Dotson Black, Wagon Train Veteran, Dies (Deputy U. S. Marhsal)
May 11, 1949—Dotson Black, who used to shoot deer on open prairie where Oklahoma City now stands, died Tuesday in the home of his daughter, Mrs. Rose Gillaspy, 1125 NW 43. He was 86 years old and had been ill about a year of heart disease.
Black, before his marriage in 1898, drove 20-mule teams from Caldwell, Kansas, to Mobeetie, Texas, across the wild country that is now Oklahoma.
He drove for Jess Evans, who operated a wagon train out of Caldwell. They hauled supplies to the cattlemen in Texas and later to the forts in Oklahoma, shuttling back and forth from Fort Reno to Fort Sill. On the trip back to Kansas they hauled bones, which they sold for fertilizer and buttons.
After the wagon trains stopped, he, his brothers and his parents moved to the Comanche Indian country near what is now Lawton. He often told his two daughters of the five-gallon coffee pot which was always going in their home. Comanche Indians, at that time unfriendly with most white persons, used to come to drink coffee and dance for his family Chief Hawkeye was one of Black’s devoted friends.
Black’s second daughter Mrs. J. L. Keller, 1620 NE 14, recalls a story her father told about one of his trips through Oklahoma. The Apache Indians, on the warpath, approached the wagon train demanding tobacco. The drivers threw them sacks of tobacco twists and the Indians left, “much to our relief,” he said.
After the run, Black homesteaded a farm near Fairview where he and his wife lived in a sod house. For several years he was a deputy marshal in El Reno. He had earlier assisted in fighting the Dalton boys out of Caldwell, Kansas.
Black came to Oklahoma City in 1905 from Sayre.
Services will be at 1p a.m. Thursday in Perrine funeral home with burial in Spencer cemetery.
Benjamin H,. Colbert, U. S. Marshal
Former State Marshal Dies
December 10, 1920--The Oklahoman--Services for Benjamin H. Colbert, 87, Hot Springs, Arkansas, who died Thursday at Sulphur, will be at 10 a.m. Saturday in Hahn-Cook Funeral Home. Burial will be at Hot Springs.
Colbert was a Rough Rider and fought during the Spanish-American War at San Juan Hill under Theodore Roosevelt's command. He was cited for bravery by the Cuban government.
The town of Colbert, where he was born when Oklahoma was Indian Territory, was named after his family.
When Roosevelt became president, Colbert, who had been closely associated with him, was appointed U. S. Marshal for the southern district of Indian Territory. He also attended Baylor and Vanderbilt Universities.
A long-time resident of Tulsa, he
moved to Hot Springs to live with his son,
Ted Colbert, about a year ago. He was a member of the Presbyterian Church, a
32nd Degree Mason and a Shriner.