Person:Thomas Fowler (25)

                                      ASHLEY FOWLER  (UNCLE TYE)

The following dialogue is taken from a cassette tape recorded 12/4/73.

"....dont' know whether the Fowlers owned it or the Cromers. And they lived there and there was three children was born there; Aunt ... Uncle Henry and another one of the girls. Grandpa Fowler was called up and went to The Civil War and left them down there on that plantation. When the war was over they came back and found the whole countryside devastated because Sherman's march through Georgia had destroyed everything. There was a lot of enmity among people. So he decided he'd move out. But they only had one horse and a cow left ... Sherman marched through Georgia...that portion of Geogia... and an old ox cart. They put what possessions they had in that and moved on up into Eastern Tennessee to McMinville Tennessee. Ther, he became a shoemaker and a tanner. Ran a tan yard tanning cow hides, making leather and then he was a shoemaker. He remained there for... I don't know how many years. That's where our own father was born, in McMinville county (Dec. 28, 1869). All of his (Floyd Alexanders')sisters was born, his full sisters (Mary, 1865, Lucinda, 1867). His mother died there and they moved out into Western Tennessee. And there he met grandma Fowler (Mary E. B.) And they married when they were very young and lived there two or three years. Eule and Ben were born there. Then they moved out into Indian Territory around what is known as Ganz in the Cherokee Nation. And there he lived until most...well, several of us was born there. I was born and Ann was born there. Well. I think Dora and May both were born there. We lived there until Statehood.

They decided, Grandma and Grandpa, that there was no educational advantages down there. They had quite a bunch of kids and they needed to get out to where there was some kind of schools. So they moved to Western Oklahoma. They rented a place from Sanford Doudy. How it came about renting this place... they never did go out and look at it but there was a Doudy lived in that community that was a cousin to these and he told them about em having all the land out there and what a fine place it was. So Grandpa rented that farm without going to see it. That's how we come to be out in that country.

I'm going to start in now to tell a story that I know the best. That was our move from Ganz out to Martha. We had a freight car and we loaded everything in it; dish pans to mules... all of our plow tools and household goods, corn, hay and our meat and fruit. Grandpa came ahead with a car and moved everything out on this farm. Then when he got it all moved out, why...every day we was expecting a telegram from him to tell us to come on out. I remember how impatient Uncle Henry was. He'd go to town every day and come back all flustrated because he hadn't heard from Floyd. But one day we got the telegram telling us to come on out. Se we began to get ready to go. We were just a batch a camping in the house where we lived. Everything else had been sent out. Had a few bed rolls, quilts and stuff. We slept on the floor, cooked on the fireplace. So it wasn't much of a packing up job. We had...I think... three or four trunks to be packed up. Se we got everything packed up and his brother-in-law, Sam Webb, came and got us in a wagon and toook us over to the depot at Ganz. It was on a Sunday when we started. I'll never forget that. We started on a Sunday and along about noontime the train came in and we all loaded on. We wild-eyed kids, we'd never been on a train...didn't know anything about it. It was quite an experience to get to ride on a train. So we got on this railroad train, the Kansas City Southern, and went down Spiro where there's a junction there between The Kansas City Southern and the Rock Island. We had to lay over there from about...oh...I guess one o'clock 'til after dark that night. And we stayed in the depot. I remember how trying that was... having to lay over ther in that depot waiting for the train to come. Go and look down the tracks and see if we could see it a-comin. Eule and Ben got very restless. They didn't want to go. They wanted to stay down there. Ben had a sweetheart that he was very much set on. So they slipped off. I don't know whether they intended to not go or not, but they let it be known they were not gonna go. They went off down the little old town. Uncle Henry got hotfoot right after 'em and went and got 'em and brought 'em back. Well...grandma Fowler was pretty well wrought up about it herself. She didn't wanta go on out there and leave them down there. So about seven thirty in the evening...that was on the thirty-first of December...I believe...we got on that train and went west all night long on th Frisco railroad. It came up through from Arkansas into Oklahoma City and that's the one we got on to go to Oklahoma City. So we got into Oklahoma City. I remember it was cold.... cold Norther. It was clear, but it was cold. We got off and went into the depot. Uncle Henry had to find .... we had to change depots to go over to another depot to get another railroad. Now that was the Rock Island that we came on. That was the Frisco depot we had to find. Uncle Henry went out and found it and came back for us. I remember that we went stringing across town carrying a sack of biscuits, some handbags and quilts and pillers and sleepy kids. It's quite a show, I'm sure. While we was in the depot, there was the first automobile any of us had ever seen drove up. We was all eyes to see that thing. It was a very small, little thing. I remember what Jack said. He said, "Oh. There's an awfulobile". It was a taxi. I think's what it was. Then we strung out over to this depot and the train pulled in. We got on it and set there ...it seemed like forever before it got ready to pull out. Finally, it pulled out and we headed west. All that rest of the day we was on the way out.... to Altus. But on coming up the night before...we had quite a hectic night trying to sleep. Those old rockin' rollin' cars a-squeekin'. In the night, Jack had a kind of ....what grandma called, "a Thompson fit". He got up walkin' in his sleep and talkin'... I think what he needed was to go to the bathroom. When I took him to the bathroom and relieved him he got all right. So, we had quite a few incidents like that comin' up. But we got on this Frisco train to go west and we traveled all day. I remember late... long in the afternoon... we got out to Laughton. We'd about run out of anything to eat. When we started from Ganz, we had a sack of bisquits and some fried ham. Old aunt Emma... the old colored woman that helped grandma around the place, had baked a great big cake and we hat that. But we'd just about eaten everthing up. All day long we didn't have much to eat. We got out to Laughton late in the afternoon and there was a guy there at the depot selling chicken and bread sandwitches. Uncle Henry got off and he carried the purse... had money... he bought us each one a piece o' chicken and a piece o' bread. It was my luck to get the dog-gone chicken neck. Didn't have any meat ot it, so, I guess I got hungrier than any of the rest of 'em because I didn't have as much to eat.

Well... we moved on into Altus and got to the old Frisco depot there at seven thirty in the evening, first day of January, nineteen hunerd and eight. By the way, that was the first day of Statehood for Oklahoma.

We pulled in there and there was a cold wind blowin' from the north. It was perfectly clear, not a high wind, but it was cold. So grandpa was there with two wagons. He'd come down to get us to pick up all of our baggage and all the kids. He had one fixed up with hay in the bottom of it and a wagon sheet on it and one to go over it and some quilts. All the kids got in there and bedded down. Uncle Henry and Eule and Ben got on the other wagon and follerd. We went up through town goin' north on... I believe that's Main Street, or Broadway. I don't know which it is. Have to go back over there to see.

So, we headed out. (it was) a beautiful night. Seems like the stars were just where you could reach 'em. Just so clear and nice. So we drove all that nine miles, way out there in the country. And we got there. I don't know what time it was. It was cold, dark. We drove up to that place. I remember, Grandpa said, "Now, here it is". (We) drove up to what looked like a barn. And Grandma said, "You mean this? It looks to me like a barn". But that was the house we had.

So, we unloaded. Had to put up a stove, a little old bachelor coal stove. He had gotten cold out there. Didn't have any wood or any thing in that country and he'd got the coal out there and bought a stove. Had the pipe and ever' thing, but never had put it up. So we froze around there. He and Uncle Henry and the boys got the stope up, built a fire in it. Oh, I remember how soothing and comfortable it was to get warmed up good. Well, we didn't have any supper and no way of cookin any. Imagine how hungrey we were when we went to bed. So just put down quilts and pallets around on the floor and kept the fire goin' all night where we could keep warm.

The next morning we got up. It was a beautiful, clear morning, frosty and cool. Now I remember we kids, May and Jack and me and Ann went out on the prairie, down on the creek, on Bitter Creek...ran right by the barn. It was the most wonderful country we had ever seen.

Then they had to put up the cook stove. Grandpa had bought a new coal cook stove. It was in a crate. We had to take it out of the crate and put the legs on it, set it up and put the joint stove pipe on it and build a fire in it. I'll never forget how the paint on it or oil or whatever it was, when it got hot it filled the house full of smoke and stunk to high heaven. We didn't have any milk to make bread but grandma had been thoughtful enough to have some cream of tartar tablets ready where she could use to make bread with water. So we got to the meat. We had lots of meat. Got a ham out and cut it. Made up a bunch of hard tack bread. Fried ham and made red eyed gravy. And we had some sargum molasses we brought with us. And that's what we had to eat for a day or two 'til we got straightened out...where could get on our feet and get orientated. So that was the beginning of our stay out there and it was quite eventful.

I remember that grandpa and Uncle Henry was gonna to go to Blair. They didn't think it was very far over there looking at the mountains. They thought it was just a short walk. And they walked from there over to Blair. They was gonna buy a milk cow. They found the cow all right. But they found out it was a long distance, about seven or eight miles. And they had to walk back. They came back the next day in the wagon to puck up the cow. They went over the next day and got the cow. That was the beginning of milk and butter. We hadn't had any in a long time and we hadn't had any good bread. We had to wait 'til we got that cowand got some milk and sour it to have milk to make bread. So they went and got the cow and I'll never forget the story... had to stop this machine and turn it over. It run out of tape. Told a lot of stuff... I'll have to repeat it... I can remember all of it. I believe it stopped on me where grandpa and Uncle Henry had gone after the cow over at Blair in the wagon and coming back they passed an old man's place up two or three miles north of where we lived there on Bitter Creek. He ha a sow and a bunch of beautiful Pole and Chinee pigs. They thought they'd stop and buy two or three of 'em in order to have meat hogs the next year. They looked 'em over and talked to the old man and he got around in his conversation to ask 'em, "What church are you affiliated with?" They said, "The Methodist Church". He was a strong fundamentalist Baptist. He said, "Well, drive on. I guess I don't have any pigs to sell ye". Uncle Henry never did get over that fact. It stuck in hiw craw the rest of his life. I think he rather rejoiced a little bit when Old Man Stedham bought him an old model T. Well, he bought it new, and he was coming down the road after the railroad was built through Martha. A freight train was goin' down the track where the crossin' is and he ran into that and it turned him over and liked to killed him. I think Uncle Henry thought The Lord got even with him for what he said. Well, anyway, that's the way we got started over there, with the milk cow and everything. I don't remember where we got the pigs but I do remember we had a bunch of pigs there pretty soon.

It wasn't long after that 'til, oh, a day or two, 'till grandma decided she had to do some washin'. I might have told this back there before this tape stopped. I don't remember. But anyway, they put out a washin' and hung it out on the line, not on the line, on a wire fence... didn't have clothes line. It was so pretty and still, they thought, "Waa. It'll be fine. Just leave the clothes out all night". But during the night it came up one of those whiz-bang northers. Clothes scattered all over the prairie around there, drawers 'n undershirts 'n pettycoats 'n socks 'n gowns and what have ye. They was out there runnin 'em down in the night. I remember they'd make a run. It was cold. They'd make a run and find what they could and come back in with it. I don't know whether they ever gathered everthing up... all of it or not. But anyway... they got some of it in.

Well, it wadn't long after that 'till we had to start school. That was a wonderful experience. We'd never been to school. Didn't know anything about school, gowin' up in The Indian Territory, out in the wilds...rompin' around and no responsibility like that. But we got started and we thought it was one of the greatest things every happened to us, which I guess it was, that we got to go to school. I'll never forget it. It started in there the first of January and some of us made three or four grades the first three or four months. We was such smart kids we really went to town.

The place down there where we moved... it was just... I don't know whether it was half of it broken out. The rest of it was prairie. So when we got straightened out there and everthing...well they set up the plow tools and went to plowing. They broke out a lot of sodd land. As I remember the rule was then if you broke it out the landlord would give you all you made on it that year for breaking it up. And so they broke that up and planted it in milo maize and then flat broke the land and got everthing in good shape.

I wish some of you here to ask questions... I can't think of everthing I might tell you. If somebody was here to kind of prod me along where... to ask some questions.... But I'll go back down to the Indian Territory. I can remember when our grandfather died. I was just a very small kid. That's the first memory I've had. It was in ninteen hundred. I remember we went out to the cemetery to the funeral to bury him. I remember he was in a black casket. The old time, like they used to have with a glass over the face of it. I remember that grandma Fowler lifted me up and let me look in the casket. And I'll never forget. I've got the image of his face with me yet. I don't know. Some people say it's... shouldn't let children see the dead or go to a funeral but I think I wouldn't take for that experience because that's all I remember about him is looking at him in that casket. So I'm glad that I got to see him even though he was a corpse.

Now I don't know what to say here further. I need somebody to give me some questions that I might answer. Well... I'll go a little further. It wadn't long after, oh, a year... about a year after w moved out there (to Martha)... Ben went back to Ganz and married his sweetheart and got into trouble. And was down there several months and grandpa went down there to see about him... and he came back. A fe days Ben came in. He quit the girl. What happened was she was pregnant when he married her. He was just taking her off another old boy's hands. So he came back to Martha and left her. But he worried him all the rest of his life about what might happen... what did happen... the threats that was made and all of that.

Well, I don't know of anything else right now. I hope I didn't overlap on what I put on this first tape. I answered it all as far as I know. Well, I might go further. We never had had any experience with church. Wadn't any churches down there in Indian Territory. I think that, oh, they had a little ol' Methodist Protestant Church where the preacher came some time. But we got out to Martha and they had a regular preacher and a church and a Sunday School. Aw... we enjoyed that. I remember grandpa Fowler bought a a big old hack. You know what a hack is. Had wheels on it like a farm wagon. Two seats with a top on it and that was somethin'. We'd hook a span of mules to that thing with chain harness and go to church. Boy, what I mean...we'd rattle down the road... kids a-hangin' all over it. We got broke in to going to church and Sunday School there at Martha... which I think was a good thing. But we didn't have that experience down in the Indian Territory.

Well, there's other things I might think of, but not right now do I think of 'em. As I said, I wish there was somebody here to ask me. I'm in here in a room by myself tellin' you this story.

I'll say this. I believe the kids being born started in with Dora and May, Ann and me. Jack, Hugh and Rene on down the line.... were all born there. Now there's a five year difference in my age and Jack's age. Maybe you didn't know that, but there was a boy born in there between Jack and me that died. He died in his infancy and they hadn't named him. Grandma Fowler always referred to him as "Baby Fowler". I bare remember that. I think. I remember grandma crying about it, weeping. And that's as much as I can remember. But I wasn't very old, oh, well, if I was five years older than Jack... I guess I was around three years... two and a half... three years old at that time. Now, I'll quit here and not waste the rest of this tape 'cause I don't know anything else to tell ye about it.

For the benefit of all of ye that don't know where the Fowlers came from... in sixteen hunerd and thirty five the first Fowler came to America. His name was Philip Fowler and he came to the Massachussetts Bay Colony. And he raised a family there and it spread out all over the United States. Wendell has a genealogy book of the whole race. But I couln't run down and find out who I was kin to. I bet there was five thousand different branches of it. I think all the Fowlers was as prolific with kids as Pa and Ma, 'cause they went in ever direction. You find 'em in ever community. I didn't know there was Fowlers anywhere. Up in Oklahoma I met one Fowler outside of our own family. Went out to Odessa and found there was two Fowlers. Went down here to Burnet and they're as thick as flies. And I don't claim kin with any of 'em 'cause I don't think any of 'em was from Georgia.

I've always told folks that our ancestors came over with James Oglethorpe when he settled Georgia. They came over and settled Georgia with a bunch of debtors. They was in jail over there in England because they wouldn't, couldn't pay their debts. Oglethorpe brought 'em here to settle Georgia. And I've told folks that the Fowlers haven't improved. They haven't paid their debts yet. We still owe everbody.

I've found out that there wasn't any Fowlers that came with James Oglethorpe. The Fowler that came here and started it was that old man Philip Fowler who came up to Massachusetts. Well, I say, "When they swarm they really swarm." They went south, north, east and west and they're all over the country. Some of 'em are perty good and some of 'em are not. I refuse to claim kin 'em. Oh, I have some around here I call "cousin". I don't know whether we're kin or not but they seem to be pleased with it and I call 'em "cousin".

In 1918, I was in the air corp stationed at Ellington Field between Houston and Galveston. At Christmas time, I got a furlough to come home. And I came home and everbody was sick with the flu. And the snow... I've never seen as much snow in that country. It was knee- deep or more... all over the country. I spent my whole time a-runnin' around a-gettin the doctor and hawlin' 'im here and there with a team o' mules to that old hack I was tellin' ye about... draggin' through that snow... get that doctor and take 'm here and there... and he'd go in and... I know he came home with me and he 'as so sleepy he couln't hardly move. Grandma fixed 'im somethin' to eat and a cup of coffee. He layed down and took a nap before I took 'im on to the next place. That was about the coldest weather I think I've ever seen out there. I know there was more snow.

I came back off the furlough back to Ellington Field down between Houston and Galveston. Got down there and all the trees was covered with ice. I never come as near freezin' to death in my life as I did down there in that cold gulf air comin' in there. Ye couldn't put enough clothes on to keep it out.

We lived in little old tents. If ye put ye snow all over it with a little 'ol hot stove in the middle of it... and get it hot... and the snow would melt... nd if you rubbed your head or your finger against it, it would go to leakin' So we had quite a time 'til it kinda cleared off and melted off.

There's two things I want to add to that... Dancin' up there in that school. Two young kids there... I was older than they were... I was in the Junior College and they 'as in the High School. One of 'em was Doctor Gaston Foot who was retired from the First Methodist Church in Fort Worth and the other was Bishop Kenneth Pole... and we danced our way out of college. (Chuckle)... If you could fold it properly... that was the first move they made. You was fit for the air corp ... anybody has hardly learned yet how to fold a road map and get it back the way it was to start with. But we moved out of Austin into Ellington Field. And it was Ellington Field when the war ended.

In 1918... 17 it was, I went out to Claredon College and enrolled. First I went down to SMU and couldn't get a job. I had to work. So, I went up to Claredon College and they gave me a job washin' pots and pans in the kitchen for my board and room. And I learned how to clog dance with wooden shoes. I remember there was an old Catholic lady who was the head cook and it horrified her that those young preachers would get down there on the concrete floor in the dining room and dance all over it. She couldn't get over that.... the Methodist preachers would do a thing like that. We had quite a time. I stayed there until school was out, then went in to the army.

.... (Woman's voice) your tape was fouled up. But I was real disgusted because there was so much in the background you could hardly understand what Tye says. And I didn't know what questions to ask him... and I know that you-all could have gotten much more information than I have. But any way, we've got what we've got. (humming noise) ... I was really chastising you wasn't I ?...gettin' after you for talking in the background... but maybe he got enough on the tape that we'll know something about our family background. I hope we do anyway. This is December the sixth, and I got sick right after I got home. I don't think the trip had anything to do with it. But I have just the last two days felt like anything at all like myself. I sure had a flare-up with my colon and everthing. But I'm better now. I'm going to let this be a letter to you instead of writing you a complete letter. We've really had the cold weather, but no moisture yet. It's just terrible. It's so dry here. But this morning it's cloudy. And maybe we're gonna get some moisture after all. I hope that you had a nice Christmas and that all your children were there. We didn't do anything for Christmas excep that I managed to be able to go upto Jigg's sister's for dinner that day... but I really didn't feel like it. Of course there was very little I could eat but that didn't matter. She had one of Jigg's cousins and her husband over too so we did some "visiting"... not very much until we had to come home so I could get some relief. So, I'll stop now. But I do want you to treasure what I did get on the tapes... and do whatever you want to about it. And this is all... good bye.

1. ↑ ^1.0 1.1 [1], in Ancestry.com. Public Member Trees: (Note: not considered a reliable primary source).