Editing Kingfisher, Oklahoma (section)

===19th century===
Kingfisher came into existence on April 22, 1889, when land owned by the federal government was opened to settlement by "[[land run]]". A huge area in what is now central Oklahoma was literally "peopled" by non-Native Americans overnight. The city is situated on a part of the [[Chisholm Trail]], over which millions of [[Texas Longhorn|Texas longhorns]] were driven to railheads in Kansas in the years immediately following the [[American Civil War|Civil War]]. Extension of the railroads and settlement of the open range ended this colorful era.

The town was named for an early resident who several landmarks were named for, a man named King Fisher.<ref name="johnalley">Alley, John. City Beginnings in Oklahoma Territory. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Oklahoma, 1939.</ref>

The bill that opened Oklahoma Territory to non-Indian settlement limited the sizes of townsites to {{convert|320|acre|ha}}. Settlers in the Kingfisher area formed two communities: Kingfisher City, on the north side of the settlement, and Lisbon, on the south side. The two merged on June 14, 1890, and the resulting town was named Kingfisher. Oklahoma Territory was organized May 2, 1890, and consisted of the Unassigned Lands and the Panhandle. The Western District included present-day Kingfisher County, part of [[Canadian County, Oklahoma|Canadian County]] and the [[Oklahoma Panhandle|Panhandle]]. [[Abraham Jefferson Seay]], a [[Missouri]] native, was appointed as District Judge and moved to Kingfisher. In 1892, Seay was appointed as the second territorial governor by President [[Benjamin Harrison]].<ref name="EOHC-Kingfisher"/>

Railroads helped with Kingfisher’s growth: the [[Chicago, Kansas and Nebraska Railway]] (later part of the [[Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad|Rock Island]]) built through the area, the first passenger train arriving on October 23, 1889.<ref name="OHS1">{{Cite web |title=Kingfisher |url=https://www.okhistory.org/publications/enc/entry?entry=KI010 |access-date=February 18, 2023 |publisher=Oklahoma Historical Society}}</ref>

A newspaper was published in Kingfisher from 1889 to 1963 under the names ''Kingfisher Free Press'', ''The New World'', ''Kingfisher Weekly Free Press'', and ''Kingfisher Weekly Star and Free Press''.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Kingfisher Free Press Archive |url=https://www.newspapers.com/paper/kingfisher-free-press/20570/ |access-date=2024-11-09 |website=[[Newspapers.com]]}}</ref>