The Slaughters

Vernon Edward Slaughter was born on February 1st, 1902 in Goltry, Oklahoma. Goltry, a rural community in far southeastern Alfalfa County, lies twenty miles southeast of Cherokee, the county seat. Through Goltry passes State Highway 45, by which Enid, the nearest city, is twenty miles to the east. Opened to non-Indian settlement in September 1893 as part of the Cherokee Outlet, the area was in Woods County until the creation of Alfalfa County at 1907 statehood. After the opening, a settlement called Karoma emerged on the John Streich farm, approximately one and one-half miles southeast of present Goltry. Among the township's early arrivals were a considerable number of Germans from Russia (ethnic Germans who had immigrated to the United States from homes in Russia), farmers by occupation. A number of other settlers hailed from the German state of Bohemia and from Switzerland. As late as 2000, 33 percent of the town's residents claimed to have German ancestry.
First Christmas at Slaughters
The back of my grandfather's head
Goltry owes its existence to the Arkansas Valley and Western Railway (later part of the St. Louis and San Francisco Railway, or Frisco, system), which in 1904 constructed a line from east to west across that part of Woods County that after 1907 was Alfalfa County. Karoma's townspeople moved most of their homes and businesses to the railroad. In 1904 a townsite company headed by John Linden surveyed and platted the town on 240 acres. The new community was incorporated and named for Enid resident Charles Goltry, who owned the land and who’s milling company constructed a grain elevator there. James Hagemeier was appointed Goltry's postmaster in January 1904. At statehood, 183 people made Goltry their home.
Mary Anne's 4th Birthday
Grandparents with 1st 2 grandchildren. I was #3.

Rail access made the settlement a market center. By 1910 the town had 320 residents, two churches, a public school, a bank, and the Goltry News. An elevator, an implement dealer, and a grain dealer served area farmers, and residents enjoyed about a dozen retail establishments, a billiard parlor, and telephone connections. Hovering between two and three hundred throughout the twentieth century, the population peaked in 1930 at 346.



Vernon moved his family around a lot looking for work. He labored on the Fort Peck Dam and was an executive with Bowen McLaughlin, a defense contractor, in York, PA. He died of lung cancer in 1975.

Slaughter Home on Cottage Place
Grandparent's home on Cottage Place in York
Gertrude Marie Rube was born on September 6, 1906 in Minot, North Dakota. She too died of lung cancer in 1985. She made the best pineapple cookies in the world every Christmas. They were awesome. The photo is of my grandparents with their youngest daughter, Joyce, in between them.

Aunt Pat with Parents

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