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====Railroads arrive==== The Choctaw people were sedentary. Their lives were tied to their farms and small acreages. The Choctaw Nation was not home to industry of any sort. As a result, the territory comprising modern-day Pushmataha County was still virgin wilderness decades after the Choctaws’ arrival. During the 1880s the [[St. Louis and San Francisco Railroad]] – popularly known as the Frisco—built a line from [[Fort Smith, Arkansas]] to Paris, Texas. The federal government granted the railroad rights-of-way in Indian Territory to stimulate development and attract European-American settlers. Station stops were established every few miles, both to aid in developing towns and also to serve the railroad. The Frisco's route traveled along the Kiamichi River valley, entering the present-day county near [[Albion, Oklahoma|Albion]] and leaving the river only at Antlers, to skirt the massive bluff where it is located. [[File:George Mayo Map.png|left|thumb|400px|This 1887 map shows the newly opened Frisco Railroad. Its construction stimulated development of a massive logging industry, attracting workers and other immigrants from the United States to the Choctaw Nation—and communities along its length.]] The railroad stimulated development of businesses and other ties to mainstream United States society. The [[telegraph]] was developed and constructed along with the railroad, providing rapid news of events outside the Choctaw Nation. Logging companies opened operations immediately. Rough-and-tumble sawmill communities began growing up around the railroad station stops. [[Kosoma, Oklahoma|Kosoma]], a veritable boomtown, boasted several hotels, doctors’ offices, and general stores during its heyday. During the next few decades, loggers harvested the entire region, using the railroad stations as transshipment points. These transshipment points developed into the present-day communities of Albion, [[Moyers, Oklahoma|Moyers]], and Antlers. Other communities along the railroad between these points later vanished or are today only place names, such as [[Kellond, Oklahoma|Kellond]], [[Stanley, Oklahoma|Stanley]] and [[Kiamichi, Oklahoma|Kiamichi]]. For decades the Frisco constituted the greatest feat of engineering and manmade structure in Pushmataha County. Workers moved and shaped huge amounts of earth to form its elevated roadbed, and constructed numerous wooden trestles over creeks and rivers. Once in place the railroad attracted commerce and industry, where white men in the Indian Territory hoped to stake a claim.
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