Then, in 1889, the U.S. government held a land rush, specifying a time when white settlers could enter a designated territory, claim a piece of land and set up a homestead. Oklahoma entered the union in 1907. Oklahoma suffered particularly during the Great Depression, when the western part of the state became the center of the Dust Bowl thousands of acres of topsoil blew away as a result of drought and poor farming practices. Many of the Okie Dust Bowl farmers fled west an exodus John Steinbeck documented in his novel The Grapes of Wrath . The discovery of oil in the late 1800s and early 1900s also had, and continues to have, a dramatic impact on the state.
Pine forests cover a large part of western Oklahoma.
Daylight Saving Time is observed April- October.