Fred Dilbeck

Field Worker:  John F. Daugherty 

Date:  April 27, 1937
Interview # 1300
Address: Sulphur, OK
Born: April 8, 1881
Place of Birth: Arkansas
Father: James Dilbeck, born in Georgia, Stockman
Mother: Harriet Wilson Dilbeck, born in Georgia

My father was James Dilbeck.  He was born in Georgia, November 21, 1853.  He was a stockman and horse dealer.  My mother was Harriet Wilson Dilbeck.  She was born in Georgia, December 25, 1857.  She is still living with me.

I was born April 8, 1881, in Arkansas.  in the fall of 1894, Father decided to move to the Indian Territory to obtain better grass for his cattle.  It took us twenty days to make the trip in a covered wagon.

We settled in the Choctaw Nation near Star in LeFlore County.  We lived in a log house with a dirt floor and a cat chimney.  There was plenty of game and fish.   We used spring water.  We lived here for three years and moved near Dolberg, near the present site of Roff in Pontotoc County.  We crossed a toll bridge which the full blood Indians operated on San Bois Creek, east of Stigler, near Kanima, as we moved here.  We paid $1.00 ferriage for our wagon and team and 10 cents for each head of our cattle.  We were on the road two months.

We paid the Choctaw Government $5.00 per year for the use of the land.   This fee permitted us to cut the grass for hay, graze cattle on it and raise crops.  All that we raised at that time was corn and cotton. 

We had many friends among the Full Bloods, and they never tried to harm us nor our stock in anyway.   They were all peaceable.

I have attended many of their stomp dances.  These were danced in a circle around a fire.  A man would dance in front of his partner.   The only music they had was tom-toms or tambourines and they yelled constantly while dancing.

My father is buried at Old Dolberg which is no longer in existence.

Transcribed by Brenda Choate and Dennis Muncrief, April 2001.

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