Volume 9 , Issue 49

Pioneer Richard Nicolds

I found this interesting history of Nicolds while I was reading A Standard History of Oklahoma, Vol. 4, page 1344.

Nicolds own tutorship would prove of more value than that provided in the common schools of the day in the old Choctaw Nation, the father of richard Nicolds never permitted his son to attend school. The young man, however, received a finished education at home and in his father's office, taking law in addition to his literary course. When the literary education was competed, Edward F. Nicolds determined that his son should acquire more physical strength and he purchased a farm near the town of Caddo, where the family lived, and there the young man learned the art of agriculture. He remained on the arm for vie years, experimenting with various kinds of crops and livestock, and thereafter retained the farm as an inheritance from his father. In 1916, Mr. Nicolds was enjoying an interesting practice in the City of Durant.

Mr. Nicolds was born May 24, 1888, in collin county, Texas. His father, a native of Missouri, moved into Western Texas before the days of railroads in that section. Nicolds was a successful lawyer in Texas, living at Abilene. In 1901 he moved his family to Caddo, Indian Territory, and there remained for thirteen years, and then he moved back to Abilene, Texas. he was the son of Richard W. Nicolds, a Confederate major in the Civil war, who served with General Hood's brigade. Nicolds was a man of high intellectual attainments, and was a native son of Virginia.

Edward Nicolds married minnie H. Hollis, the daughter of Dr. T. H. Hollis, who was a surgeon in the confederate army. The family is one that first came into American prominence in revolutionary days, and Hollis Hall at Harvard University was named for one of the name.

Two brothers in the paternal ancestry of Richard Nicolds came to America prior to the revolution, and during that period of stress and strain one of them was allied with the British and the other with the colonists. Before the war was ended the former was captured and hanged, whereupon the latter chose a new name for himself in a new land. The original name was "Olds" and his Christian name was "Nicholas." Detaching some of the letters from the latter, he evolved the name of Nicolds, and the family has been known down to the present time.

When Richard reached the age of 12 years, he was taught by a governess. After that time he began studying in his father's office, and there he completed his education, as we stated earlier.

At the age of 25 years he was appointed deputy clerk of the District Court of Bryan County, a position he held for two years when he was admitted to the bar and began practice on his own initiative. In his law class before the State Bar Commission was Walter Turnbull, who later was endorsed by a majority of leading men of the Choctaw Nation for governor of that tribe.

Mr. Nicolds was a member of the Episcopal Church, the county and state bar associations, and the Durant and Bryan county Democratic clubs.
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