extracted or pulled the tooth, charging fifty cents. The tooth did not ache any more, and the patient was relieved, and the result was good.

Cuts and wounds were cleaned with turpentine or iodine, and well dressed with clean dressing, and they usually healed without any trouble.

Fractures or broken bones were put in plaster paris casts or board splints, and well bandaged, and they united.

Gunshot wounds were quite usual at that time, and were cleaned and dressed without probing for the bullet or asking questions. They either got well or we went to Fort Smith before Judge Parker's Court as witnesses to prove the cause of their death.

In chronic ailments, we advised them to take Peruna in order to shift the responsibility, as it was the age of advertised patent medicine.

Our practice and territory grew and extended for miles, as the country was thinly settled, and we visited patients in the Cherokee Strip, then in the Jordan Valley, as far as Cleveland, Oklahoma, and beyond, West to the old Stage Stand, which is now Kellyville, Oklahoma; South to Duck Creek and Spike "S" Ranch beyond Mounds, Oklahoma; South and East to Adams Creek, and North and East to Catoosa, the Verdigris District, Ramona, Skiatook, Friends Mission and the Bird Creek District; West as far as Pawhuska, Hominy and Keystone and Mannford, and the territory around, for fifty miles, we covered in early days, in buggy or on horseback, but in the buggy most of the time, as country doctors.

Part II