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INDIAN RECORDS IN THE OKLAHOMA
HISTORICALL SOCIETY ARCHIVES
By Lawrence C. Kelly
On March 27, 1934, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed into law a bill
which authorized the Oklahoma Historical Society to assume archival
responsibility for a large mass of records and documents relating to the his-
tory of the Indians of Oklahoma. A few months later, however, the prece-
dent which this act set was negated when Rooseveh signed a second bill,
the National Archives Act. This second piece of legislation created the
National Archives and Records Service, charging it with the custody and
safekeeping of all noncurrent federal records.
The bare outline of the negotiations which led to this unique acquisition
of federal Indian records by the Oklahoma Historical Society has been
previously recorded in the minutes of the Society. Thus, a more detailed
examination of those negotiations and a brief assessment of the importance
of the collection which they made possible should be of interest to all
western historians.
Two men, Grant Foreman and Judge Robert Lee Williams, were the
driving forces behind the acquisition. Foreman, a native of Illinois, came
to Muskogee, in the Creek Nation, in 1899 as a legal advisor to the Dawes
Commission, which had been created to liquidate the tribal property and
governments of the Five Civilized Tribes. After four years, Foreman
resigned his position to embark upon the private practice of law in Musko-
gee. Several years later, upon witnessing the widespread looting of Indian
lands which resulted from the removal of federal protection, Foreman
joined the Indian Rights Association of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and
plunged into his lifelong examination of the history of the Five Civilized
Tribes. By the early 1920s he was financially comfortable enough to abandon
the active practice of law and to devote his attention to historical research
and writing.'
Like Foreman, Robert Lee Williams was a lawyer who had emigrated
to Oklahoma. In 1893, he left his native Georgia to take part in the run on
the "Cherokee Strip" but, when this enterprise failed, he returned home to
study for the ministry. After a brief, three year career as a Methodist min-
ster, Williams resigned and for Oklahoma, settling first
A Atoka, in the Choctaw Nation, and then in Durant. This time his career
' The author is a member of the History DIpartment at North Texas State University,
Into. Texas.
' Stankey Clark. "Grant Foreman," The Chronides of Oklahoma, Vol. XXXI, No. 3 (Au-
tnin. 1953). pp. 226-2.42.