I'm David Willis. My dad, A. R. Willis owned the Willis Variety Store @ 119 S. Chickasaw, just 2 doors south of the 1st Nat. Bank back steps. My mother, Helen Willis had a beauty shop in the back of store @ sometimes at home, 714 N. Willow. Our last home was 822 N. Willow, where Mrs. Joe Butts now lives.

I found an old, time yellowed handout of Allstott's explaining his evaluation of PV's water needs at the time, which I got from him near the Daily Democrat as he was walking around handing them out. My mother had a music and book store east of Revis drug near the paper, in '44-45. Below is my OCR of the front and my transcribing of his handwritten comments on the back. Attached are scans of same.  I am 73, a modern-day old-timer of PV. Ottis, as he was commonly known, was quite a character. He wore tan engineer's pants and matching shirt, laced up boots over pants legs, beard and always had his Airdail dog with him. Some considered him a bothersome crackpot, but he was actually very intelligent...more so than some of his critics, and this is evidenced by his work on water sheds. I believe much of his work was used in placing PV's first reservoir out near Hwy 19 north. I have tried to locate Pevine on maps but cannot.

Front of handout OCR:

April 9, 1953
This is all chance I will have in Public
Printing newspaper route to you.
The good Lord will send his 6% Soft
Water from the Heaven's clouds and Wash-
ington Creek will send you hard water of
20% test hard and could reach 48 hardness
after sloshing the banks of Section 33 from
both sides one mile up to the Bottoms School
line.  From this line north and up the Peavine
shed would likely get by with some sort of
mixed water test from the West Peavine shed.
Heading to Washington Creek dam Section 33,
near bank of  Washita  river  supposed to
whollop all this water over your dam site spill
way with a 200 foot wide spillway, when you
will need at least 2 to 500 yard spill way and
a 1000 yard spillway would sound more like
common horsesense when all the danger from
holding is figured in and besides you are cov-
ering up guite a lew acres when supported with
reclamation projects can be made worth $600.00
dollar land.
I got my eyes open when we as free men
of these United States tries to be unfair with
flood control and reclamation for good of one
and all.
Pardon me for exploding on the subject
while thats my say and I can't help it for the
good of one and all its said right and no wrong
about it. So back we go to the Bottom School
line from the west gets water, gets hard water
from Sec. 29, 20 and a sizeable creek enters
Sec. 33.  Your dam site pond from Sec. 32 Le-
low the Bottom School house line Sec. 18 is
home of the Paoli zinc water mines, and its ear
marks plainly shows its mark south down Sec-
lion 17, 20. 29 and 32 south and Sec. 33 east
your Washington dam site pond section.  If
you don't believe in me, bless your souls, go
see for yourself before you vote Yes on the
14th day of April, 1953.  Sometimes cases of
no seeing gets P. V. thumbs down on projects
rushed in an them by Hoorah Slickers. Do your
seeing before you do your voting.  Pauls Val-
ley is in no danger for good soft water when
you turn me loose right now.  In 6 working
days we will have it in P. V. stand pipes
by the plenty and soak it in the old Washita
sloughs on Wacker Park to tide us through
August and September should we need it.
I will close by saying don't wait until
August to do this.  If I do it now my day
(to get at it)  and if  I  wait  I  might
be a blowed up firecracker in August just like I
was (or we was) in 1952 when we fixed the west
P. V.levee.  I begged for a chance to get P. V.
through with a chance for water for August
and September, 1952. We would of had it if
you had said yes in the place of no then.
Now is my day for yes on chance to get
us through August, 1953, and September. The
creek has it now and we can get it ready if we
want it.  Pauls Valley is blessed now with
good water supply, if we can develop it, which
we CAN and MUST.
Respectfully,
J. O. ALLSTOTT

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Back transcription:

Hanna and Davis
lays in the Owl Creek
and Canadian Shed
while 3 miles South
East of Rosedale
on Look Out Hill
Cows in Pasture brand
A on right hip
is in the Peavine Shed
while Washington Creek
takes the li[?]* of
water S in big supply
from this Peavine
Look Out Hill** and
not maybe
     J O Allstott

P S  4-10-53

Burn it if you
dont like it
send it around
if you do [then on the margin]
it was hard to go through muddy weather
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
*Looks like"K" or "tE" but I favor "K" since it
looks like his "K" in "takes", 2 words before,
and "like" in the P. S. There may be an "e" at the end

** Is Look Out Hill East of Rosedale
AND near Peavine??
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Brenda, the dog may have been an Irish Hound, large red or rust hair color. But it was regal!