Editing Pushmataha County, Oklahoma (section)

===Since statehood===
[[File:PushmatahaCounty1909.jpg|thumb|250px|Map of Pushmataha County, 1909]]
Pushmataha County at statehood was considered an agricultural paradise. Local residents believed the soil to be fertile and the weather enviable and moderate; it seemed that almost any fruit or vegetable could be grown. Most residents at the time were farmers who lived off their land.

Cotton was king for the county's first few decades. It was grown throughout the Kiamichi River valley. Growers hauled it into Antlers, Clayton, [[Albion, Oklahoma|Albion]], and other railroad towns to be weighed and shipped to distant markets on the [[Frisco Railroad]].

Many of the farmers or hired hands were African Americans, descendants of slaves of the Choctaw. After being emancipated following the American Civil War under an 1866 treaties that the United States made with each of the Five Civilized Tribes, African Americans who stayed with the Choctaw were called [[Choctaw Freedmen]]. They were granted membership in the nation with voting rights. Others came to the area as laborers in the late 19th century. The county had a significant African-American population in the early 20th century, although this has since dwindled to almost nothing, as people left to seek work. Many African Americans worked in cotton cultivation and, after cotton's decline, they moved elsewhere for other work.

The territory comprising Pushmataha County had been part of the Choctaw Nation, Indian Territory. It was almost completely unimproved in the European-American sense. The Choctaw government owned land in "severalty", or common, controlling the communal land. The Choctaw had their own culture and did not need bridges, roads, or [[public works]].<ref>Angie Debo, ''Rise and Fall of the Choctaw Republic'', p. 222.</ref>

Early business leaders at statehood immediately sought to fund public improvements by asking local voters to pass bonds. The state government did not invest in such infrastructure. Businessmen tried to pass bridge bonds, as example, to build bridges across the Kiamichi River and Jack Fork Creek. These uniformly failed to gain approval, slowing the county's business development. [[Choctaw County, Oklahoma|Choctaw County]], by contrast, passed bonds almost immediately, causing bridges to be built throughout the county. This proved excellent for business and commerce, and after this point Hugo grew significantly faster than Antlers.

Pushmataha County began to develop as European Americans settled and founded communities throughout the county. Each community built its own school, and raised money with which to hire a teacher or teachers. Residents also founded churches, mostly of various Protestant denominations with which they were affiliated. Residents of some of the more significant towns, such as Jumbo, Moyers, Clayton and Albion, also established cultural leagues or institutions—poetry clubs, music groups, and [[literary societies]] – in a bid for cultural refinement.
The Choctaw continued playing a role in the region; its members were elected to local government and served as other government and society leaders in Pushmataha County.

During World War I, county resident [[Tobias W. Frazier]] (Choctaw) was a soldier in the U.S. Army and a member of the famous [[Choctaw Code Talkers]]. Other Code Talkers were from just over the border in McCurtain County. The fourteen soldiers were part of a pioneering use of American Indian languages as military code during war, to enable secret communications among the Allies. Their contributions helped gain victory and brought World War I to a quicker close.<ref>"Choctaw Code Talkers", ''Oklahoma Today'', July–August 1988; "Choctaw Tongue Proved Too Tough for Germans", ''Antlers American'', March 5, 1966. For full information on the Code Talkers see the unpublished compilation of research by the school students of Rattan, Oklahoma, on file in the school library and the Pushmataha County Historical Society.</ref>
[[File:USA work program.svg|thumb|WPA graphic]]
Federal government programs developed by the administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt during the [[Great Depression]] of the 1930s brought substantial improvements and infrastructure to the county: the federal [[Works Progress Administration]] (or WPA) directed the construction with local workers of handsome, sturdy schools and school [[gymnasiums]] in numerous communities. The new buildings were built of native "red rock" gathered in nearby fields. They aged very well. Several are still in use, notably in Moyers, Rattan and Antlers. But the school at Jumbo was bulldozed by a local farmer in the 1990s to clear the field for cattle.

The [[Rural Electrification Administration]] provided guidance and funding to bring electricity to the rural county; electrical lines were strung, connecting homes to the electrical grid. These changes improved indoor conditions, and people began to acquire [[air conditioning]] and television from the 1950s on. People more often conducted their social lives inside rather than on town streets. Architectural design changed, as stores, churches and homes no longer had to allow for maximum ventilation via the free flow of air from open windows and doors.

Highways were paved and standardized in the 1950s, making travel easier and linking farms and countryside to the town markets, and the towns to one another. As people bought more automobiles, they stopped using the railroad. The Frisco ceased passenger operations in the late 1950s as unprofitable. Wholesale changes resulted from railroad restructuring in the later 20th century, and the Frisco ended freight operations in the early 1980s. At that time the [[trestle bridge]]s were dismantled, rails removed and the roadbed was abandoned to nature.

The [[Indian Nation Turnpike]], which opened in 1970, had only one interchange in all of Pushmataha County, at Antlers, connecting residents to freeway travel to [[Oklahoma City]] and [[Tulsa]].