History

Nathaniel Pryor, great grandnephew of Pocahontas, and a scout with the Lewis and Clark Expedition, married an Osage Indian and set up a trading post near what is now the City of Pryor, Oklahoma. Nathaniel Pryor’s gravesite had been on private property five miles southeast of Pryor for many years but in 1982 the Mayes County Histor­ical Society moved the grave to the Fairview Cemetery, east of Pryor.

The first United States Post Office opened in the Archer & Bryan Store, on the Texas Trail, July 15,1870. This was known as Pryor’s Creek, with the possessive connotation. On Novem­ber 27, 1878 a new post office by the name of Pryor Creek (the ‘S had been dropped) was opened.

The MK&T (now Union Pacific) Railroad determined the final location of the City of Pryor Creek when it opened the depot in what was then Coo-Y-Yah. The post office officially dropped the word “Creek” from the name on January 26,1909 although all other legal records retain the word.

The first school was a subscription school organized in 1887 in a one-room building. By 1894 the school had enlarged to two rooms, and in 1896, a large, two story, eight-room building was erected.

On June 28,1898, by an Act of Congress, towns were given permission to incorporate under the laws of Arkansas, and to create public school systems. The first free public school system in the city opened October 2, 1902. An additional building was erected in 1915 which was used for
the high school and the 1908 building was designated a grade school.

Oklahoma became a state in 1907, forty-sixth in the union, and boundaries were set that included Pryor Creek and the surrounding area. The Arkansas border is roughly 39 miles from the community.

Oklahoma itself is named from two words in the Choctaw Indian language; “Okla” meaning people and “humma” meaning red, literally meaning red people. There are descendants of sixty-seven tribes living in the state.

The flags of Spain, France, Napo­leon, Mexico, Texas, Confederate States and Great Britain flew over the area until replaced by the flag of the United States of America.

Pryor Creek was incorporated as a city under the laws of the State of Oklahoma. A city charter was adopted at a city-wide vote on January 16, 1951. Governor Johnson Murray signed the charter for the State of Oklahoma on January 30, 1951.

In 1963 the voters of the community decided not to drop the word “Creek” from the city’s name, as the feeling was one of historical significance. Therefore “Pryor Creek” remains the official name, although most residents and visitors know the community simply as Pryor.