of 160 acres of land by acting as scout for the settlers. As T was well 
acquainted with the lay of the country and knew where the best land 
lay, I secured for myself a good winded red buck horse that would 
lope and run for miles on the day of the opening and T would lead 
my friends to the best land. Of course, the bunch of them paid well 
for this, and I made a business of it as long as I was in Oklahoma, 
never taking any land for myself, however. I saw lots of misery 
there. Many times I have seen poor families destitute with no em¬ 
ployment, the mother and children hungry, with supplies high. 
I took what money T had and purchased a ferry boat on the north 
Canadian River, 16 miles below Oklahoma City. The fellow was 
charging the public 50 cents to cross the river. I secured from 
Oklahoma County a charter to build a bridge at this point and operate 
it as a toll bridge for the term of three years, charging wagons and 
teams 10 cents each, fellows on horseback five cents. At the end of 
three years I was to turn the bridge over to the county in good re¬ 
pair. At this bridge I made my headquarters for three years, quit¬ 
ting my trapping to some extent for the time being, but I would 
buy furs from the Indians. 
One day Joe Mack, the Shawnee interpreter, rode up and said: 
“Hello, Squeagochathe.” “Hello, Joe,” I answered. Joe told me 
that Big Jim, their chief, wanted me to come down on the next day 
and the whole tribe would hold a council about their home in Texas. 
I remembered my promise to Joe and I rode twenty miles down 
south to the Shawnee village. It began, to snow early in the morn¬ 
ing and by the time we reached the Shawnee village the snow was 
almost three feet deep. My horse was warm when I arrived so I 
told the chief that I would have to blanket my horse. Jim went 
after two good blankets and by that time my horse had begun to 
shiver in the cold. Old Jim looked at him and said, “Maybe so 
bring him in the house.” We led him into the log cabin in which 
we were to hold the council and tied him in the back end. The cabin 
was a large roomy structure with a large chimney in one end. In 
that room we sat up the entire night, making arrangements and plans 
on how we would proceed to get the 40 miles square on Brazee River 
in Texas. It was agreed that Big Jim, the chief, and Joe Mack, the 
interpreter, and I would go to Austin, Texas, and investigate their 
claim. The set time arrived to go to Austin. The chief and their 
interpreter were all dressed, or rather, they were presentable. 
When we arrived in Austin, I proceeded to investigate the war 
records with an old Texan. It took us about three days to find out 
the whole thing. The war records showed that the Shawnees and 
Delawares had been of great service to Texas in the early Indian 
wars. They were used mostly as scouts and after the Texas settlers 
had driven the Indians out they gave the Shawnees and Delawares 
40 square miles of land. Sam Houston was governor at the time 
the grant was given to the Indians. The Indians dearly loved him, 
as he was a real pioneer governor. Hog was governor when we were 
in Austin and he was entirely different; however, he was greatly 
interested in our research and gave us all the aid we had asked for. 
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