Tent City That Became Muskogee

The tent city that became Muskogee was at the end of the railroad tracks. It housed card sharks, thieves and murderers. This picture is of a "Terminus Rough," which means a person who lived in the turbulent world of a railhead city. Muskogee had a violent reputation before it was properly established in 1872.

As told by a conductor a couple of years later, the railhead that became Muskogee had "terminus troubles" in 1871. Wide-eyed travelers in a "gaily-decorated sleeping-saloon" railroad car listened intently as he spoke of murders and threats of recent times.

"Three men were shot about twenty feet from this same car in one night at Muskogee. Oh! This was a little hell, this was. The roughs took possession here in earnest. The keno and monte players had any quantity of tents all about this section, and life was most uncertain thing to keep you ever saw."

"One night a man lost all he had at keno; so he went around behind the tent and tried to shoot the keno-dealer in the back; he missed him, but killed another man. The keno man just got a board and put it up behind himself, and the game went on."

"One day one of the roughs took offence at something the railroad folks said, so he ran our train off the track the next morning. There was no law here, and no means of getting any. As fast as the railroad moved on, the roughs pulled up stakes and moved with it."

"We tried to scare them away, but they didn't scare worth a cent. It was next to impossible for a stranger to walk through one of these canvas towns without getting shot at. The graveyards were sometimes better populated than the towns next them."

All gamblers and card players needed for starting a game was a little protection from the elements, so they used tents. As the railroad pushed south dealers folded their tents and moved to keep up with the money.

Muskogee was a special spot because it was about the right distance down the tracks from the previous railroad town. After considering the Checotah area for a location, railroad officials selected this hilltop. Muskogee was an ideal spot for a town. To secure the location, a Post Office application was submitted for approval. In January, 1872, embryonic Muskogee received its post office designation and officially came into existence.

At first the honest businessmen operated out of tents, too. These merchants began erecting wooden buildings as quickly as they could afford to. The lawlessness of the tent town did not cease when the railroad pushed construction south of the Canadian River. The pace of development, however, quickened the approach of western civilization.