Published: September 20, 2008 11:38 pm            

Starting over

• Potter Church begins rebuilding after May 24 tornado

The annual Potter School/Church Reunion will be held Sept. 28. Things are being done a little differently this year because the Potter Church was destroyed by a tornado May 24.

Plans are to have Sunday school and church services at the Potter Church site and then go to the Orlando Community Center (air conditioned) for lunch and business meeting. Sunday school will start at 10 and church will adjourn at 11:45 to allow time to travel to Orlando for lunch. Plans are to have a tent in place for church services on the grounds. In the event of inclement weather, the church services will also be held in the Orlando Community Center.

A covered dish luncheon will be served at noon. Everyone is asked to bring a meat dish, salad or vegetable and dessert. Table service and drinks will be provided.

Because of the dedication of past and present members, along with hundreds of supporters, the church is being rebuilt. The debris has been removed, a pad for a new building has been leveled and the footing has been run and the concrete slab has been poured.

CREC has upgraded electricity to the site, and the plumbing has been completed. Plans have been drawn up for the new building which will be similar to the old church but with running water, handicapped accessible bathrooms inside the building and upgraded electrical capacity.

Plans are to put up walls on the new church sometime this fall. An update on the progress will be given at the reunion. Plans for the new church will be on display at the reunion along with pictures of the destruction and clean up. Part of the afternoon program will be a virtual tour of the church which includes a walk through of the way the new church will look when it is completed.

Please bring photographs from past reunions to share while reminiscing about the “good old days.” Sam Jerome is trying to restore some pictures that were damaged or lost in the storm. If you have any extra photos of Potter or past reunions, please bring them to replace those that were lost.

If you have any questions about the reunion, please contact Cleta Simms at 580-336-2044 or by e-mail at Cook_1943@att.net



History of the Potter Church and School



It is often said that rural neighborhoods are another good thing of the past erased by progress. But Potter, a rural church in southeastern Garfield County, stands proof that they can be active and beneficial. Even though the rural population of this community has declined since the 1950s, there are some families who still attend this church and care about it.

Soon after the Cherokee Strip was opened in 1893, Miss Lyda Potter opened a post office in a dugout on the claim she had staked. This was one-half mile south of the present Potter Church. The name Potter has stuck since that time. Even though Potter didn’t run the post office very long, she married and a Mr. Siebert took over.

In 1900, William Cawood was postmaster and the next year, his son, W. A. Cawood, became postmaster until it closed. Mail was received by Star Route, and Potter was one of the few inland post offices to receive mail each day. The mail carried by horse and buggy, left Marshall one day, went through Potter and on to Orlando to stay all night. The next day it came back the same way.

In 1903, Abraham Koch carried the mail from Potter to Orlando and back the same day. When five rural routes were started out of Orlando in 1904, Potter Post Office was closed. Koch was appointed the first regular mail carrier for the vicinity, a job which he held for 14 years.

Potter store was opened in 1901 when W. A. Cawood became postmaster. He built a large new home and adjoined it to the post office. The store was his home. The store was supplied by home grown food; the family made cheese and kraut and butchered their own meat to sell. It operated until 1912, eight years after the post office closed.

Potter School was built two years after the Strip opened. The first building was made of logs and located 1 1/2 miles northeast of the present location. Sally Cowan was the first teacher. In 1899, a new school was built just south of the present location of the church on land donated by the Estes family. Church was also held in this building.

In 1905, the first church building was dedicated. It was built on the present church site on land donated by the Hebbe family. There have been having church services at this location ever since except for a short time in the 1920s. The Potter School closed in 1941, and students were transferred to Hayward, Orlando and Marshall.

In 1954, the Potter Community won the state wide Rural Neighborhood Progress Contest sponsored by the Farmer Stockman in cooperation with the Cooperative Extension Division of Oklahoma A&M College. The community was recognized for conservation work and land judging contests. In 1955, the church building burnt. An old school building was bought and moved to that location and church services were held in that building until the tornado May 24.

Reunions were started in 1952. The first one was at an Enid park and the second one was at a Perry park, but they have been at the Potter Church since that time, offering past residents a chance to come home. In the late 70s or early 80s, the old school house was torn down and the only building left standing was the Potter Community Church.

Some of the current activities at the Potter Church, in addition to the regular Sunday services include a live nativity they have at Christmas, Bible School in the summer, camp at Camp Joy and the annual Potter Reunion in September.

        

• Click to discuss this story with other readers on our forums.