Okie's NW Corner

The beginning of another year. OU (Oklahoma University) Sooners brought home the Rose Bowl trophy to Norman and Oklahoma with a 34-14 win over Washington State. 2003 gives us another year to gather more Okie Legacies and hear more of your memory jogging histories.

Someone wrote and inquired about, "How many Pro-Baseball leagues there were in 1904." I do not have the answer to this and thought maybe some of you out there could help find the answer.

Another reader wrote in concerning his GG-Grandfather, Wiley Cowan. It seems that Tom Dyer wrote a poem about Wiley Cowan that appeared in the obit in the Alva paper in November of 1935. If anyone has a copy of that 1935 Obituary to share, send it this way. Also, Wiley Cowan was a superintendant of the Eagle Chief Pool Ranch - foreman of the Schlupp Balinger Ranch; and the first whiteman to travel the Old Cantonment Trail. I was looking back at some of my "Fairvalley Legacies" and found the following little tidbit that I had gotten from Wilma Terrill that she compiled in 1997...

".....Mart Benson was an old timer who worked for Wiley Cowan and followed the trail a long time. At one time he wintered on Anderson Creek, then he homesteaded where Iva and Virgil Murrow lived....."

Before I end here and send you to explore some more NW OK Marriages dating from 1940-41, I have to mention here that the beginning of this week brought sad news the morning we left Colorado Rockies to head back home to Oklahoma.

It was early Monday morning, 30th of December 2002, that we received a call that my two year old black gelding (Moon) was found dead in his stall at a trainer's near Shawnee, Oklahoma. We haven't heard the results of the autopsy yet, but we are told that Moon was a bit nervous. I have to tell you this, though... He wasn't use to being confined in a stall and has had the pasture to roam in most of his almost three years.

Some may say he was just another animal, but to me he was like a member of the family. We took our first steps into learning about horses with each other. He sent me to Parelli's horse camp in Pagosa Springs, Colorado the first week in May, 2002 for a week so I could learn his language.

To me he was a priceless family member that greeted me everytime I walked into his pasture. I will not forget him or the first time I put a halter on him and lead him around the corral. I will not forget the first time I put a saddle on him and had to get me a stepping stool to reach the stirrups to set in the saddle. Then there was the time I was riding him in the pasture and he stopped short and flipped me off his back and I landed on my backside out in front of him -- still holding on to the reins. He just stood there while I caught my breathe -- stood up and walked him back to the corrall.

To leave you on a happier note... May your hopes, dreams become reality - May they be everything you want them to be for 2003. See you all next weekend around the same time... or earlier!

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