James I. WOOD
The present mayor of that large and flourishing industrial City of McAlester, James I. WOOD has been closely identified with the agricultural and political life of this section of old Indian Territory and the new state for more than twenty-two years. He was the first treasurer of Pittsburg County, and also was one of the delegates to the Constitutional Convention.
He was chosen to represent a portion of the Eighty-ninth District in the convention which formulated the organic laws of Oklahoma, and during the session he served on auditing committee, the committee on impeachments and removal from office, and the committee on geological survey. Because of the progressive character of Oklahoma's first state constitution it has always been considered an honor to have been identified with the making of it, and that distinction will have increasing importance with passing years.
After the constitution was completed Mr. Wood became a candidate for county treasurer of Pittsburg County, was nominated by the democrats, and was elected by a majority of about nine hundred votes. He was the first individual elected to fill that office, and served for five and a half years, retiring from the county office in July, 1914. In April, 1915, Mr. Wood was elected mayor of McAlester, and has already shown the progressive and independent quality of his administration, which is one of marked benefit for the municipality.
Mr. Wood is of old American stock. His great-grandfather William Wood served as a soldier in the War of 1812, and was a prominent settler in Tennessee from which state he subsequently moved to Marion County, Arkansas, and died there during the second year of the Civil War. Thomas B. Wood, the grandfather, was born in White County, Tennessee, and went out to the frontier of settlement west of the Mississippi, and established a home in Arkansas when it was a part of the old Louisiana Territory. He died in Marion County of that state about 1851 at the age of sixty. By his marriage to Elizabeth TALBOTT his children were: William S., Fred T., Benton, John W., and four daughters.
William S. Wood, father of McAlester's mayor, was born in Marion County, Arkansas, in 1823. At the outbreak of the Civil War he enlisted in Gen. Joe Shelby's Confederate command and served in the Trans-Mississippi Department. He had previously been sheriff of Marion County from 1850 to 1854. In 1873 he moved to Comanche County, Texas, and died there during the early '90s. He was a democrat, a member of the Masonic order and of the Christian Church. He married Malinda COKER, daughter of William COKER of Alabama. Their children were: Thomas B., Sylvester, Fred T., Frank, William S., Arminta who married James MAGNUS, Maggie, and James I.
James I. WOOD was born in Marion County, Arkansas, February 3, 1850, grew up on his father's farm in that state and was twenty-three years of age when he accompanied the family to Comanche County, Texas. He continued his efforts there as a farmer for twenty years, and then in the early '90s moved into the Choctaw country of Indian Territory, establishing a home near Scipio. In that locality he conducted farm and ranch for about thirteen years, and played the part of an industrious and hardworking citizen with only incidental participation in public affairs until he was made the choice of his fellow citizens for representative in the constitutional convention.
Before leaving Arkansas on March 26, 1872, Mr. Wood married Miss Cynthia A. DOBBS. Her father was Jonathan Dobbs. To their marriage were born the following children: Ada, who married Virgil H. GRANTHAM; Jonathan W.; Burr; Olin; Ota, who married E. C. WINGROVE; Minnie, and Lafe.