Murray County Oklahoma Cities and Town History- presented by Genealogy Trails

Murray County, Oklahoma Cities and Townships

Davis owes its existence to the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway. Although trains still clatter along the rails, more traffic flows down U.S. Interstate 35, situated two miles west of Davis, along State Highway 7, Davis's Main Street, and U.S. Highway 77, which runs north-south through town. Davis is located in Murray County, twenty-three miles north of Ardmore and twenty-three miles south of Pauls Valley. It has a council-manager form of government. Davis is named for Samuel H. Davis, who moved to Washita in the Chickasaw Nation, Indian Territory, in 1887. After relocating his dry goods store four miles south to the present town's site in 1890, Davis successfully petitioned for a Santa Fe depot to be constructed near his establishment. In March 1890 he obtained a post office for the settlement, which was initially proposed to be named Chigley, after Nelson Chigley, a Chickasaw on whose land the townsite was located. However, "Chigley" was already an Indian Territory town designation. Samuel Davis's post office petition of December 11, 1889, noted that his "place is very well known as Davis Store." Thus, the town was named Davis and was incorporated on November 16, 1898. In 1900 Davis bustled with some fifty-seven business, two banks, ten doctors, three dentists, and three lawyers. Of its 1,346 residents, those who were not employed in retail sales were farmers, for Davis was at the heart of one of the best cotton producing sections in Oklahoma. By 2000 the town's population had reached 2,610. Most residents were then employed in sales, production, or services. About one-fourth worked in the educational, health, and social service fields. Only sixteen listed farming, fishing, or forestry as their occupation. Davis is the home of Turner Falls Park, which the citizens voted to purchase for $21,000 in 1925. Located in the Arbuckle Mountains, Turner Falls is named for pioneer resident Mazeppa Turner, who represented Murray County in the Oklahoma Legislature from 1907 until 1911. Oklahoma's Initial Point, from which all of Oklahoma except the Panhandle was surveyed, and Fort Arbuckle are about eight miles west of Davis.

Dougherty lies at the southern terminus of State Highway 110, seventeen miles southwest of Sulphur and thirty-six miles north of Ardmore. Situated near the Washita River in the Arbuckle Mountains, Dougherty was originally known as Henderson Flat, then Strawberry Flat. The settlement was renamed in honor of William Dougherty, a Gainsville, Texas, banker, circa 1887. The Thomas W. Johnson family acquired and established a residence on the present townsite in 1880. They were subsequently joined by Mazeppa Turner, a rancher and namesake of nearby Turner Falls. The Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway, an Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway subsidiary, reached the settlement in 1887, and the Dougherty post office was established that same year. A Masonic order was chartered at Dougherty in 1889, and the town had a population of about 103 in 1890. Dougherty's early economy was based on ranching, farming (the town had two cotton gins in the mid-1890s), and mining. In 1895 approximately 550 workers were employed extracting asphalt from area mines. In 1899 Dougherty incorporated as a community of Tishomingo County in the Chickasaw Nation, Indian Territory. The town's earliest church was built in 1899, and its first school opened in 1908. The Arbuckle News, Dougherty's only newspaper, was published from 1909 to 1911. A sand and gravel pit was opened north of town in 1917. Dougherty's population declined from 437 in 1900 to 278 in 1910, increased to 405 in 1920, and dropped to 371 in 1930. Dougherty's mining industry remained operational through the Great Depression. From the early 1920s until the mid-1940s, local production exceeded one million tons of gravel and sand and three million tons of rock asphalt.

The town of Hickory is situated west of State Highway 1 on County Road N3450, ten miles northeast of Sulphur. Hickory was founded in the Chickasaw Nation, Indian Territory, during the late 1880s. A post office was established there on November 15, 1893, with Charles W. Reed serving as postmaster. The post office was robbed at least twice before its closure on March 31, 1964. The community was named for a grove of hickory trees that thrived along Mill Creek west of the townsite. The Hickory vicinity is among the most picturesque prairie regions in Oklahoma. To the present, residents have worked in farming, ranching, and the dairy industry. The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway reached Hickory in 1901 when a line was built between Sherman, Texas, and Sapulpa in the Creek Nation, Indian Territory. The railroad created a period of growth in which Hickory's population reached 468 in 1907. The local newspaper, the Hickory Advance, began publication in 1906, and the People's Bank of Hickory opened in 1907. Four businesses were destroyed by fire in 1909, and the newspaper soon went out of business. In 1922 a group of Hickory citizens combined their money to open Murray County's first radio station, but the necessary equipment could not be obtained. By 1923 Hickory had become one of Oklahoma's major cream-shipping centers. The community had Nazarene, Methodist, and Baptist churches with only the latter remaining in 2003. Population numbers declined after a count of 359 in 1920. There were 224 residents in 1940 but only 62 by 1970. That number increased to 87 in 2000. The local cemetery is still used and is maintained by the Hickory Cemetery Association.

Sulphur, the county seat of Murray County, is situated at the intersection of U.S. Highway 177 and State Highway 7, eighty-four miles southeast of Oklahoma City. The Sulphur vicinity was known for its mineral springs before the town's founding. In 1878 Noah Lael, son-in-law of former Chickasaw Gov. Cyrus Harris, established a ranch south of Pavilion Springs. His house was Sulphur's first residence. Lael sold the ranch to Perry Froman, an intermarried Chickasaw, in 1882. Sulphur developed in the early 1890s when conventions and gatherings were held at the springs. Around 1890 fishermen built a clubhouse there. They enlarged and sold the building as a hotel. Richard A. Sneed, a lawyer and farmer and future Oklahoma secretary of state and state treasurer, visited the area circa 1890 and afterward organized the Sulphur Springs Company. He and stockholders bought land from the Froman Ranch and platted a townsite. The Sulphur post office was established on October 2, 1895, with William J. Bloomer as postmaster. The Sulphur Headlight, the town's first newspaper, was published in 1899. In 1900 the community had 1,198 inhabitants. The Sulphur Springs Railway reached Scullin in 1902 and was sold to the St. Louis and San Francisco Railway in 1907. In 1902 the federal government created the 640-acre Sulphur Springs Reservation. The Chickasaw Nation deeded the land to the Department of the Interior, and town residents had to relocate. Some moved to a hill on the east side of Rock Creek. Others settled west of the reservation but vacated again after the government added more than two hundred acres to the park in 1904. They moved north and resided west of the creek. Thus, there was West Sulphur and East Sulphur on opposite banks of Rock Creek with no bridge between. A rivalry developed as the sections vied for prominence. Then in 1909 residents built the Washington Bridge. A hatchet for peace and a horseshoe for prosperity were buried in the structure. In 1904 the name of Sulphur Springs Reservation was changed to Platt National Park, the present Chickasaw National Recreation Area. Sulphur flourished as a resort. Stores and refreshment stands were built around Pavilion Springs. The post office was the center of the "East Side," and businesses opposite the springs developed the "West Side." The Belleview Swimming Pool was billed as Oklahoma's largest, and the Vendome Well remains the state's largest artesian spring. Its sulphur water fed a stream that converged with Travertine Creek and formed a small lake. People smeared the lake's mud on their bodies to cure ailments. The Sulphur public schools opened in 1904. On December 9, 1908, Sulphur defeated Davis in an election determining the county seat. The State School for the Deaf was established in East Sulphur in 1908, and the Soldier's Tuberculosis Sanitarium (presently a Veterans Center) was constructed in Platt National Park in 1922. Sulphur was incorporated in 1908. Its economy remains dependent upon tourism. Local asphalt, lead, and zinc mines were once profitable.