By Lou Ann Murphy

In the fall of 1887, relatives of Charlotte Cox and her husband Leon Cullis Meltabarger of Knox Co. TN gathered for a last good-bye to family members who were heading west.  Seated in the bottom row left to right are Issa Meltabarger, her mother, Charlottia Cox Meltabarger holding baby Tennesee Meltabarger, Earnest William Meltabarager and next to him his daddy Leon Cullis Meltabarger with daughter Ada seated on his lap. 

Five years later Marvel MacHenry Cox and his wife Eliza Ramsey Cox would also join the families in Oklahoma, as would Saphronia and Melissa Ellen and various other Cox cousins.

Also shown in this picture is the family of Leon Cullis’s sister Sarah Ellen Meltabarger Lester, her husband Jerome Lester and their three chidlren,William, baby Nola and James, who joined the trek to the western territories.  They are standing behind the Leon Cullis family.

 Going by train, they disembarked in Texas where they stayed for about two years and the birth of another child. Apparently the Oklahoma land runs had no appeal to this group from TN, though certainly talk of the land in Oklahoma reached them. The families left Texas settling in Indian Territory in the Chickasaw nation for several years.  There the Lesters eventually bought a large amount of land. But by 1904, apparently the lure of other land pulled Leon Cullis and his family away from Indian Territory.  By then the family had grown by several more children, one of whom was my grandmother Lou Vestes Meltabarger who had been born in I.T. along with her twin Lo Estes.  One wonders if leaving the area would have been hard for Charlotte.  Even though there were now seven children loaded in their covered wagon, she was leaving behind the graves of two others, including the son who had been born in TX.  And her daughter Ada, now a young woman, had gone to western OK to help take care of the children left by the death of Charlotte’s sister Saphronia.  Saphronia had married Joseph Lett, also from TN, and settled with her husband west of Lawton, OK where he had established a successful business, but she had died a short time after the birth of her third child. When the wagon rolled out of the Chickasaw nation, it was filled with children and chickens and was towing their cow and hogs.

 To this day, I’m not sure where they were headed.  My grandmother, throughout her life insisted they were going to Tillman Co. and it would have been possible since Tillman Co. was not too far from the Letts.  But she was either mistaken or my great grandfather had the worst sense of direction in the new territory.  In July of 1904, they stopped at what is now Cedar Lane in Norman, OK.  Wherever they were going, they could go no further.  My great grandmother was about to give birth to their youngest child, Eddy Leon. 

 True to his enterprising nature, my g grandfather found work.  As a matter of fact, all the children who were old enough went to work picking cotton and by early winter of that year my g grandfather bought a half section east of Norman. It had been originally settled only fifteen years before during the run that opened the territory.  It was located on what is now known as Indian Meridian.  On the land was a house, the only house that ever sat on that piece of property.  It was a very small house by today’s standards, but it must have looked like heaven to a mother of eight children, some of whom were very small, and all of whom needed shelter from the winter.

 On his farm my g grandfather had feed crops and cotton, raised animals, maintained a blacksmith shop and most importantly put in a stand of ribbon cane from which he gained the reputation of making the best sorghum molasses in the territory.  My g grandmother set out lilacs and the roots of not only her flowers, but also her family, grew.  Her children were raised with deep love.  They were a close and sentimental family, in spite of their father who was often compared to a cantankerous banty rooster.

In 1936 tragedy struck.  In January an early morning house fire only about a mile away from their own house claimed the lives of Eddy Leon, his wife and two of their children.  Two small children escaped the flames, climbing out a window and running barefoot in the snow to their nearest neighbor’s house.  My g grandmother died that March.  Though the actual cause of death was listed as pneumonia, the family knew she had greived herself to death.  She was 74. 

By 1943 my g grandfather died.  He was 82.  Their children held on to the farm for several years, renting it out for a while, but finally in the late 40’s or early 50’s sold it.  I can remember occasions when I was small that we would visit friends who still lived in that area and my grandmother would point out to me the place where she grew up.  At that time it was a mile of fenced field that was being overtaken by tall grass and the beginnings of brush.  But I could hear the love in her voice when she talked about it.

 May, 1999:  My cousin Aretha from Lawton came for a visit and to work on our family tree. Aretha is a granddaughter of my grandmother’s sister Ada, who had eventually married Joe Lett, the widower of her "Aunt Fronia" whose children she had gone to take care of.  While we were working on our family information, she asked if we (my mother being there) remembered where the old home place was.  Of course we did.  It was only about seven miles from where we lived.  She asked if we would take her to see it. We were delighted to do so and on the way there, she asked my mother what she remembered the most about it.  My mother said, “Oh, I remember my grandma’s lilacs!”  Secondly, she remembered the windmill that stood in the yard.  I told Aretha that I hadn’t been by there in years, but I doubted that we’d be able to drive into it since I remembered it being fenced.  We’d have to just drive by and look. 

 When we turned onto Indian Meridian it began to look different.  There was a house or two that hadn’t been there before, but as we got closer to where the old house had been we noticed the biggest change.  The road in front of the house had once been a fairly high hill and the yard was flush with the road.  Now the road had been cut through the hill and the yard was high above our heads.  And most importantly, there was a gravel driveway going in.  We learned later that the county had to build the driveway because when they cut the road down, they cut off access to the place and were required to build a new one.  We were thrilled to be able to get that close.  We drove in. 

We could not belive our eyes.  Almost the first thing we saw were my g grandmother’s lilacs blooming. My great grandmother had by this time been dead for 63 years, and there were her lilacs on that lonely hill blooming for no one.  They were very close to 100 years old.  A little exploration revealed that they were not only blooming, they had spread.  And a little more exploration revealed the remains of the windmill, now brush covered and barely visible.  Looking further we found the boards of the old house where it had finally fallen in. Beside it was a huge hole where the root cellar had been.  But exploration was made very difficult by the huge amount of brush and growth which had overtaken it almost everywhere, so we weren’t able to go much further.

One thing we could see was a realtor's sign.  I wrote down the number, telling my mother and my cousin that I wanted to call and get permission to dig up some of the lilacs so we could transplant them and preserve them.  If I had in the back of my mind the thought of buying it, it was so far back I wasn’t acknowledging it.  With the advent of a lake nearby land in that area was expensive.  I knew it would be ridiculous to consider it. 

The next day, almost first thing, I called the realtor and asked for permission to dig up some of the lilacs.  He didn’t think it would be a problem.  As an afterthought and more out of curiosity than anything else, I asked what price had been put on the place and how much of it was for sale.  What he told me stopped me dead in my tracks.  The part that was for sale was 18 1/2 acres where the house had been and the price had been reduced to an amount that was irresistible.  My excitement was instantaneous.  Was this what I had been hoping to hear?  I couldn’t get those lilacs out of mind.  It was as if they had been sitting there waiting all those years for someone to come home.  I told the realtor I would call him back in 10 minutes. I wasn’t sure I could get it financed.  I discussed it with my mother, made a phone call to the bank, called the realtor back and the rest is history, or perhaps destiny.

We did learn of one ironic twist in this story.  The reason the price had been reduced was that they were having trouble selling it.  The reason they were having trouble selling it was that apparently a neighbor wanted continued use of the land himself without buying it and kept running off prospective buyers with tales of flooding.  I learned the truth of this when he attempted to do the same with me.  He told me exactly what the realtor said he had been telling others.  He told me he had lived there for 20 years and it had always been that way. I simply said, “That’s funny, my grandparents lived here for almost fifty years and it never once flooded.”  He closed his mouth, ducked his head, and walked away.  That man had made possible my purchase, he just didn’t know it.  It was not the end of my problems with him, but no amount of trouble from him could dampen my absolute joy everytime I walked on the land.  I knew my g grandmother was smiling down from her perch in Heaven.

Today, I am putting in a Christmas tree farm where I plan to offer not only trees, but the magic of Christmas. I am also adding grapes and blackberries and pumpkins.  I’m leaving the woods and creek for the deer (which will now be protected from the neighbor) and will eventually build a home. The old windmill which had been stolen long ago will be replaced and around the ruins of the old one will be a lovely rock garden built from the rocks that are still there.

My mother and my aunt and uncle have caught my excitement and are helping my dream become reality.  What was once brush and blackjack and eroded gullies are leveled terraced fields waiting for things to be planted, thanks to my uncle’s great work.  A lilac, which had to be moved to make way for a fence, has been transplanted by my aunt to many places…including her house, my mother’s house and many places on the farm. And in all those places little green leaves are popping out.

As almost a postscript to my tree farm plans, I learned of a wonderful story about my great grandmother.  We were telling one of our older cousins who remembered her grandparents’ farm about my tree farm. She said that one of her most wonderful memories of childhood was a Christmas when her Grandma Charlotte had moved every single item out of one of the rooms of their tiny house in order to put up a huge Christmas tree for the grandchildren.  How fitting, I thought.  My great grandmother will surely approve of my plans.

Most importantly, her lilacs are once again going to bloom for the enjoyment of her offspring and others.  She lives in them and she lives in us.  It is a tribute to the love she taught her children to have for each other, for it is that love which especially lives on.