Volume 10 , Issue 18

Highway 281 & Main Road To Alva, OK

I was letting myself ramble through the Woods County history book published in 1986, Pioneer Footprints Across Woods County. I was gathering some information on Herb Gold, an Alva, Oklahoma pioneer. On page 432, there was a bio of Willard Marsh and what I found interesting was a description of highway 281 that lead into Alva, Oklahoma from the North. It goes something like this:

"Those who have traveled Highway 281 north from Alva know the hill about two miles north of town. When the Cherokee Strip was opened for settlement that hill was much bigger and steeper and it was very, very heavy sand from the top of the hill to the corner south, and possibly to the railraod crossing."

I know of that steep hill going north out of Alva on hwy 281, just about a mile north of the railroad overpass. At the top if you turn west, there is a blacktop road today that takes you to the country club & golf course.

Anyway... back to the pioneer footprints story and the description of highway 281 leading to Alva, Oklahoma. As you head south on highway 281 going down the steep hill you come to a railroad bridge. It was just south of this railroad bridge that the main road to Alva turned west and followed around near the track to the bridge over Salt Fork River.

Today that road leads to Rhodes Salvage, but I have never checked it out to see where or if the rest of the road still leads to another bridge over the Salt Fork River. This earlier bridge was one-half mile west and south of the bridge being used today. This was the early main road to Alva. Is that earlier bridge still standing? Or... is it a dead end at Rhodes Salvage?
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