Chronicles of Oklahoma
Volume 18, No. 2
June, 1940
MRS. LAURA E. HARSHA
BY CAROLYN THOMAS FOREMAN
Page 182
Mrs. Laura E. Harsha, an outstanding citizen of Oklahoma for many years, was the daughter of the Rev. Luther Newcomb and Elizabeth
Kelsey Newcomb. She was born August 25, 1858 at Napoli, New York and attended school at Pomona, Kansas, where her father was
pastor of a church. Miss Newcomb began teaching in a rural school at Valley Brook, Kansas, the spring before she was sixteen
and in July, 1878, she became a teacher in the Indian Public School at Okmulgee, Creek Nation, under the superintendent, the
Rev. William McCombs.1
Though Okmulgee was only a hamlet thirty-five pupils attended Miss Newcomb's classes. In addition to her work in the day school
she organized and conducted a Sunday school; she trained the children to sing hymns and when a circuit rider preached in the
town once a month her pupils formed the choir. At that period Okmulgee was distinctly an Indian town with few white citizens.
Stores were kept by the late Clarence W. Turner and Jonathan Parkinson. There were two doctors but no churches. "Uncle Jack"
Porter was the proprietor of a small hotel while another was run by a Negro man.2
In Okmulgee Miss Newcomb became engaged to William S. Harsha and they were married in Kansas by her father. William S. Harsha
was born at Albia, Monroe County, Iowa, February 8, 1857. His parents moved to a farm south of Ottawa, Kansas, where their
son spent the first nineteen years of his life. He went to Muskogee, Indian Territory in 1876, and drove a mail hack between
that town and Okmulgee until he secured a position in the store of Turner and Harvison in the Creek capital. Mr. Harsha learned
to speak the Creek language which was a great advantage to him in business.3
For a year after their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Harsha lived in Wetumpka where there were only two white families and two general
merchandise stores. Game was plentiful and they lived on prairie chickens, wild turkeys and venison hams which could be bought
for twenty-five cents each. When they moved to Okmulgee Mr. Harsha was a partner in a store and once when he was away from
home buying cattle a rumor was circulated that the store was to be robbed by a band of thieves. There was a large sum of money
in the till and Roscoe Cutler, who roomed in
Page 183
the store, carried the money to Mrs. Harsha who sewed the bills in the hem of her long full skirt where it remained until
all danger was past.
Mrs. Harsha saw a white boy given fifty lashes in the council grounds at Okmulgee, for stealing, and the punishment almost
killed him. Under Creek law one hundred lashes were administered for a second offense and death for a third.
Mr. and Mrs. Harsha had two children born in Okmulgee after which they moved to Muskogee in August, 1881, and made their home
on South Second Street. Mr. Harsha became a member of the first grand jury after the Federal Court was established in the
Indian Territory and he was a member of the first city council when a municipal government was organized in Muskogee. The
Harshas lost much property in the fire of 1886 which practically destroyed the town. At the time of the fire in 1899 they
were living at 321 North Sixth Street.
Mrs. Harsha was one of the first members of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union in Muskogee and the first convention of
the organization in the Territory appears to have been held there in July, 1888.4
In the early days in Muskogee, Harrell Institute, a girls' school, was maintained by the Methodist Church and boys up to twelve
years of age were allowed to attend. Bacone College took boys of all ages but it was a long distance from town and there was
no school in the place for older boys who were running wild on the streets. The W. C. T. U. decided to remedy this deplorable
situation and Robert L. Owen gave the society a lot on which to build a school. Mrs. Harsha secured a loan of $1,000 from
Professor Bacone of the college and Clarence W. Turner allowed the organization to get lumber from his yard with the privilege
of paying for it as money was available. Mrs. Harsha stood security for the sums.
By the autumn of 1890 the building was completed, two teachers were employed and the school was opened for boys and girls.
Tuition was paid by parents who could afford to do so but no child was refused the chance to study because of poverty by the
devoted women of the W. C. T. U. Salaries for the teachers were donated by liberal citizens of the town while the W. C. T.
U. members gave entertainments, medal contests, dinners and even sold ice cream on the streets to raise the monthly sum due
on the debts. As much as $100 was raised at some of the entertainments and that was clear gain as the buildings in which the
affairs were held were used without cost. Fifty dollars were sent cyclone sufferers in McAlester as a result of "The Old Maids
Convention."
Indian Agent Leo E. Bennett, in his report to the commissioner of Indian affairs in 1890, wrote: "As a movement calculated
to
Page 184
educate the people, I mention the efforts now being made by the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of the Indian Territory
to establish a free public school at Muskogee, with branches spoken of elsewhere. This is directly educational and should
receive all possible encouragement." The loan and debts were almost repaid when the public school was started in Muskogee
in September, 1898.
Mrs. Harsha related that in 1898, Miss Frances E. Willard,5 Anne Adams Gordon and Mary Powderly (Miss Willard's secretary) made a tour of the southern states and Mrs. Harsha prevailed
upon them to visit Muskogee, although it was not on their itinerary, in order to help cancel the debt still owed by the society.
While in Muskogee Miss Willard was a guest in Mrs. Harsha's home. Miss Gordon held an afternoon meeting for women and children
while Miss Willard spoke at a general meeting in the evening.
The Indian Territory W. C. T. U. aided the Orphan's Home at Pryor. Through the efforts of this society the merchants and other
people of Muskogee sent a car load of furniture, clothing and other supplies to the school soon after it was opened; the costs
of transportation were donated by the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railroad.
In February, 1898, the firm of J. E. Turner & Company, of which Mr. Harsha had been a member for many years, was dissolved
by mutual consent. Mr. Turner retired and the firm, thereafter Harsha & Spaulding, became one of the prominent establishments
in the Creek Nation.
Mr. and Mrs. Harsha were the parents of nine children; Izora, Roscoe, Hoy, Rex, William, Edith, Frances Willard, Anna Cordon
and Truman. Between the years 1891 and 1905, Mrs. Harsha attended almost all of the annual W. C. T. U. national conventions
and two worlds' conventions in the United States.
Mrs. Harsha was a Presbyterian when she first came to the Indian Territory but later joined the Christian Church. Mr. Marsha
died February 5, 1939 and Mrs. Harsha passed away at the home of her daughter, Mrs. W. V. Ryan, in Seattle, Washington, Friday,
January 19, 1940. She is survived by three sons, Hoy of Haskell, Oklahoma; Truman of Miami, Oklahoma; William M. of Rosemead,
California, and two daughters, Mrs. Ryan of Seattle and Mrs. Joe Brandon of Para, Brazil; twenty grandchildren and two great
grandchildren.
Funeral services for Mrs. Harsha were conducted in Muskogee, January 24, 1940 and burial was in Greenhill Cemetery.6
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