Oklahoma Trivia & Tidbits - Page 13

Looking for Oklahoma trivia? Try our list Oklahoma little know facts, tidbits and trivia.

One of the most famous oil gushers in history blew at the Sudik dairy farm in Oklahoma County on March 26, 1930, when a rampaging column of oil, natural gas, and rock sprayed up to 3,000 barrels of oil an hour into the countryside. Efforts to control it failed for 11 days, as oil covered pastures, cattle and farmhouses. Nobody knows how much oil was lost before the gusher was capped, but more than 211,000 barrels were recovered later from ditches, gullies and creeks.

first appeared: 12/14/2003

The bronze statue named Hopes and Dreams that stands in the Noble County Courthouse plaza in Perry (pop. 5,230) was erected in 1993, the centennial year of the Cherokee Strip Run, to honor the settlers who took part in the land rush Sept. 16, 1893. Oklahoma artist Bill Bennett created the statue, which depicts a man and a woman coming to the newly opened Western frontier.

first appeared: 12/7/2003

Adopted in 1893, 14 years before statehood, mistletoe is Oklahoma’s oldest symbol. The semi-parasitic plant grows on trees throughout the state, especially in the southern part, and bears dark green leaves and bright white berries. Mistletoe reportedly was chosen to represent the state at the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago because it decorated settlers’ graves when flowers weren’t blooming.

first appeared: 11/30/2003

Actress Joan Crawford was born Lucille Fay LeSueur in San Antonio, Texas, in the early 1900s, but her family later moved to Lawton, where she learned to dance at her stepfather’s music hall. She went on to become one of MGM’s most successful stars, working with the studio from 1925 to 1943. She won an Academy Award for best actress for her role in the 1945 film Mildred Pierce.

first appeared: 11/23/2003

Completed in March 1940, Pensacola Dam was the state’s first hydroelectric facility. Built in a multiple-arch style, it stretches more than a mile across the Grand River Valley between Disney (pop. 226) and Langley (pop. 669), creating the 43,500-acre Grand Lake O’ the Cherokees.

first appeared: 11/16/2003

The "Flight of Spirit" mural in Oklahoma City’s state Capitol building honors the state’s five renowned American Indian ballerinas: Yvonne Chouteau from Vinita (pop. 6,472), Rosella Hightower from Durwood, Moscelyne Larkin from Miami (pop. 13,704), and sisters Maria and Marjorie Tallchief from Fairfax (pop. 1,555). The dancers achieved international acclaim during their careers in the 1940s and 1950s.

first appeared: 11/9/2003

Camille Nixdorf Phelan spent two years researching Oklahoma’s history and another four years portraying it on her Oklahoma History Quilt. She exhibited the intricate work at Chicago World’s Fair in 1933, and donated the quilt to the Oklahoma Historical Society in 1935. Phelan embroidered the quilt with the state’s key historical events and people from 1541 (the year of Coronado’s expedition through the Oklahoma Panhandle) to 1931.

first appeared: 11/2/2003

Centennial Plaza in Ponca City (pop. 25,919) was built as part of the 100th-anniversary celebration for the 1893 land run that founded the community. Some 7,000 bricks on the plaza bear the names of pioneers and their descendants, and organizers and supporters who helped the project. The plaza also features Centennial Monument, sculpted by Jo Saylors, of a settler stepping off his horse to stake his claim.

first appeared: 10/26/2003

The state adopted Indian blanket as its official wildflower in 1986, symbolizing Oklahoma’s scenic beauty and its American Indian heritage. Tolerant of heat and drought, Indian blanket grows about 1 to 3 feet high, and blooms from June until August. Its round flowers measure about 4 inches across, and are orange-red toward the center of the petals, and yellow at the tips.

first appeared: 10/19/2003

In 1985, Wilma Mankiller became the first woman in modern history to lead a major American Indian tribe when she was appointed, and subsequently elected, principal chief of the Cherokee Nation. She held that position until 1995, when she resigned for health reasons. Mankiller was born in Tahlequah (pop. 14,458) in 1945, and is known for her commitment to rural community development.

first appeared: 10/12/2003

Astronaut Gordon Cooper Jr., who was born in Shawnee (pop. 28,692), has logged 225 hours, 15 minutes, and three seconds in space, on two flights. During his 1963 Mercury 9 mission, he orbited the Earth 22 times and became the first American astronaut to sleep in orbit. During the 1965 Gemini 5 flight, he completed another 120 orbits.

first appeared: 10/5/2003

Most state properties have legal descriptions that rely on Initial Point—a sandstone slab set in a mound of stones 6 feet across and 3 feet high. Oklahoma’s marker is located 7.5 miles west of Davis (pop. 2,610), and marks the “initial point” for the state’s property description system of sections, townships, and ranges.

first appeared: 9/28/2003

The Chickasaw Nation founded Tishomingo (pop. 3,162) in 1856 as its capital, in order to restore authority over their governmental affairs in Indian Territory. The tribe adopted a constitution and organized executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government, with the offices filled by popular election, and also built some of the area’s first schools, banks, and businesses.

first appeared: 9/21/2003

The rivalry between the sports teams of Oklahoma State University (OSU) in Stillwater (pop. 39,065) and the University of Oklahoma (OU), based in Norman, is known as “bedlam.” “A house divided” refers to what happens when one household member cheers for OSU, and another for OU.

first appeared: 9/14/2003

Country music singer Reba McEntire was born in McAlester (pop. 17,783) in 1955 and raised in Chockie (pop. 18). She majored in elementary education at Southeastern State University in Durant (pop. 13,549), but of course has since found a career in music and acting, performing in movies and television, and on Broadway. One of her earliest musical performances was singing Away in a Manger in her first-grade Christmas pageant.

first appeared: 9/7/2003

The community of Antlers (pop. 2,552) gained its name from one of the area’s many natural springs in the late 1880s. Surrounded by a grove of trees, the spring became a regular stop for travelers, and for hunters, who mounted large sets of deer antlers on the trees to demonstrate their success. The spring still exists today.

first appeared: 8/31/2003

The state adopted a 16-foot-tall, 40-foot-long Jurassic dinosaur, the Saurophaganax maximus, as its state fossil in 2000. Similar in size to Tyrannosaurus rex, but an even more formidable predator, Saurophaganax has been found only in Oklahoma—in a quarry in Cimarron County (pop. 3,148) in the late 1930s.

first appeared: 8/24/2003

On Nov. 15, 1953, Dr. Leon Stuart, an amateur astronomer from Tulsa, photographed an explosion that he believed showed an asteroid hitting the Moon—an event that occurs about once in 50 years. NASA researchers recently uncovered an image of a crater almost a mile wide that corresponds with Stuart’s photograph, meaning that he’s likely the only person to have documented such an impact.

first appeared: 8/17/2003

Pioneer Telephone Cooperative, one of the country’s largest telephone cooperatives, is based in Kingfisher (pop. 4,380). When it was formed 50 years ago, the cooperative had four part-time employees and four exchanges. Today, it’s the state’s largest telephone cooperative, with about 540 employees, and 76 exchanges that cover 10,900 square miles and more than 50,000 subscribers.

first appeared: 8/10/2003

The state song is Oklahoma!, from the musical of the same name, which was the first collaboration between Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II. Based on the Lynn Riggs book Green Grow the Lilacs, Oklahoma! opened on Broadway in 1943, and won Rodgers and Hammerstein a Pulitzer Prize.

first appeared: 8/3/2003

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