The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1894-10-20
OKLAHOMA'SPOPULATION
e Consists Largely Of Negroes
and Indiana



lawless white men; to-day it is knock
ing at the doors of congress for admis-
sion to the union as state. When it
is admitted it will have q larger Afro
American population than any state of
its size and population in the union OUT
side the southern states. From figures
furnished the New York Sun by Mr..
Peter Flynn Oliver, a reputable lawyer
of Ell Reno, who went to Oklahoma
from South Carolina few years ago.
it is learned that the Afro American
population numbers &C, 900, there being
s,566 in Blaine county, $4,000 in King
fisher county, s,40O in Lincoln county,
10000 in Logan county. the remainder
being scattered in all the other coun-
ties The total property holdings Of
these people is 1858, $50, divided as
follows: 5, ,46S. 100 represented by 54s,-
$40 acres Of farm land; $a7, 400 repre-
sented by town property, and ss37, ,736
represented by personality. Comment
ing on these figures, Mr.. Oliver says:
1.-The land in Oklahoma is largely
raw, and the price place upon it is
extremely low. Settlers have hardly
begun to build elaborately, and the
majority Of the pioneers brought with
them no personality worth mentioning
save their teams w1s.. ..zoyr first ca ne:
some came even teamless. The person
atty valuation is, therefore, very low.
II you could have seen this barren
country, however, April %, 1889, then
gone away and dropped down upon us
to-day, you would be wonder-struck at
the metamorphosis. The dugQut, the
sod house and the shock are being rap
idly replaced by beautiful and COM
Portable homes for man and beast.
'sThe estimates have given you are
for Oklahoma, excluding other portions
of the old Indian territory. The4ls
large Afro-American population in
that portion of the territory, many
of them worth their hundreds of
thousands of dollars. The Creek and
Seminole nations have more African
than Indian blood in their veins, and
Gov. Brown, of the Creeks, shows his
African more than his Indian blood.
&c is a man of education and wealth.
The Kickapoo, the Kiowa, tb& ~
manche and the Apache la1 aafc
likely to come in soon for. settle
ment. The next move will then be
upon the Eve civilized tribes, who own
their lands in common. Then the
whole Indian territory will have been
swallowed by the white man. May lots
of black men help in the swallowing" :"
.. The Afro-Americans have settled In
some parts almost to the exclusion of
the whites. .Langston City was founded
by E. y McCabe, who was once auditor
of Kansas, . man OF great resource and
energy. The streets, avenues and
boulevards Of Langston City are named
in honor of prominent Afro-Americans.
It supports weekly newspaper called
the Herald. Mr.. McCabe projected an
Other town. but it has not prospered rs
well as Langston City.
Most of the Afro-Americans In Okla
holAa went there from the southern
staaes, Tennessee furnishing . very
large number, and these are constantly
dr$wing others after them, as is natural
ana usual in'such cases, 50 that it ispos-
siRe that when the territory is ad-
mkted to the union it will have an
Afro-American population of some
100000. In several instances when
these men have been nenaced by un-
friendly Indians and whites they have
shofn that the courage and determine
t1Which carried them into the ter
and enabled them to secure
htenee In the wilderness were sufficient
to protect them and their property.