Chapter 7 | Section 3
Tenant Farmers
Race and racism left a heavy imprint on the young state of Oklahoma, but it is important to remember also that poverty affected the lives of many Oklahomans, regardless of race, ethnicity, or religious beliefs. Many who moved to Oklahoma in the early years of the twentieth century wanted to own their own farms, but Oklahoma proved to be a difficult place for poor farmers to get ahead. They suffered from high rent prices and extreme poverty. Most were uneducated and saw working the land as their best chance to create stable lives for themselves and their families. In the same way that many African Americans faced disappointment when confronted with the limitations of Oklahoma as a promised land of opportunity and equality, poor whites who moved to Oklahoma looking for a better life for themselves and their families also faced disappointment.
The bustling cotton market in Idabel, Oklahoma, 1925. During the 1910s and 1920s, cotton cultivation expanded in Idabel, beginning with one cotton gin in 1904 and increasing to six by the 1930s.
Courtesy of the Oklahoma Historical Society.
A number of people migrated to Oklahoma to participate in land runs and land lotteries as a means of owning their own property. But what happened to most of that property? Some found success with the land they acquired. They turned their plots into farmland, or they used their land to help develop cities and open businesses. Others, however, quickly faced financial ruin, especially those who were poor to begin with and had no additional money to invest in the property they acquired. Some lost property they could not maintain and instead became tenant farmers, who rented rather than owned the land on which they farmed.
One particular challenge that tenant farmers faced was the corrupt guardianship of Indigenous land. Prior to the 1890s, a number of poor people made their way into Oklahoma from the South and rented land from Native American tribes, especially from the Five Tribes in the eastern half of what became Oklahoma. As Indigenous land came under the control of white guardians, both before and after allotment, rent rates increased as competition for land also increased. This rise in the cost of rent caused economic hardship for tenant farmers. It also did nothing to help Indigenous landowners when guardians pocketed the money. In the decade after statehood, rent rates for farmland throughout Oklahoma skyrocketed. Tenant farmers faced extraordinary hardships as they struggled to survive.
Many tenant farmers grew angrier and angrier as time went on because the rent they paid kept increasing. They encountered a range of other problems as well. Fluctuations in sale prices for their crops made planning difficult from one year to the next. A surprising number of tenant farmers changed land every year or two when their leases were up. This constant moving around made it hard to get ahead. Sometimes owners refused to renew the lease, or renters sought better quality land and/or more reasonable rates. On the whole, efforts to secure better land and more favorable leases proved unsuccessful.
Another problem was a tick-borne disease commonly known as “Texas fever.” It proved so devastating to herds of cattle that the government began requiring treatment for cows that involved dipping them into large vats of highly toxic chemicals. Ranchers and farmers with large numbers of cattle were more likely to support dipping than tenant farmers who only had a few cows. If a farmer only had one or two cows, the death of one cow in a vat would be an extreme hardship.
Tenant farmers viewed government-required dipping as a violation of their rights and were vocal in their opposition to it. When forced dipping continued, some tenant farmers turned to violence. Night riders destroyed property, including vats, in the middle of the night. They also threatened landowners with physical harm and property damage if they continued to raise the rent. Some turned to membership in the Socialist Party because they believed Socialist candidates were more sympathetic to the problems they faced. Some joined labor unions and other organizations that promised to help them. The largest organization in Oklahoma that voiced support for tenant farmers was the Working Class Union (WCU). They claimed to have as many as 35,000 members in Oklahoma prior to the First World War.
The First World War
When war broke out in Europe in the summer of 1914, many Oklahomans paid little attention. It was far away. It was not their fight. And Oklahomans had their own problems to address. But the war’s outbreak created uneasiness across the country, which only increased the longer the war went on. Cotton prices during this time dropped about 20 percent, which only hurt Oklahoma farmers. President Woodrow Wilson initially urged Americans to remain neutral in their thoughts and their actions. He reminded them that as a nation of immigrants with citizens from both sides of the conflict, America could not choose sides without risking its own civil war. Americans were not interested in another civil war. Immigrants from numerous countries called Oklahoma home and had sympathies on both sides of the conflict. It seemed a good idea to follow Wilson’s advice. However, the longer the war went on, the trading partnerships between the United States and the Allied Powers put the country clearly on the side of the Allied Powers, which included (among others) the British, French, and Russians. Germany, as part of the Central Powers, was fighting against the Allies. Germany’s opposition to some of America’s greatest allies put German Americans, including those living in Oklahoma, in a complicated position.
President Wilson won re-election in November 1916, in part because for more than two years he had officially kept the United States out of the war. That all changed in early 1917. Germany tried to entice Mexico to attack the United States. Germany also began aggressively attacking American ships used for trading with the Allies. These two factors among others finally led Congress to declare war against Germany on April 6, 1917, after four long days of debate.
Many Oklahomans remained unconvinced that this was a necessary war. After all, to some it seemed that tenant farmers in Oklahoma had more in common with poor German farmers than they did with the political and economic elites of their two countries. They wondered why America and Germany should fight each other. When the Selective Service Act was passed in May of 1917, many Oklahomans ignored the new law, which required men between the ages of 21 and 30 (the age range was extended to 18 to 45 the following year) to register for the draft. In June of 1917, fewer than 25 percent of draft-eligible men in Oklahoma had registered and indicated their fitness to serve. The war was especially unpopular with poor male farmers who worried about what would happen to their families and their farms if they had to go fight a war in Europe.
The Socialist Party was vocal in its criticism of the war, and Oklahoma had a significant number of Socialist Party members—more members per capita than any other state in 1910. In 1914 the Socialist candidate for governor won 21 percent of the vote. Socialists characterized the war as a conflict that pitted working-class people from different countries against one another. They said that poor people were being forced to fight a rich man’s war. In the United States, the Socialist Party creatively, though unsuccessfully, argued that the Selective Service Act violated the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery and made involuntary servitude illegal. In their view, the war draft was a form of involuntary, or forced, servitude. Antiwar and antidraft sentiment was strong in rural Oklahoma, until two important events caused Oklahomans to reconsider—and then abandon—their opposition.
Green Corn Rebellion
Oklahoma was not alone in its draft opposition. Antidraft protests and rebellions occurred in other western and southern states, including Texas and Arkansas. However, one particular rebellion in Oklahoma shocked those in state leadership positions as well as citizens who feared lawlessness and property destruction. Unrest among poor farmers in rural Oklahoma grew in the spring and early summer of 1917. As we have seen, there were plenty of reasons for their frustration. There were also organizers from outside Oklahoma who traveled around the young state speaking at events that looked a lot like religious tent revivals. Fiery speeches mixed evangelical Christianity with Socialism and antigovernment sentiment. The core message: farmers were being exploited. The entrance of the United States into World War I and the passage of the Selective Service Act further inflamed the farmers.
Green Corn Rebellion, 1917. In early August 1917, hundreds of tenant farmers, such as those in this photo, gathered at the farm of John Spears near Sasakwa, Oklahoma. These men opposed the First World War and the draft, so they organized a rebellion against the US government. Their plan was to march to Washington, DC, surviving on roasted green corn during their journey. Their protest became known as the Green Corn Rebellion, and it was the beginning of the end for the Socialist Party’s influence in Oklahoma.
Courtesy of the Oklahoma Historical Society.
As a result of their fears over how the draft would affect their ability to support their families and maintain their farms, hundreds of men took part in plotting a rebellion. The plan was simple. They would march to Washington, DC, and demand to speak to President Wilson. They would tell him to end the war. Then they would return home to their families and their farms. They planned to take corn with them to eat on their journey to the nation’s capital, but the green corn was not yet ripe, which is how their protest earned the name the Green Corn Rebellion.
The Green Corn Rebellion ended almost before it started. Local authorities were alerted to the rebels’ plans. Another antidraft group had been arrested a few days before the Green Corn Rebellion started. Within a short amount of time, on August 2 and 3, over 450 men were arrested. Some never made it beyond their home counties, while others made it only a short distance outside their counties. Whites, Native Americans, and African Americans all participated in the rebellion. They shared a common fear about what would happen to their families if they were forced to fight overseas. And they were determined to fight against government officials who would force them to leave their families to go to a distant war. Many, however, were not prepared to take up arms against neighbors and friends. Local sheriffs deputized community members to help put down the rebellion, and this as much as anything caused the participants of the Green Corn Rebellion to surrender within a few days.
The socialist movement and Green Corn Rebellion. With a high percentage of landless farmers, socialism grew in popularity in Oklahoma in the early twentieth century.
Courtesy of Brad Watkins, PhD.
Jones Family Conspiracy Trial
While those who participated in the Green Corn Rebellion planned to travel away from their home state to convince the president to end the war, members of the Jones Family plotted a very different strategy to oppose the draft. Eleven members of an antidraft group, known as the Jones family and loosely associated with the WCU, were arrested a few days before the Green Corn Rebellion. Their trial came on the heels of intense media attention to that other rebellion, and eight members of the Jones Family were found guilty of conspiracy to oppose the draft. In their trial, testimony revealed that they planned to hide draft-age men and set traps for any government agents who came looking for them. They intended to use dynamite to blow up bridges and destroy communication lines to keep the draft-age men safe from those who would force them to fight. Another plan included instructions for women helpers. To give their men time to escape, the women would offer food laced with deadly strychnine to government agents.
The testimony in the Jones Family conspiracy trial revealed two important facts. First, the Jones Family had planned to use illegal and destructive tactics, including murder. Second, the Jones Family had used a troubling amount of misinformation to convince these farmers that such drastic actions were not only just, but necessary. Farmers feared that “all able-bodied men would be taken by the army and sent to Germany,” while “the old men, the women, and children would be forced to work large tracts of land.” They were also led to believe this scenario would leave “their women despoiled and broken, their babies starving and dying from neglect.” In the same trial one witness testified that a state organizer told a group of tenant farmers that President Wilson had ordered the drafting of farmers to spare the college boys. This argument, though false, must only have increased whatever antidraft sentiment these farmers already possessed.
Although it is true there were outsiders who came to Oklahoma to spread lies among tenant farmers about the war and the intent of the government, it is also true that tenant farmers had legitimate grievances. Their fear of leaving their families both physically and economically unprotected was not unreasonable. The fearmongering used by organizers to incite rebellions against the draft is important to bear in mind, but it is also important to understand the very real concerns that participants had over the survival of their families. Still, the Jones Family conspiracy trial and the Green Corn Rebellion led to a strong backlash among Oklahomans who quickly went from questioning the war to supporting it whole-heartedly.
Council of Defense and Extreme Patriotism
Across the country, cities and states created Council of Defense organizations to promote patriotism during World War I, especially in the South and West, where opposition to the war was strongest. Oklahoma had a state Council of Defense even before the summer unrest of 1917, but it was now growing in power and popularity.
At the direction of Governor Robert Williams, the Oklahoma Council of Defense took on several wartime jobs. It started by educating Oklahomans about the necessity of the war, but after a few months its focus shifted more to silencing any criticism of the war, rounding up draft dodgers, and promoting the sale of war bonds. In some communities, people who did not buy war bonds (even if they had no money) were harassed and accused of disloyalty. The fact that Oklahomans outpaced many states in their purchase of war bonds had as much to do with fear as it did patriotism. Teaching and speaking the German language were banned. Lutheran churches in Oklahoma stopped offering German language sermons and crowded their sanctuaries with American flags. Those who opposed the war or did not convey enough support of it were called “slackers,” and were subject to ridicule, beatings, and imprisonment. In some instances, they were even tarred and feathered—a brutal form of public torture.
Although most citizens did not participate in these more disturbing displays of extreme patriotism, many Oklahomans ultimately came to support the war effort in a variety of ways. Crop prices increased significantly between 1916 and 1918, which helped Oklahoma’s economy. Oklahoma wheat and cotton farmers eagerly responded to the global demands for their crops by increasing production, and they enjoyed newfound prosperity thanks to higher profits. By the time World War I came to an end in 1918, 85,000 Oklahomans had served. This included nearly 20,000 African Americans, 5,000 Native Americans, and 60,000 whites. Some of the first code talkers came from Oklahoma. Code talkers were Comanches, Choctaws, and Cherokees who used their native languages to send coded messages that German forces were unable to break. Joseph Oklahombi (Choctaw) captured 150 German soldiers and used his native language to pass coded messages.
During the First World War more than 50,000 soldiers trained at Fort Sill. Here is an Armistice Day parade in Lawton, Oklahoma, just three days after the war ended in 1918.
Courtesy of the Oklahoma Historical Society.
Joseph Oklahombi (Choctaw) served with distinction as a code talker in World War I. Oklahombi was a member of Company D, 141st Infantry Regiment, 36th Division, American Expeditionary Forces, in France in 1918. In honor of his service, he received the Silver Star with Victory Ribbon and the French Croix de Guerre.
Courtesy of the Oklahoma Historical Society.
Flu Epidemic and Public Health Crisis
The flu epidemic of 1918 and 1919 infected nearly one-third of the world’s population. Approximately 500 million people contracted the highly contagious virus, and 50 million of that number died from it. The first recorded case was in Kansas in March 1918. The flu then spread rapidly and globally during the last year of the war.
During the First World War, almost 500,000 women in Oklahoma joined American Red Cross organizations in their communities. They promoted the sale of war bonds and worked in factories. Some served as nurses in the army or navy. Others volunteered for the YWCA and other nonmilitary groups supporting the troops. Volunteers also often treated flu patients. In the city of Muskogee, Alice Robertson (left foreground) organized the American Red Cross canteen and workroom.
Courtesy of the Oklahoma Historical Society.
The close proximity of soldiers and their lack of access to daily hygiene allowed the virus to spread rapidly, especially in the trenches. Soldiers infected one another and spread the virus to civilian populations as well.
In Oklahoma, approximately 7,350 people died from the flu, nearly ten times as many Oklahomans as died fighting in the war. The victims were diverse in race, ethnicity, religion, age, and class. It was impossible to explain why some people lived and some people died. Theaters closed. Curfews were set. People were frightened. A century later, in the 2020s, Oklahomans would live through another public health crisis in the battle against COVID-19. Although the COVID pandemic may seem to us like no other event, it is important to remember that earlier generations of Oklahomans found themselves in a not-so-different situation. They too grappled with debates over individual rights and responsibilities, the role of government and public health experts, mask requirements, and mandates to close public facilities and businesses to slow the spread of disease.