Albert Lee Wyatt

 It's been almost a year since I've posted anything here and, all of a sudden, I feel a need to post some things.  This entry is about a man who was my father's half-uncle.  Neither my father nor I ever met the man but I've done quite a bit of research on him.

Albert Lee Wyatt (1878-1949)

Albert Wyatt was born in 1878 to L.A. Wyatt and Laura Dunham. His father was from Tennessee and his mother from Missouri but they had migrated to Palo Pinto County in Texas when Albert was born. L.A. and Laura had married in Palo Pinto County in 1878 so it may have been a “shotgun” wedding.

L.A.’s fate is not known but Laura remarried in 1885 in Fannin County, Texas, this time to William Eugene Porter. William was born in Minnesota but had lived in Missouri and Texas before his marriage to Laura.

William and Laura had five children:

Ethel Dorothy 1887 Grayson County, Texas

Thomas Perry Sr. 1888 Travis County, Texas

Hermina 1893 (Location Unknown)

Doss Alan 1898 Indian Territory, Oklahoma

Arbell 1899 Indian Territory, Oklahoma

The 1900 Census found William Eugene and all five of his children, as well as his stepson, Albert, living in the Chickasaw Nation in Indian Territory. William’s marital status was listed as “widowed”. It is possible that Laura had died while giving birth to their youngest daughter, Arbell.

In about 1901, when Thomas was thirteen, he ran away from home, wound up in the Mannford/Keystone area and never saw his father again. William apparently remarried and he and his second wife had two daughters whose names are unknown.

By 1906, Albert had married a woman named Calvin “Callie” Horton and they had a son, Raymond. Raymond lived in Mannford, Oklahoma most of his life and went by the nickname “Slip”. He became the local town “ne’er do well” and spent most of his time drinking. He was also rumored to have been a moonshiner but this has not been confirmed.

At the time of the 1910 Census, Doss was living with his older sister, Ethel, and her husband, William Renner, in Roger Mills County in far western Oklahoma. Thomas Perry has not been found in that census, neither has his half-brother Albert. It is presumed that Thomas was in the area of Mannford or Keystone since he is presumed to have fathered Tommy Alexander who was born in February, 1911.

By 1917, Thomas had moved back to Texas, living in Archer County, and working as a cowboy on the Waggoner Ranch. In the 1920 Census, Albert was living with his wife, Callie, and their son in Mannford. Doss was not found in the 1920 Census but apparently he and Albert kept in contact with each other.

In 1921, Doss married Emma Marie Vanderpoll and they had two sons before 1930. Most of this time, they lived in Oklahoma City but, by 1930, they had moved to Binger, Oklahoma. Binger is west and south of Oklahoma City and just south of Hinton, Oklahoma. In 1930, Albert and his wife, Callie, and their son, Raymond, continued to live in Mannford.

By 1935, Doss and Albert both had moved to the McCloud/Dale area in Pottawatomie County. Doss had his wife and two sons with him but Albert had left Callie and their son, Raymond, in Mannford. No record of a divorce has been found. While living in Pottawatomie County, however, Albert either married a second time or took a common-law wife. Her name was Ida May (or Mae) McCartney. She had a son, Merlyn, who was born about 1921, and a daughter, Delores, born about 1926. The identity of their father is unknown but they took Albert’s last name and were listed in census records as Merlyn and Delores Wyatt.

During the mid- to late-1930’s, the depression had worsened to the point that many Oklahomans were leaving and going to California. Albert Wyatt and Doss Porter joined this migration and moved to Riverbank in Stanislaus County. Doss was still married to Emma but Albert had his new family with him. According to family members, Albert and Doss were always close and these moves confirm that relationship.

Albert died in 1949 at 70 years of age. His second wife, Ida May, remarried to a man whose surname was Blackwood. She died in 1997.

Doss’s wife, Emma, died in 1950 at 50 years of age and Doss remarried a woman named Bessie Pitts. He died in 1976 at the age of 77.

Callie Wyatt, Albert’s first wife, remained in the Mannford area for the rest of her life and is remembered for her gardening skills. She apparently was always surrounded by beautiful plants and flowers. She died in 1973 at age 91 and is buried in Oilton, Oklahoma.

The Wilson "66" Ranch

It's amazing how fast time gets away from you.  I haven't posted anything here in months!  I've been busy lately doing research on the Wilson "66" ranch which was located in Archer City, Texas, and my hometown, Mannford, Oklahoma.  Here is a copy of what I've learned.

History of The Wilson “66” Ranch

The Wilson, or 66, Ranch had it’s beginnings in Archer County, Texas in about 1882 when the 099 Ranch, owned by J.H. Stone, was divided into three parcels and sold to three different people.

Before white settlers came to Archer County, the only people there were Indians from several tribes, including Apaches, Comanches, and Kiowas. The first permanent white settler was Dr. R.O. Prideaux who moved to Archer County in 1874. Dr. Prideaux was originally from England and had made scouting trips to the Archer County area before his permanent move there.

The late 1870’s saw a host of ranches spring up in the area because the grass was good and land prices were cheap. One rancher of that time bought eight sections (over 5000 acres) for a total of $14.00! By the time of the 1880 Census, 596 people lived in the county, along with 56,000 head of cattle and 1400 sheep.

The 099 Ranch consisted of 130,000 acres in the northern part of Archer County.. When it was divided, Luke Wilson purchased the western part, consisting of 61,000 acres and it became the 66 Ranch. The center section became the TL Ranch and the eastern part was purchased by the Files Cattle and Land Company.

Luke Ferrell Wilson was born in 1842 in Palestine, Illinois. His father, Isaac Newton Wilson, was a well-to-do farmer who had moved to Illinois from Virginia. In fact, the 1860 Census listed Isaac’s personal estate at $10,000 and his real estate holdings at $35,000, a huge sum in those days.

Luke was the fifth child of ten born to Isaac and his wife, Hannah Decker Wilson. All eight of the children who lived to maturity received educations and became prominent in their communities. One of his sibings, Edward S. Wilson, became a lawyer and his children would figure strongly in the 66 Ranch.

Luke’s college education has not been documented but in 1869 he married Sarah Ellen “Nell” McCrory while still living in Illinois. By 1880, he had moved to Kansas City and was working as an investment banker. In fact, he was listed as the Secretary of the National Bank of Commerce in Kansas City in some documents. During the period from the 1880’s to the 1920’s, he variously listed his occupation as cattle and land dealer, office, stockman, and investments.

No documentation has been found concerning Luke Wilson’s purchase of the 66 Ranch. However, the name of the ranch came about because of the previous name, the 099. It is said that he just turned the brand over to become the 66.

After Wilson’s purchase of the ranch, Allen H. Harmer became the foreman. Cowboys working for Parmer included Milton Walker Alexander (later nicknamed “Cap” Alexander), Jim and Pie Baker, Ed, Eph, and George Brown, John McCluskey, Lee McMurtry, and several others.

The mid-1880’s were especially harsh with a blizzard-drought-blizzard series in 1885 through 1887. In fact, some ranches in the area didn’t survive this harsh series of events. The 66 Ranch did, however, and in the late 1880’s and the decade of the 1890’s it thrived.

Allen Parmer, the foreman of the Ranch, had an interesting and checkered background. He had been a member of the infamous Quantrill’s Raiders guerrilla group during the Civil War and had been wounded five times in battles. He finally surrendered to Federal authorities in July, 1865, in Kentucky.

After attending a business college for two years, Parmer married Susan James, sister of Frank and Jesse James. His association with the James brothers haunted him for years and he was arrested on several charges, including train robbery, but never convicted. However, the story is told that he was once backed down by a Mrs. F. Matthews who was wielding a shotgun. He had come to her house to run her off but she had other thoughts.

In the late 1890’s, Luke Wilson decided to take a herd of cattle into Indian Territory where they would be fattened up and shipped by rail to Kansas City. He sent Cap Alexander, along with 5000 steers, north from Archer City. In the 1900 Census, Alexander was in Indian Territory just southwest of Haskell where he listed his occupation as “cowboy”.

Milton Walker Alexander was born in Dallas County, Missouri, in 1857. He was one of five children, three boys and two girls born to James Orville Alexander and Malinda Bradford Alexander. Both of his parents were from Tennessee but had migrated to Missouri in the 1850’s. Milton’s nickname, “Cap” or “Captain” came about after his arrival in Mannford, Oklahoma. He was so called because he was the foreman or “captain” of the ranch at Mannford.

Soon after 1900, Cap Alexander arrived in Mannford with the 66 Ranch cattle. Land arrangements are unknown but it is surmised that Luke Wilson leased land from the local Indians to run his cattle on. Prior to statehood in 1907, Indian land was not available for purchase.

The ranch at Mannford is said to have stretched from Mannford on the north to Bristow on the south, a large tract indeed. The headquarters of the Ranch was located very near where Mannford City Lake’s dam is now.

In about 1906, Cap Alexander married Mary May Stephens, 24 years younger than him. She was born in 1881, the daughter of James Stephens and Mary Melinda Hall Stephens. Stephens was a local blacksmith and their family had migrated from Missouri. She was working in a laundry in Mannford and caught Cap’s eye after taking in his laundry.

Cap and May had two children, Beulah in 1907, and Tommy in 1911. The ranch headquarters house had burned down in late 1910, so they were living in Kellyville on another part of the ranch when Tommy was born. Shortly after his birth, the ranch house was rebuilt and the family returned to the Mannford area. The rebuilt house was moved into Mannford after the town was moved. It still stands there today.

In 1915, Cap Alexander bought his own small place near the site of today’s “Coyote Corner” at the intersection of State Highway 51 and Coyote Trail. Although he continued to work with the Wilson’s when needed, he was no longer the foreman. The identity of his successor is unknown.

Towns within the main ranch in Archer County included Luke Wilson (or Wilson Switch), named for the ranch’s owner. Wilson Switch consisted of cattle pens, a school, a land office, and a house which Luke Wilson had built for his nephew, Glenn, to live in. Glenn was the nephew of Edward Wilson, an attorney, and Luke’s brother. Because Luke and Nell never had children, he had chosen Glenn to be his “hands on” representative at the ranch in Archer County. Although Glenn was born in Illinois, he had moved to the ranch when he was a young man, sometime before 1910. Glenn did travel frequently to Mannford to advise and assist Cap Alexander on the operations of the ranch.

Another town which sprang up within the confines of the Wilson Ranch was the town of Geraldine. In 1901, a newspaper publisher from Indianapolis, Mr. Philander H. Fitzgerald, decided to invest in real estate “out west”. He was going to start a new colony and sell tract of land to add to his fortune. After much looking, he found the Wilson Ranch and worked out an agreement with Luke Wilson to purchase it. By 1904, however, the “ponzi” scheme had collapsed. Mr. Wilson had sold his land to Fitzgerald for $3 an acre (in cash) and bought it back for $1 per acre. Geraldine became a ghost town.

In the years of 1914-15, oil exploration came to the Wilson Ranch. Although there were no huge fields found, there was a considerable number of discoveries and Luke Wilson increased his wealth from this. Little is known about the demise of the ranch but Mr. Wilson died in early 1928 and it can be surmised that the ranch was sold off shortly after his death.

People of the Wilson Ranch

This is a short biography of some of the people who were involved with the Wilson Ranch, both in Archer County and in Mannford. Some of them have been mentioned previously. They are listed in alphabetical order.

Alexander, Milton Walker “Cap” – For several years after he left the employ of the Wilson Ranch, he did quite well with his ranch near State Highway 51 and Coyote Trail. His marriage to Mary May was tumultuous, however, and she left him sometime around 1925. She married a man by the name of Charley Griffey, from Lenepah, and they moved to the Grove area. Many years later, through DNA testing, it was discovered that Cap was not the father of their son, Tommy. Tom Porter, a cowboy on the Wilson Ranch at Mannford was his true father. Whether Cap was the father of their daughter, Beulah, is unknown. Cap lost his entire savings in the crash of 1929, and lived with his daughter, Beulah, and her husband until his death in 1935.

Alexander, Tommy Herman Milton Walker – Ironically, he was named after two of the cowboys on the Wilson Ranch at Mannford, Tom Porter (his true father) and Herman Weer. Tommy lived in the Mannford area on and off all his life and worked as a drilling rig mechanic. He died in 2004 at the age of 93.

Craven, Earl Been – Earl was a cowboy on the Wilson Ranch at Mannford but little is known about his tenure there. He was born in Missouri but lived in the Mannford area all his life. He died in 1983. Two of his grandsons, Larry and Gary, still live there today.

Henkell, David Casper “Buster” - Buster was a cowboy on the ranch at Mannford and his wife, Sarah Leanna Ihrig, was a cook. He was born in Kansas in 1889 and his family moved to the Mannford area before 1907. After Cap Alexander left the Wilson Ranch, Buster stayed with him and worked on the ranch at Keystone. He died in 1957 in Oklahoma City at the age of 68. He is buried at Oak Hill Cemetery in Mannford.

Ihrig, Ernest “Twenty” - He was born in 1892 in Tahlequah and moved to the Mannford area with his parents between 1900 and 1910. He was nicknamed “twenty” because of his short stature and because he was always seen with Cap Alexander, who always wore a .44 caliber revolver. Ernest was a brother to Sarah Leanna Ihrig, Buster Henkell’s wife, and a first cousin to Tommy Alexander. After his stint as a cowboy, he went to work in the booming oilfields as a roughneck. In about 1931, an accident on a drilling rig cost him three fingers on his right hand. In spite of this injury, he could roll a Bull Durham cigarette with two fingers better than most men with five. Ernest died in 1951 and he and his wife, Ivy, are both buried at Oak Hill Cemetery in Mannford.

Ihrig, Sarah Leanna – Previously mentioned, “Lee” was the wife of Buster Henkell, a sister of Ernest Ihrig, and a niece of Mary May Stephens Alexander. She was born in 1902 in Mannford, the daughter of Francis Marion “Frank” Ihrig and Mahala Stephens Ihrig. Mahala, who was called “Hailie”, was a sister of Mary May Stephens Alexander, Cap Alexander’s wife. Apparently Lee and Buster co-habitated for some time before they were married because they presented themselves as sister and brother. She served as a cook for the Wilson Ranch for several years and, when Cap Alexander left to start his own spread, she went with her husband to work for him.

James, Susan Lavenia – Susan was born in Missouri in 1849 and died in Wichita Falls, Texas, in 1889. She was the youngest of four children born to this family and the only girl. Two of her siblings were Alexander Franklin “Frank” James and Jesse Woodson James, the famous outlaws. She married Allen Parmer in Missouri in 1870 and shortly after that moved to the Archer City, Texas, area.

McCluskey, John B. – John, or “Uncle” John, as many people called him, was Glen Wilson’s number two man on the Wilson Ranch. Like many of the other people of the ranch, he was born in Missouri, in 1854. He would often travel with Glen Wilson to Mannford to discuss the operation of the ranch with Cap Alexander. McCluskey died in 1934 in Archer City.

McCrory, Luke Wilson – Luke was a nephew of Sarah Ellen “Nell” Wilson and was born in 1881 in Cooke County, Texas. After leaving home just after the turn of the century, he moved to Arkansas and became a banker. Sometime before 1930, he moved back to Wichita Falls and became a trustee of the Luke Wilson Estate. He figured prominently in the affairs of the estate.

McCrory, Sarah Ellen “Nell” - Nell was born in 1845 in Charleston, Illinois, very near where Luke Ferrell Wilson, her future husband lived. She was the third of seven children born to James and Mary McCrory. Like most people of that time, McCrory was a farmer. Nell married Luke in 1869 and soon after they moved to Kansas City. The couple never had children and she died in 1927 in the Kansas City area.

McMurtry, Lee – After the breakup of the 099 Ranch in 1882, McMurtry became the foreman of the Files Cattle and Land Company, one of the three offsprings of the 099. Later he went to work for Allen Parmer on the Wilson 66 Ranch. There were many McMurtry’s around the Archer City area and details about Lee are sketchy. One of Archer City’s most prominent natives was Larry McMurtry, a well-known writer and movie producer.

Parmer, Allen Hazard – Allen Parmer was born in 1848 in Missouri and, after his stint as a member of Quantrill’s Raiders during the Civil War, moved to Clay County, Texas, the county joining Archer County on the east. By 1889 he had quit working for the Wilson Ranch and had gone into farming for himself. In 1905, he gave up farming and went into the railroad construction business. He retired in 1920 and died in Wichita Falls in 1927.

Peacock, Curtis Eugene - Born in 1902 in Joplin, Missouri, his family moved to Mannford before 1910. His tenure at the Wilson Ranch is unknown but probably was in the late 1910’s and early 1920’s. He and his wife had five children and he died in 1987. He is interred, along with his wife, at Oak Hill Cemetery in Mannford.

Porter, Thomas Perry Sr. - Tom Perry was born in Austin, Texas in 1888. When he was 13 and living with his family in the Chickasaw Nation in Indian Territory, he ran away from home to escape an abusive father. He came to Keystone, Oklahoma, and was taken in by a Zickefoose family, who enrolled him in Keystone School in the fourth grade. In his late teens, he went to work as a cowboy for Cap Alexander on the Wilson Ranch. In 1910, he apparently had a tryst with Cap Alexander’s wife, May, and the result of this was Tommy Alexander. In later years, Tommy stated that he was named after Tom Porter and Herman Weer, two cowboys on the Wilson Ranch. Sometime after 1910, Tom Porter moved to Archer County and was a cowboy on the Wilson Ranch there. By 1920, he had married and left the Ranch. He worked at several other ranches before opening a tack and saddle shop in Seymour, Texas. He died there in 1974.

Stephens, Mary May – May was born in 1881 and her first marriage was to Joseph Henry Pendergraft. Two children resulted from this marriage, Gertha and Clarence. Mr. Pendergraft died in 1902. Both children were born in Missouri but shortly after Clarence’s birth, the family moved to Mannford where May’s sister, Mahala, was living. Gertha later married Arthur Bellis, the oldest son of Bill and Charity Bellis. May met Cap Alexander, they married and lived in Mannford for several years. She eventually divorced Cap and married a man from Lenapah, Charley Griffey. They moved to the Grove area for several years. For some reason, this marriage didn’t work either and May returned to the Mannford area, taking her Alexander name back. She died in Bristow in 1967 and is buried at Oak Hill Cemetery in Mannford.

Weer, John Herman – Herman was born in 1887 in Labette, Kansas. His parents had moved there from Indiana. Before his 10^th birthday the family had moved to Muskogee, Indian Territory. In 1896, his father, John Emmett Weer, went to court in Muskogee to get the members of the family put on the Creek Nation rolls. This effort failed. John Emmett was a store owner and at one point there was a settlement east of Bixby and south of Broken Arrow by the name of Weer. In 1917, when Herman registered for the draft, he was living in Mannford. He listed his employer as L.F. Wilson and place of employment as the Wilson Ranch. Before 1920, Luke Wilson asked him to go to Archer City and manage the dairy that the ranch was then starting. He did move there and lived in Archer City as late as 1942. Herman Weer died in Collinsville, Oklahoma in 1978 at the age of 91.

Wilson, Glenn Sylvester – Glenn was the son of Edward Wilson, Luke Wilson’s brother, and the on site family representative to the Wilson Ranch. He was born in 1872 in Illinois and married Dora Eckenrode there. Sometime before 1910, they moved to Archer County when he went to work for Luke Wilson. Glenn and John McCluskey would often travel to Mannford to confer with Cap Alexander. After Luke Wilson’s death and the demise of the ranch, Glenn moved back to Illinois and bought a farm. He died in 1938 in St. Louis.

Wilson, Luke Ferrell – Little remains to be said about him. He was obviously a very successful business man and those who knew and worked for him were quick to offer praises for his compassion and understanding. He died on May 17, 1928, and is interred in Charleston, Illinois, his hometown.

Thomas Perry Porter Sr.

Tom Porter was born October 6, 1888, in Austin, Travis County, Texas.  Austin is the capital of the State of Texas and Travis County is slightly more than 1000 square miles in size.  His parents were William Eugene Porter and Laura Emaline Dunham Porter.

William was born in Minnesota but had moved to Missouri and then to Texas as a youth.  Laura was born in Missouri and had married L.A. Wyatt when she was 16 years old in Palo Pinto County, Texas.  Palo Pinto County is located about 65 miles west of Ft. Worth.  L.A. Wyatt’s fate is unknown but Laura had a son by him, Albert, who was born in 1879 in Palo Pinto County. Of interest to residents of Mannford, Albert later married a woman named Callie and they had a son, Raymond. Raymond was known to local residents as "Slip". He was sort of the town "ne'er do well".

In 1886, Laura married William Eugene Porter in Fannin County, Texas.  Fannin County is located about 60 miles northeast of Dallas, a good distance from Palo Pinto County.  Laura and William had five children as follows:

Ethel Dorothy 1887 Whitesboro, Grayson County, Texas

Thomas Perry 1888 Travis County, Texas

Hermina (girl) 1893 Indian Territory, Oklahoma

Doss 1898 Indian Territory, Oklahoma

Arbell Abt. 1899 Indian Territory, Oklahoma

There are, of course, no records of the 1890 Census.  During the 1900 Census, William Porter was listed in Township Two of the Chickasaw Nation in Indian Territory.  All five of his children, as well as Albert Wyatt, his stepson were listed as living with him.  Interestingly, William’s marital status was listed as widowed.  It is presumed that Laura died during the birth of their youngest child, Arbell.

William Porter supposedly died in Antlers in Pushmataha County, Oklahoma in 1904.  No documentation for his death exists however.  At any rate, Tom would have been 16 years old at this time.

By the time of the 1910 Census, Ethel Dorothy had married William Renner and they were living in Roger Mills County, Oklahoma, just northwest of Elk City.  The Census listed them as having two living children at home as well as her brother, Doss.  The rest of the children, Tom Hermina, and Arbell, have not been found in the 1910 Census, neither has Albert Lee Wyatt, their half brother.  Albert Lee did, however, register for the draft in 1917 (during World War I) while living in Mannford, Creek County, Oklahoma.

Sometime before 1910, Tom Porter also came to Mannford.  He worked as a cowboy on the Wilson Ranch whose foreman was M.W. “Cap” Alexander.  DNA testing indicates that Cap Alexander’s wife, May, had a son, Tommy Herman, by Tom Porter while she was married to Alexander.  Since Tommy was born in February, 1911, it is presumed that Tom Porter was working on the Wilson Ranch in 1910.

By 1917, when Tom Porter registered for the draft, he was living in Dundee in the northwest corner of Archer County, Texas, just south of Wichita Falls.  He was still listed as a cowboy, now working for W.T. Waggoner on his ranch.  The Waggoner Ranch was then and is today the largest ranch in the United States with a single fence line.  The Ranch encompasses more than 510,000 acres in six counties.  In the draft registration, he was listed as tall and slender and with a stiff arm.  Family lore indicates that he was injured in a fall from a horse, the arm was never set properly and resulted in it being somewhat immobile.

Tom married Margaret Ann Cox on October 30, 1919, and they had two children: Thomas Perry Jr., who was born in 1920, and Minna Lo, born in 1922.  Both were born in Menard, Texas, in Menard County.  Menard is 235 miles from Dundee so it is presumed that he no longer worked for the Waggoners in 1920.  In fact, the 1920 Census listed his occupation as a truck driver for an oil company.  The 1930 Census listed his occupation as a tool dresser for an oil company.

By 1935, Tom and his wife, Ann, and their two children had moved back to Vera in Knox County, just southwest of the Waggoner Ranch.  His occupation was listed as foreman and it is possible that he was a foreman on the ranch.  They remained in Vera at least through 1942, where he registered for the draft during World War II.  In the draft registration, he was listed as working for W. R. Ross of Ft. Worth, although his occupation was not listed.

Sometime after 1942, Tom and Ann moved from Vera to Seymour, a distance of only 18 miles.  Tom opened a saddle and leather shop on Main Street in Seymour and ran that business until his death in 1974.  For several years during that period, he shared his store with a watch repairman, V. V. Overton, who had a work bench in the front of the store.

Tom died on June 7, 1974, and is buried in Riverview Cemetery in Seymour.  Four years after his death, his son, Thomas Jr., died in New Orleans, Louisana.  Tom Jr. is buried beside his parents.  Ann lived for in Seymour for 18 years after Tom’s death, dying on February 26, 1992.  She is buried beside her husband.

The Real Truth

In August, 2015, I wrote about DNA testing which had raised some doubts about our family name.  As Paul Harvey used to say on the radio, here is "The Rest of the Story".

My adoptive father, Tommy Alexander, was born on February 7, 1911, ostensibly to Milton Walker Alexander and Mary May Stephens Alexander.

Milton Walker, or “Cap” as he was called, was the foreman of a ranch in Mannford, Oklahoma. He had come there in 1901 or 1902 with a herd of cattle which had been brought from Archer City, Texas. The owner of the ranch was Luke F. Wilson from Kansas City, Missouri. Cap was in charge of the ranch in Mannford and had several cowboys working for him. Tommy was named after two of the cowboys, Herman Weir and Thomas Perry “Tom” Porter, as well as for his father.

(L to R): M.W. "Cap" Alexander, Bob Powell, Tom Porter, Katie Porter

Mary May Stephens was born in Arkansas in 1881 and had spent most of her young life in Missouri before coming to Mannford around 1900. Cap, her husband, had been born in Tennessee in 1857 so he was 24 years older than his wife. Their first child, Beulah, was born in Mannford in 1907. Sometime after her birth but before 1911, the ranch house burned. Cap and May moved to another house on the ranch, near Kellyville, Oklahoma, while a new ranch house was being built in Mannford. Tommy was born in the house near Kellyville.

Cap Alexander died in 1935 in Mannford and is buried there. May, his wife, died in 1967 and she is also buried at Oak Hill Cemetery in Mannford.

Cap and May's marriage was tumultuous to say the least. Eventually they divorced and she remarried, living in several places before her death. In all, May was married four times.

Tommy Alexander, after a first marriage that lasted 13 years, met Annie Sue Nash and married her. Sue had two young boys from a previous marriage, Roy Edward (this writer) and Gary Wade. Tommy adopted these two boys and he and Sue had two children of their own, Mary Sue and Thomas Milton. Tommy died in 2004 at the age of 92 and Sue died in 2012 at 86 years of age.

In 2014, Roy Edward, “Edd”, who had been involved with genealogy for several years, became interested in DNA. He had his own DNA tested, along with those of his wife, Mary Louise “Louise” and Thomas Milton “Milt”. He noticed that, although Milt had a lot of cousins turn up on his paternal grandmother's side, there were no Alexanders who showed up.

Finally, in mid-2015, a match showed up on Ancestry DNA which showed a second cousin relationship between Milt and a person who lived in California. After exchanging several emails, it was discovered that one of this man's great uncles was Thomas Perry Porter, the cowboy who had worked for Cap Alexander on the ranch in Mannford. Since then, several Porter relatives have been discovered through DNA testing.

Apparently May Alexander, who was 24 years younger than her husband, had had a relationship or “dalliance” with Thomas Perry Porter! At the time Tommy was born, Thomas Porter was 23 years old and single. He later married and had two additional children. Interestingly, Tommy Alexander was named after his biological father.

May Alexander probably knew who Tommy Alexander's biological father was, since she named him. What will always remain a mystery is whether Tommy knew who his father was. Although he was much more fond of Cap Alexander than of his mother, May, he did have several pictures of Tom Porter which he kept throughout his life.

Without a doubt, May went to her grave thinking that no one would ever know about her dalliance with Tom Porter. However, 50 years later, through DNA testing, the truth came out!