I thought long and hard on what I wanted my 100th post to be, cause you know I assumed that there would be balloons and confetti and Blogger sending me a congratulatory e-mail or something. Cake maybe? Obviously none of these things happened. I decided that since it is the 100th year of statehood of Oklahoma, I would post about my heritage.
I wrote a term paper in college about my heritage. An A paper it was from a tough professor. I was proud of that paper and wanted to hang on to it for historical purposes as I had dates and a plethera of information about my familys journey to Oklahoma and the free land they accuired through the land run. I lost that paper in the 4th or 5th move we had. I'm going to try to remember what I can.
My mothers family came over to the U.S. from Germany with a hope for a better life for their children-my grandmother included. Some how word spreads quickly over seas about free land in the states. So thats where they were headed. My mother believes it was not the "big one" for Oklahoma as they had several. They did their race by horseback and not by wagon as most had done. The land was zoned out and ready for the taking.
My great grandfather Mr. Schmidt settled and claimed their land in the Okeene area. If my recollection is correct Mr. Schmidt also had his brothers and other relatives settled together on the free land frenzy. They had a nice large plot for their farm and built a dug out into the land as a home. This dug out was later used as the food storage area once the house was built. A lot of hard work went into the settling of their new claimed land. My grandmother grew up on this land and when she married she raised all of her 8 plus children on this land until after her husband John died at a very early age, when my mother was only 6 or 7. My mother's older brothers pretty much handled the farm until it was sold. Most of the mineral rights are still owned by Johns children as grandfather Schmidt ensured to them to never sell it. Smart guy as mom still gets a small check every month.
Though I may have been to the land once as a small child, I think about it and how it is the foundation of my history and my children's children's history. The only true foundation we have as this is the only branch of the family tree we have concrete information on.
I am grateful to them in setting this foundation for me and giving me a sense of pride in our country and what it stands for.
Aren't they precious? Thats Great Grandpa John and all of moms brothers and older sister. My mom is the little one that looks like Laura Ingalls right off of Little House on the Prairie.
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