Beyond this gate is a formerly well traveled and well known
Canadian River crossing. Directly across the river in Oklahoma
Territory was a wild and rowdy place known as Corner.
The town of Corner bordered the Chickasaw Nation to the south,
and the Seminole Nation to the east. In those days, there was a law
against the sale, possession and consumption of alcohol in any of
the Indian Nations that comprised Indian Territory. Corner had but
one purpose: To serve the thirsty who were willing to travel to get
alcohol.
Surprisingly, Corner wasn't named because of its location. In
1892 Bill Corner carved out a spot among the cottonwood trees and
wild plum thickets only forty feet west of the line that separated
Oklahoma Territory from the Seminole Nation. Indians crossed at
will, for there was no "John Brown" fence, at least not for the
first few years, and even later when there was a fence, the draws
and gulches were so difficult that no fence could stop the
trafficking in booze.
Outlaws soon learned that they could live in the area with
relative impunity. It would have taken a large posse with little
fear of lead poisoning to take on these toughs. The Dalton Gang,
the Christian Brothers, and Bill Doolin were all regulars to a town
that began with no store, no blacksmith shop, not one dwelling,
with nothing at all but a saloon made of rawhide. For convenience,
I am sure, the cemetery was located directly behind the main saloon
in town. It took another eight years to get a general store, and a
second saloon opened inside of the store. Corner got a post office
in in March of 1903 that remained in existence until April of
1906.
Business rivalry took the form of a running, bloody duel, played
out by pathological outlaws, intoxicated cowboys, and rowdy
Indians. Any respectable benefit went entirely to the only
physician in the region, Dr. Jesse Mooney. Mooney lived ten miles
away — close enough to escape immediate threats but not their
consequences. He "enjoyed" a steady practice in the treatment of
knifings, shootings, lacerations, and the gouging of eyeballs. The
good doctor also cleaned what remained of several fingers and at
least one ear, all having been bitten off, although presumably not
by the same psychopath. The booze-fed enmity lasted into the first
two years of statewide prohibition.
For the "thirsty" who lived in the "dry" Chickasaw Nation, the
Corner Saloon was the nearest oasis. This road leading to it from
Ada was one of the most well traveled roads of that day. For many
years, Corner was a rendezvous of a wandering gentry who neither
asked nor answered questions. The trip from Ada was about 12 miles,
and the livery stables did a thriving business-particularly on
Saturday nights - providing conveyences for those who wanted
weekend libations.
While researching Corners's colorful history, I learned that the
famous lynching in Ada has strong ties to this place. Angus "Gus"
Bobbitt, the owner of Corner’s original saloon, had changed his
life and was a law-abiding man - so much so, he had been appointed
as Deputy US Marshall. Unscrupulous white men had been "Indian
Skinning" by getting some of the Indians drunk and buying their
allotment of 160 acres of restricted land for $50. An Oklahoma law
said that such sales of restricted land from Indians to whites had
to have the approval of the county court judge. Gus Bobbitt pushed
for honest men to hold the elected jobs of county attorney, sheriff
and county judge.
Jesse West and Joe Allen, two ne'er-do-wells who owned one of
Corner's saloons, were getting rich "Indian skinning" by bribing
these county officials to sign the phony papers. Gus Bobbitt forced
them to leave the territory because of these crooked deals. Allen
and West returned to Corner in 1909, wealthy from land and cattle
investments made in the Texas Panhandle, bent on revenge. They had
asked a cotton buyer from Texas named D. B. Burwell if he knew of a
professional killer who could take care of Bobbitt. Burwell made
the arrangements for "Deacon" Jim Miller to do the job of killing
Bobbitt for the sum of $2,000. The law-abiding Bobbitt was gunned
down as he was driving home with a load of cottonseed meal. This is
the background for one of the last and most sordid events in the
history of Corner, OK.
Allen, West, and Miller were arrested and taken to jail over in
Ada. Burwell was arrested for his part in this plot when he came to
Ada to try to bond the others out of jail. A lynch mob of locals,
fed up with justice being avoided by those defendants with money
and power, broke into the jail, removed the four defendants, and
unceremoniously hanged them in a livery barn next to the jail.
Corner never recovered and soon became a ghost town. A group of
fed-up neighbors sent a petition to the governor of Oklahoma
Territory asking for Corner to be abolished. The reasons given
included the 26 murders documented over a 2 year period.
After living by the sauce, Corner subsequently died by the
sauce. Any evidence of Corner's existence was washed away in one of
the Canadian River's raging floods in the 1920's. Such massive
flooding was common in the days before upstream flood control
projects were completed in the days after WWII. Today, the Canadian
River is far more serene, and the course of the river is relatively
stable.
Special thanks to the Pontotoc County Historical and Genealogical
Society and the Ada Public Library for their help with research.
