Dedication

It wasn't until my parents were gone that I began to wonder about my heritage.  I'm sure that I had fleeting wonderments of it in the past, mostly when I was just a little girl.  Yet, here I am, turning 46 next Spring and somehow the distant past has begun to swirl around me creating an empty void which cries out endlessly to be filled. 

As a child my grandmother, affectionately called "Meamie", told me wonderful stories about when she was a little girl.  She lived on a farm in Oklahoma with her parents and seven brothers at the turn of the century (early 1900's). 

By the time I came along Meamie was already in her late 60's, hair as white as snow, cut short and kept neatly in a hair net. She wore glasses, had tiny irredescant blue eyes, crinkly soft skin with age spots.  She had a slight head shake which was most probably a smidgen of Parkinson's.  She always carried a "hanky" and never "liked" anyone, but only "loved" them.  She was a petite woman with slim, deep colored rosey lips.  She had a knot on her wrist which I remember seemed to 'pop' quite frequently. 

Ruby Fern Wheeler came into being after a long and arduous journey from Southern Illinois (Pope County) with a stop over in Kingfisher, Oklahoma. This is where she was born on August 2, 1902 in an old Creamery Station.  The family of seven lived there for about 8 months before traveling to what would become their home.  They had family living here already, cousins on Ursula Pylands (Meamie's mother) side.  Ursula's mother was Marriah Jane Farmer and she had a nephew named Pleasant Ditterline.  Pleasant and his wife Lottie were living in Kingfisher on the 1900 census.  Also James Green Farmer, Marriah Jane's brother is living with the Ditterlines on the 1910 census in Kingfisher, Ok.

 In April of 1903 George and Ursula Wheeler along with their five children packed up their belongs and traveled by covered wagon onto Western Oklahoma, or Indian Territory at that time.  The town was located just a few miles from the Texas border in the County of Roger Mills and was called Rankin (now Reydon) Oklahoma .  By the time they arrived the house that George Jr (Meamie's Daddy) had built, was now burnt to the ground.  Most probably by cowboys of the day.  Cowboys didn't take kindly to farmers as barbed wire had been invented and settlers had begun to fence off their land which was cutting their cattle out of free range grazing.  George and Ursula (Meami's parents) then had to make due with what they had and live in what was called a "dug out" using parts of their wagon as a door and floor until money could be saved to purchase enough lumber to build a proper house.

Meamie always said, "I was the first Okie and the Fifth child"! 

There is much more to our family history which can never be told.  Most of the memories and those old times have been lost to us as our loved ones pass away.  The purpose of this blog is to capture some of those living stories of the past.  Some of it comes from the words of those who have gone on, and most from historic records that we have researched along the way. 

This blog is dedicated to the memory of my Meamie and Grandad, along with my Mama and Daddy and many other family members who have made their way across the river and into paradise.  It's also a living testament to those family members who will come after me and mostly belongs to them.

To my Son Jesse Derrick and the legacy and life he has before him.  This History is for you and the generations who come after you. Sometime later in your life and in your grown children's lives this information will be priceless to you.  I promise.