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McMullan Family History Trip - 2003
Interstate
40 Through Oklahoma, to Texas and Home
After topping off the
gas tank the next morning, I was back on the road heading west.
I reached the Oklahoma state line at 10am. The wind was blowing
hard right out of the west. My truck doesn’t get very good
gas mileage and when you add a strong head wind, it barely gets
any gas mileage at all! I finally settled back to about 65 miles
per hour rather than the posted 75. It was a lot easier on my
nerves instead of having to fight the wind. Just out of Oklahoma
City, I stopped and ate a late lunch at a Luby’s cafeteria.
I had not eaten at one of those since before I moved to Salt Lake
City in 1993. Shortly after that, I was back on the road. My father’s
sister, Zuma (McMullan) Sutton lives in Erick, Oklahoma. I called
her to let her know that I would be there at about 5pm. Her cousin,
Verdee Lee York, was there but had to leave before I could get
there. When my grandfather was orphaned, he lived with Verdee
Lee’s father and mother. Annie was my grandfather’s
sister but was much older than him. I really wanted to visit with
Verdee Lee but driving as hard as I could, I just couldn’t
be there before she had to leave.
As I exited the Interstate
in Erick, Oklahoma, I drove right by Zuma’s house and saw
that there were no other cars there so I drove out to the city
cemetery. It had been a long time since I had been there and it
took me a few minutes to find my brother’s and grandparent’s
graves. I marked all the grave’s locations with the GPS
so I can walk right to them next time. My brother, David Bruce
McMullan, died at the age of twenty one in 1978 from cancer. He
is buried very close to my grandparents Hubert Newton and Martha Ann "Nettie"
(Hughes) McMullan. I looked at some of the other
graves and then drove back to Zuma’s house. Zuma was the
firstborn of my grandparents and she was just a few months old when my grandparents moved to New Mexico to homestead. Zuma (born Sept. 6, 1920) is ten years
older than my father (born May 21, 1930). She will be 83 years old this year and my
father will be 73 years old. Monday was a good time to see Zuma
because the next day she had to have some medical tests run in
Elk City, Oklahoma. While I was there that night, Gail Sutton,
my first cousin’s wife came into town from her farm to see
us. Zuma and her husband, Howard Sutton, had two sons. Billy David
(Billy Mack) and Frankie Lee Sutton. Billy Mack passed away in
November 2001. He was quite a few years older than me but I always
thought a lot of him and Gail. They had three children, Dwana,
Twila and Sonny. Sonny is running the farm now which is just north
of Erick in the Mayfield, Oklahoma area. I had a great visit
with Zuma and Gail that evening. I told Zuma about my trip and
what I had found out about the McMullan family’s history.
When I awoke the next
morning, Gail had already picked Zuma up and they were on their
way to Elk City, Oklahoma for the medical tests. I stopped at
Howard and Inez Fuchs' farm and house near Sweetwater, Oklahoma. Inez is
my mother’s sister. When I was young I was very close to
their daughter Debbie, my cousin. I always enjoyed when we would
go out to their farm to visit. After I visited there I drove
up to Spearman, Texas to visit with my father. I had noticed how
from about Sayre, Oklahoma eastward, the country was beautifully
green and west of Sayre, the country began to be more brown. The
area where I grew up in the Texas panhandle used to be considered
a large desert. The dust bowl photographs that were made in the
1930's and ‘40's were mostly taken within a short distance
of where I grew up in Spearman, Texas. With the advent of irrigation, much of that desert was
tamed and the crops and livestock that have been grown there have
fed the world. I shared the details of my trip with my father
and had a good time visiting with him that night.
The next morning, before
leaving, I stopped by Max and Carolyn Taylor’s house in
Spearman. I consider Carolyn to be my spiritual mother. We have
been very close for a number of years and share a lot of spiritual
ideals. Leaving Spearman, I drove to Dalhart, Texas and then
crossed into New Mexico. At Raton, I took Interstate 25 north
to Denver. Normally on this trip, I drive all the way through
Colorado and up to Cheyenne, Wyoming. Then I go west across Wyoming
and into Utah. This time, because the westerly wind was so strong,
I turned west at Denver. This would take me west on Interstate 70 and out of much of the brutal wind.
I spent
the night in Georgetown, Colorado. The next morning I got back
on the road and got into a raging snowstorm on Vail Pass at over
11,000 feet in elevation. I was about to think I should have just
braved the wind through Wyoming when I drove out of the snow.
I saw the highest gasoline prices on my trip in Vail. Regular
unleaded gasoline was $1.86 per gallon. The least expensive was
in Hartwell, Georgia at $1.23 for a gallon of regular unleaded.
I arrived home at
6:30pm on Thursday May1, 2003. I had driven 5,220 miles in just
over 93 hours of actual driving time. My GPS told me that my average
driving speed was 54.9 miles per hour and my fastest speed on
the trip was 88.7 miles per hour. I would like to extend a heartfelt
“Thank You” to all of the fine people I met on my
trip. It turned out to be better than I had ever hoped for. |