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| This section may contain notes in the form of short sentences or larger multiple paragraphs. Notes are listed in chronological order that should match an individuals order, subject or time frame of the Family Line pages. Also where possible indicate or include peoples names, places, times, dates and sources of information. |
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| An Interview With David Clead Stewart |
This interview was recorded on a small audio cassette recorder when my family (my mother Sharon, my step-dad Robert Reece, my brother Tim Sporer, and myself Pam (Sporer) Harpster. joined Uncle Clead and Aunt Allie in their home in Salisaw Oklahoma on December 1975. I was only 14 years old, Tim was almost 16 years old. The memory is priceless and even though the tape is somewhat crackled and old, the sounds of our discussion brings back fond laughter and joy. Wish you all could have been there. This is the best way I know how to share the experience with you.
Love Pam
Interview with Uncle Clead and Aunt Allie Stewart
In their home in Sallisaw, Oklahoma
December 26, 1975
Those present: Robert & Sharon Reece, Tim & Pam Sporer, and Clead and Allie Stewart.
Sharon: How long was E. C. Sheriff? (Note: E. C. is Earl Cleveland Stewart, son of David Clead Stewart)
Uncle Clead: He got out of the service in 1945 - he ran for Sheriff in 1946.
Aunt Allie: He resigned from office. E. C. went to teaching school. He taught in Telequah. He didn't like to be told what to do so he quit teaching. Went down and took his test for mail carrier and passed the test and now has been mail carrier for 12 years.
Uncle Clead: E. C. was tired taking orders so went to carrying mail. He said he had all the orders he wanted in the Army. "All salute and no shoot".
Aunt Allie: E. C. likes this job as mail carrier just fine.
Uncle Clead: E. C. had one peace in the paper that right on the last you know how they got to complaining about not being married. In his closing few words he said 'I've got a girl and if she don't act out on me I'm a gonna marry her.'"
Sharon: How long have you lived out there in Akins?
Uncle Clead: Well let's see, I'm 83. We been up here 30.
Sharon: Why, were you born at Akins too!
Uncle Clead: Oh yeah, yes sir.
Aunt Allie: I've lived in a 10 mile area all my life.
Uncle Clead: I was born 1892, the house out there was a double log house, a porch on the North and a side room, a hall between them the dining room. I was born in a log cabin.
My mother had four or five boys and my dad did too. And I reckon they were all there or part of them. There was quite a bunch.
Aunt Allie: It took a lot of taters.
Uncle Clead: Lots taters and beans. I've heard tell it might have been Will or Henry I believe, they were all sitting around the fire. (The kids were). Will had an old pistle. I don't know if it was my dad's pistol or not, they were fooling around there and the thing went off. The gun was pointing towards the bed I was laying back on there on the bed, and my mother ran in there and thought they shot me but just went over me about that much. They found it in one of the old logs. Mother ran in there, "you've killed Cleveland!"
Sharon: Is that your name, "Cleveland?
Uncle Clead: Yes, it is David Cleveland.
Sharon: Where did they get Clead from?
Uncle Clead: At that time, Grover Cleveland was President. Uncle Dave Faulkner was Chief of the Cherokees and him and my daddy were great friends. And I understand that he named me and that's where I got the David and Cleveland is from the President Cleveland.
Bob: You say your Uncle David fought with the Cherokees?
Uncle Clead: yeah, he was full-blooded Cherokee Indian and he was the Chief Indian Territory.
Aunt Allie: I am so glad you all came, I de clair!
Uncle Clead: they have a log building down here just below where you all cross the railroad to come over here. David Faulkners daddy lived in it and that was out of A"kins just South of Akins. And that's where he raised his family. And Dave Faulkner, one of them, and my mother married a brother to him.
Pam: Do you guys know Pretty Boy Floyd's sister or anything?
Allie: Oh yes, our boys raised up with them. They would come by the house. My boys would join them down at the school.
Sharon: they called him Pretty Boy because he was good looking?
Aunt Allie: Some girl could only describe him only that he was a Pretty Boy. His name was Charles.
Uncle Clead: He was just a big country boy.
Pam: What did you think when he did all those robberies?
Aunt Allie: We just thought he got in bad. But his mother, they don't make em any better. And all of his sisters too! The nicest peoople. His brother was Sheriff of Salisaw.
Tim: (Laughed - a thought struck him) That would be something, chasing your brother all over the country.
Allie: Oh, he wasn't sheriff until after Charlie passed away.
Sharon: You know there was so many things I wanted to ask you and now I can't think of anything. I just wanted to ask about my grandfather and what your dad's name was.
Uncle Clead: His name was James T. Stewart. John T. is Clead's brother.
Bob: Well Akins hasn't grown much since that time has it?
Aunt Allie: Oh its not as big as it used to be.
Bob: Everyone just moved out?
Aunt Allie: It used to be a post office. We haven't had a post office in a long time.
Sharon: Looks as if Akins consists of Stewart an d Stewart. E. C. Stewart on one side and Clead Stewart on the other.
Aunt Allie: E. C.'s place use to belong to Clead's brother John.
Uncle Clead: That` was Indian land from my mother and mine was Indian land. John sold his or swapped. It was above Akins, when him and her died it went to John's boy, then he passed away, and then his wife taken it over. She wanted to sell, so E. C. bought it.
Sharon: How many head of cattle out there?
Uncle Clead: Oh, when you get to feeden them you wish you didn't have a one, but we have over a hundred.
Sharon: What do you do with them? Do you milk or eat them?
Uncle Clead: Oh no, we are a cow and calf operation. We get the calves up in good shape and sell them. And you can take when cattle were high, we could sell a four hundred pound calf, would bring three or four dollars.
Sharon: Boy the price is really down! Why is that?
Thanks to Pam Harpster
Uncle Clead: That's what we wonder why is that. Because you go buy beef, just about as high as ever was. You take calves now well we had sixty-five calves and we sold about five thousand dollars worth. So that's how it has dropped down the cow-calf operation, but we just keep holding on. We raise our own hay. Hay is forty cents a bail then we have to pay twenty cents then to get it hauled and put in the barn.
Ida's mother was your Grandaddy's sister, Elsies sister, her sister us here in the rest home.
Sharon: Well who does she belong to?
Uncle Clead: That's Laura, Henry's sister, my half sister. Ida and Elsie are Laura's daughters. You daddy and Elsie would be first cousins.
Sharon: How old is Ida?
Uncle Clead: She is getting close to 70.
Pam: What is a goat roper?
Uncle Clead: Tryen to catch a billy I guess.
Bob: It's a city fella trying to act like a cowboy.
Pam: I think that you're just trying to tease me.
Uncle Clead: Bob was you born in California?
Sharon: He doesn't sound like a Californian, does he?
Uncle Clead: No, he sounds like an Okie.
Bob: I guess I got that from my dad.
Sharon: Uncle Clead, when are you coming back to California?
Uncle Clead: We'll I don't have plans for it. I guess one time will be it. Oh, I'd like to go back once in a while.
Aunt Allie: That was his first plane ride.
Sharon: Did you like the plane ride?
Uncle Clead: Well of course it was new to me. I enjoyed it. Guess I'll just stay in Oklahoma. You know we were up thirty-four thousand feet and someone said we were in a wind pocket or something and it would drop of course it would catch but one time it seemed like it wasn't gonna catch. |
| Thanks to Pam Harpster for this interesting piece. |
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