Volume 16 , Issue 30

History of D (Dewey) County Oklahoma

Some of you Oklahomans probably did not realize that the area along State Highway 34, near Dewey County (also known as D county), was created from the former Cheyenne and Arapaho Reservation after it was opened to non-Indian settlers, 19 April 1892, in Oklahoma Territory.

Towns in Dewey County

A post office was established in Camargo on 16 September 1892, with Rosa Meek as postmaster. Some historians assert that Camargo was named for an Illinois town, while other sources claim that Camargo was a Cheyenne word meaning "little dog."

It was in 1912, the Wichita Falls and Noethwestern Railway (later the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railway, or Katy) built a line between Leedey and Forgan, Beaver county, that passed through Camargo. It was also in that same year the Camargo Comet newspaper began serving the citizenry. Farming and ranching sustained Camargo's early economy. by 195, the town had four general stores, two hotels, two lumber yards, and two grain elevators.

Leedey was located 2 miles north of the junction of State highways 34 and 47. Named for early settler Amos Leedey, the town of Leedey is situated in the southwestern corner of Dewey county.

Agriculture and oil and gas industries had contributed to the town's economy. In 1912, Leedey farmers shipped 485 railroad cars loaded with broomcorn. In 1923, Leedey was touted as the latest oil-boom town due to drilling in the area. In the 1930s two broomcorn warehouses and a grain elevator operated. The town's only restaurant was a oat-world War II diner (a prefabricated eatery reduced by the Valentine manufacturing Company of Wichita, Kansas) that was moved from Sayre to Leedey in 1993.

Oakwood is located on State highway 3/US Highways 270/281, 20 miles southeast of Seiling, within the former Cheyenne and Arapaho Reservation. Oakwood would be placed in a valley in the southeast corner of the county in Sickle Township, where the population in 1900 reached 1,276. In 1902, as the Kansas City, Mexico and Orient Railway built its tracks through Dewey County, developers became interested. The union Real Estate and Townsite Company of Jackson county, Missouri, purchased the area nd in May 1903 surveyed and platted a fifty block town. Some area residents wanted to all the new place Edsallville, after a local family prominent in its development, the settled on Oakwood, because of the oak trees nearby.

Putnam is situated 13 miles south of the county seat of Taloga on US Highway 183. Named for Revolutionary War hero Gen. Israel Putnam, a post office was established on 4 June 1895, with Lyman Reed serving as the first postmaster. The town's growth was stunted by the fact that the railroad bypassed it.

Seiling is located in north central Dewey county in northwest Oklahoma and immediately south of the North Canadian River and approximately seven miles north of the South Canadian River. The town lies at the intersection of US Highways 183/270/281 and State Highway 3 north-south and US Highway 60 and State Highway 31 east-west and is ten miles from Taloga, the county seat. 5 May 1894, a post office was designated to be placed in a store operated by Louis Seiling, for whom the town is named, on the homestead he had acquired in the land run. Seiling incorporated 5 April 1909.

An important seasonal economic activity revolved round horse racing and associated tourism. A horse track operated as early as 1903. A larger track facility was built before World War I, and the Seiling Race Meet was organized circa 1925. The spring and fall three-day race meets also included carnivals and other attractions. The track was complete with grandstands and barns. Seiling came to be known as the Little Louisville of Oklahoma racing. Expanded to six-day meets and conducted under the auspices of the Oklahoma Racing Association, which formed in 1948, the activity was still ongoing through 1951.

Once a part of the Cheyenne and Arapaho nations' lands, the county was on the pathway for herds going from texas to Kansas along the Western Trail.

Vici lies twenty-one miles south of Woodward on State Highway 34 at its intersection with U.S. Highway 60/State Highway 51. In February 1899 Albert Vincent received a permit to establish a post office two and one-half miles southeast of the present Vici site. He served as postmaster, and the mail came from Beement, six miles east. Vincent soon moved his post office/store to a spot three-fourths of a mile south of present Vici, and another store was moved there from Beement in 1902. That was the beginning of "Old Vici."

Taloga, county seat of Dewey county, lies almost in the center of the county and is situated in the horseshoe bend of the main (South) Canadian River. The town is accessed by State Highway 183 and is thirty-seven miles north of Clinton, Oklahoma. It has been said that the Taloga is an Indian word meaning "beautiful valley," although in other accounts it is a Creek word meaning "rocking water."

During the first days of settlement, members of the original Dalton gang, as well as other outlaws of the day, are said to have filed on lots, using fictitious names.   |  View or Add Comments (0 Comments)   |   Receive updates ( subscribers)  |   Unsubscribe

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