Great2 Grandmother Corilla Jane "Jennie" Day lived with her parents near Little River in central Kansas. Great2 Grandfather Charles C. McIntosh lived with his parents in nearby Emporia and by 1880 lived in Parson were he worked in lathing, i.e. using machines to fabricate things. Charles and Jennie somehow met and married on Dec 27, 1882. They lived in Lyndon, Kansas (just south of Topeka). Charles was a minister for the Church of God later in life, but I am unsure when he began that career.
Charles and Jennie (pictured) had eight children in three different states: Gertrude "Gertie" was born in 1884, married Milton Jennings who died at age 48, then married Ed Rogers, and lived in Pawnee, Oklahoma; Bertie "Roy" was born in Galena, Kansas in 1889, married Vernie, and lived in Pawnee; Edith "Neetice" was born in 1890, married Harve Wingo, and lived in Oklahoma City and Woodward, Oklahoma; Elmer was born in 1894 in Missouri, married Bertha Elizabeth Downing, and lived in Salina, Oklahoma; Retta (my Great Grandmother) was born in Kansas in 1885, married C.O. Jennings, and lived in Guthrie, Oklahoma; Oscar was born in Kansas in 1898 and lived in Oklahoma City. Bessie was born in Oklahoma in 1903, married Roy Walters, and lived in Pawnee and Oklahoma City; Beulah was born in Oklahoma in 1907, never married and lived with her parents most of her life. Pictured below (L-R) Oscar, Charles, Roy, Elmer, Beulah, Ed Rogers, and Gertie.
The 1910 Census shows 51-year old Charles, Jennie, Elmer, Oscar, Bessie, and Beulah in Esculapia, Arkansas, just across the border from Oklahoma. They also lived in Pawnee, Oklahoma. It is unknown if they lived in Kansas, Missouri, Arkansas, and Oklahoma, or migrated from a home due to Charles evangelical work. By the 1920 Census, Charles and Jennie are living in the tiny town of Tiger Creek, Oklahoma. It is unknown why they put down roots in the recently privatized Creek Indian reservation. Drumright was an oil boom town two miles south, but there was also a famous Muscogee Creek Indian family in the area with many descendants of Chief William McIntosh whose father was Scottish. The Creek were forcibly marched to Oklahoma in the 1830s when their lands in Georgia were seized.
Why did Charles and Jennie McIntosh move to Creek County within the Creek Jurisdictional
Area where influential McIntosh Creek families lived? Nearby McIntosh County is
named for Chief McIntosh and was also within the Creek area. Most Creek were
Methodist, and Charles was a Methodist preacher before becoming a Church of God evangelist.
The Oklahoma Territory in the western half of the state was open for white settlement in the 1890s, but the Indian tribes retained the eastern half. The 1893 Dawes Commission was tasked with integrating American Indians by subdividing tribal lands and granting plots to tribal members. Some 250,000 people applied for land claiming American Indian heritage, but only around 100,000 were granted. Thousands of whites were suspected of bogus claims, while thousands had Indian blood but no hard proof. Perhaps Charles sought free land using the McIntosh name. If so, he failed, but 339 persons with a McIntosh surname were certified as having Indian blood and awarded land.
Charles and Jennie chose to live in a small town named after an Creek Indian Chief - Tiger Creek, which was near the Sac and Fox Indians who were forcibly moved to Oklahoma in the 1870s from southeastern Kansas. Charles may have been a minister for these Indians in Kansas. Perhaps Charles thought his McIntosh name would carry influence in the area, or he was related to the Creek McIntosh, or was drawn to the boomtown of Drumright, which had rapidly grown to 6400 people by 1920. Land was cheap since many Indians promptly sold their new property.
The McIntosh children settled in various parts of Oklahoma. Charles met preacher C.O. Jennings during his travels as a circuit preacher and introduced him to his daughter Retta. They married, lived in Guthrie, and had three children, to include my Grandfather Howard. Charles, Jennie, and daughter Beulah remained in Tiger Creek for the remainder of their lives where Caldwell relatives made many visits. Jennie is pictured above with grandson Howard and his three daughters: (L-R) Carmen (my mother), Diana "Jill", and Angela "Angie".
Charles
and Jennie are buried
at the Highland Cemetery in Pawnee. Beulah is also
buried there alongside "Bertie R McIntosh"; inscribed as her brother. This is Roy, who family tales say died at a
young age. But he died in 1948 when he was 59 years old! Internet searching
shows that he registered for the draft in World War I and was married with one
child and living with them in Pawnee in the 1940 Census. I suspect he had a
conflict with his family because he left his first wife and married Vernie,
an American Indian born in Oklahoma who was 14 years younger.
Most of this McIntosh family lived in Pawnee at some time. This was a small town that had just 2400 people in 1920 and even fewer today, but it is the county seat and a railroad intersection. My Great2 Grandfather Nelson E. Jennings moved to Pawnee from South Dakota, with his son and my Great Grandfather Charles "C.O." who eventually married Retta McIntosh.
