Oklahoma Trivia & Tidbits
Looking for Oklahoma trivia? Try our list Oklahoma little know facts, tidbits and trivia.
—Arthur A. Jones, inventor of the Nautilus exercise machine, was raised in Seminole (pop. 6,899). The exercise equipment was the first to use variable resistance to build muscles. Jones died last year at age 80 at his home in Ocala, Fla. (pop. 45,943).
first appeared: 5/4/2008
—Five famous American Indian ballerinas from Oklahoma are honored in the “The Five Moons,” a quintet of larger-than-life-size bronze statues in Tulsa. The sculptures depict Maria Tallchief, Marjorie Tallchief, Rosella Hightower, Yvonne Chouteau and Moscelyne Larkin in the costume and pose of one of their signature ballet roles.
first appeared: 3/9/2008
—Sheri Glasgow, 40, of Muskogee (pop. 38,310) is the 2007 Toyota Women’s Bassmaster Tour Angler of the Year. The honor landed her a 2008 Toyota Tundra pickup truck.
Jeane Kirkpatrick was the first female U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, serving from 1981 to 1985 under President Ronald Reagan, who awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom. She was born in 1926 in Duncan (pop. 22,505) and died in 2006.
first appeared: 2/24/2008
—At the Oklahoma Railway Museum in Oklahoma City, visitors can explore the state’s railway history on 3.1 acres filled with locomotives, passenger cars and cabooses, and a 19th-century depot. Seasonal train rides are offered.
first appeared: 2/10/2008
Beavers Bend Depot in Broken Bow (pop. 4,230) operates a one-third-size replica of the C.P. Huntington S.P. train that was built in 1863. Riders can see deer, turkey and other wildlife when the train passes through the Beavers Bend Resort Park game preserve.
first appeared: 2/10/2008
––Singer, songwriter and producer Jimmy Webb, who wrote chart-topping hits including “By the Time I Get to Phoenix,” “MacArthur Park,” “Wichita Lineman” and “Galveston,” was born in 1946 in Elk City (pop. 10,510).
The first Sam’s Club, the members-only warehouse store, was opened in Midwest City (pop. 54,088) in 1983. Today, the chain, a division of Wal-Mart Stores Inc., has nearly 600 stores throughout the United States.
first appeared: 1/27/2008
—Capt. Robert Hawley, a 2003 graduate of Oklahoma State University’s veterinary school in Stillwater (pop. 39,065), was honored last year as the top veterinarian in the U.S. Army with the Army Veterinary Corps Above and Beyond Award. Hawley is stationed at Incirlik Air Base in Turkey, where he operates a clinic for military dogs and pets of military members, and inspects food and water for troops in the Middle East.
first appeared: 1/13/2008
—The Atherton Hotel on the Oklahoma State University campus in Stillwater (pop. 39,065) is staffed by students enrolled in the university’s School of Hotel and Restaurant Administration. Built in 1950 as the Student Union Hotel, it recently was named The Atherton Hotel after Bill Atherton, an alumnus who spearheaded a $6-million renovation.
first appeared: 12/30/2007
Convicts can bust loose at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary Rodeo in McAlester (pop. 17,783), an annual event since 1940. Billed as the world’s only “behind-the-walls” prison rodeo, the competition lets convicts test their skills in events such as bull riding and steer wrestling in an arena filled with cheering spectators.
first appeared: 12/30/2007
—In 1972, David Green borrowed $600 to open a 300-square-foot miniature-frame store in north Oklahoma City. Today, Green’s Hobby Lobby Creative Centers are a chain of more than 375 stores in 30 states that sell art supplies, crafts, frames and home decorating products.
first appeared: 12/2/2007
—Founded in 1986 by Bob Carroll of Clarita, Black Cat Mountain Trilobites, part of Carroll & C. Enterprises, collects, prepares and sells fossils of the extinct arthropods, which are quarried from the nearby Black Cat Mountain. Carroll has discovered two trilobite species, and another, Cyphaspis carrolli, was named in his honor.
first appeared: 11/18/2007
A 100-acre meadow in Edmond (pop. 68,315) known as Chitwood Farms has been established as the first community farm in the state. Plans are for local residents and community groups to grow gardens on the property, which was donated by a housing developer.
first appeared: 11/18/2007
—At age 32, Alfred Paul Murrah in 1937 became one of the youngest men in history to be appointed a U.S. District Court judge. Murrah, born near Tishomingo (pop. 3,162), later was elevated to the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals and became its chief judge. Two years after his death in 1975, the federal building in Oklahoma City was named in his honor. The building was bombed in 1995, killing 168 people.
first appeared: 11/4/2007
—Watonga (pop. 4,658) is the boyhood home of Clarence Nash, who was the voice behind Walt Disney’s Donald Duck for more than 50 years, from 1933 until his death in 1985. Nash was born in Watongo in 1904 and has a street named in his honor.
first appeared: 10/21/2007
—A 1957 Plymouth Belvedere buried as a time capsule 50 years ago to celebrate Oklahoma’s golden jubilee as a state was unearthed, rust and all, in June on the lawn of the Tulsa County Courthouse. The car, a 1950s icon, was wrapped in three protective layers and housed in a concrete vault, but still bore the blemishes of time. Also unearthed were gasoline, which at the time cost 24 cents a gallon, and a handbag containing typical items of the day: bobby pins, lipstick, cigarettes and a pack of gum.
first appeared: 10/7/2007
—John Hope Franklin is known as the dean of African-American history and one of America’s greatest historians. His best-known book is From Slavery to Freedom, published in 1947 and still being used in college classrooms. He was elected to the Oklahoma Hall of Fame in 1978 and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1995. Franklin was born in 1915 in Rentiesville (pop. 102).
first appeared: 9/30/2007
The former home in Yale (pop. 1,342) of 1912 Olympian Jim Thorpe is a museum containing artifacts, including Thorpe’s track and field awards and family items. Thorpe, considered one of the greatest athletes of the 20th century, was born in Prague (pop. 2,138) and lived in Yale from 1917 until 1923.
first appeared: 9/30/2007
—The Sherwin Miller Museum of Jewish Art in Tulsa displays 4,000 years of Jewish art and artifacts. The museum’s collection, said to be one of the nation’s largest, includes ancient ritual objects, historical documents, traditional costumes and artwork. Included is a Holocaust exhibit of the experiences of survivors who settled in Oklahoma, and Oklahomans who helped liberate the Nazi concentration camps during World War II.
first appeared: 9/9/2007
The Healing Rock near Skiatook (pop. 5,396), once called Teepee Rock, was considered a healing site by the Osage and Quapaw Indians in the late 19th century. Archaeologists say the 12-foot-tall triangular rock is a natural formation and set in near perfect vertical alignment by natural erosion, ending speculation that the rock was manmade. The rock was to be covered by the planned Skiatook Lake in 1985, but residents campaigned to save it and the Army Corps of Engineers moved it to the lake’s south rim.
first appeared: 9/9/2007
—After an online statewide vote, Oklahomans chose a design featuring the state wildflower, the Indian blanket, and the state bird, the scissortail flycatcher, for the state’s commemorative quarter to be minted next year. More than 148,000 votes were cast and the winning design garnered 76,643 to beat out designs of the Pioneer Woman statue in Ponca City (pop. 25,919), a gushing oil derrick, waving wheat, a windmill and a calumet.
first appeared: 8/26/2007
jump to page:
1
,
2
,
3
,
4
,
5
,
6
,
7
,
8
,
9
,
10
,
11
,
12
,
13
,
14
,
15
,
16
,
17
,
18
,
19
,
20
additional links
articles by category
search for articles
American Profile Hometown Cookbooks
our picks
message boards
about us
Contact Us