Hey, friends!This week our museum memory comes from an interesting article found at the McCarter Museum titled “Gilkeson built first house in Tonkawa” (By Margaret Lawson Foster) 1994W.W. Gilkeson built the first house, from the ground up, in Tonkawa at 103 N. 10th St. His wife, Sarah Leelanau Brewer, died in 1892. Her father, GC Brewer, was Tonkawa Indian agent at the time. His children, Earl, Mary, Anita and Ben stayed at the agency with their grandparents while their father participated in the race for land. Anita Gilkeson Lawson age 105 is now living in Dallas with her daughter, Margaret Lawson foster. As a young woman in Tonkawa, she worked for Miss Alice Loeb who ran a military shop, making beautiful hats for the ladies of Tonkawa. Later, with the coming of the telephone, she was one of the first telephone operators. In 1917, she went to work in Ponca City as bookkeeper for Lessert’s Garage, where she met her future husband Samuel Lawson. The marriage ceremony took place in the house on 10th St. which she owned in 1919. Her sister, Mary, married a J Brown of Tonkawa. Their only child, Kenneth, died in his early 20s. In the early days, WW Gilkeson worked as a freight agent bringing in supplies from our Arkansas City, KS which was a two day trip by team and wagon. Later he worked as a brickmason, laying the foundation of the Presbyterian Church as well as a number of Tonkawas brick streets.In a letter from Margaret Foster she writes “I spent a lot of time in Tonkawa in my growing up years and it means a great deal to me.”
