Speaker 1: Good morning, good morning, good morning, and welcome, welcome, welcome.
Speaker 1: It is now nine forty five and it is time
Speaker 1: now for our community connection. We got Joe Sears in
Speaker 1: the studio today and it's always fun when we have
Speaker 1: Joel board, So Joe, I know. It is the holidays
Speaker 1: season and the hotel in Dewey.
Speaker 2: Yes, we were carrying.
Speaker 3: We're kind of reintroducing a little bit of a tradition,
Speaker 3: I guess.
Speaker 2: Well.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, some new, some old, some new and some old. Well,
Speaker 4: the Dewey Hotel has been the center of Dewey's whole being.
Speaker 4: It was the in the whole area, the icon of
Speaker 4: history around. Yeah, and thank goodness, somebody had the good
Speaker 4: sense to save the old hotel. It was turned into
Speaker 4: a museum in the mid sixties. But the Jake and
Speaker 4: Nanny Bartles built the hotel back in eighteen ninety nine.
Speaker 4: As for the wheat business, that's beautiful New England hotel
Speaker 4: out in the middle of the prairie. But it's like
Speaker 4: Frank Phillips and wool Rock. You know, he wooed people
Speaker 4: in the oil business with that beautiful ranch. Mister Bartow's
Speaker 4: and Nanny wooed people in the wheat business with that
Speaker 4: New England hotel out in the middle of the park.
Speaker 4: But they had arrange for a stage line to come
Speaker 4: in from Coffee Bill Kansas. It would get their customers
Speaker 4: from the east right up to the front door. And
Speaker 4: when they opened the stagecoach and there was this New England,
Speaker 4: beautiful place, hey you know, yeah, and good cooking featured
Speaker 4: wild game and so that's been the nucleus of entertainment
Speaker 4: for many years. So we're trying to bring a lot
Speaker 4: of that back with new modern day. And so we're
Speaker 4: getting ready to have our Santa visits at the hotel
Speaker 4: and it coincides with the City of Dewey and their
Speaker 4: Christmas Tree lighting, which takes place Thursday. Is coming Thursday
Speaker 4: at six o'clock, and they planted the City Dewey planted
Speaker 4: Christmas tree years ago across the street from the hotel
Speaker 4: in that city park in hopes that someday it would
Speaker 4: be big enough to decorate them.
Speaker 2: Well it is.
Speaker 4: It's finally big enough and they put lights on it
Speaker 4: and Santa throws his hand and magically the lights all
Speaker 4: pop on and the Dewey High School choir pops into
Speaker 4: Joy to the world and it's just goodness, theatrical.
Speaker 2: Fun. Well, it is in force.
Speaker 4: We call it celebrating the small town Christmas. And all
Speaker 4: the little northern communities of Want and Copan and Uh
Speaker 4: and all the country people come in to Dewey with
Speaker 4: their kids and grandkids and wait their turn inside the
Speaker 4: lobby and we take pictures of them in the parlor
Speaker 4: and give them how Coco and it's just a special
Speaker 4: thing we do for the families up in that area.
Speaker 4: Now Bartlesville's welcome, but it's really celebrating the small town
Speaker 4: Christmas understood.
Speaker 3: And you know, Dewey is one of those communities where
Speaker 3: it looks like just about everybody's little small hometown that
Speaker 3: they have remembered from childhood, wherever they come from across
Speaker 3: the United States.
Speaker 2: It just kind of fits that mold. It does. And
Speaker 2: as one of the those is there's still this thing
Speaker 2: that kind of draws.
Speaker 4: Off and when they come back from other places as residents,
Speaker 4: they bring their friends with them and they bring him.
Speaker 2: To the hotel. But they always say, you know, I've
Speaker 2: been here all my life and I never went in.
Speaker 4: The hotel and it's like my last time you did there,
Speaker 4: you go and once they do it now a lot.
Speaker 2: We now bring kids in from the school.
Speaker 4: Just a block away is the school and they come
Speaker 4: down and re educate them as to how do he
Speaker 4: got his name? And Dewey was named by Jake Bartles.
Speaker 4: The Battle of Manila, the Spanish American War was taking
Speaker 4: place as the hotel was being built and mister Bartle's
Speaker 4: named his new town after Admiral Dewey and the Battle
Speaker 4: of Vanila, and so he's just, well, how wonderful is
Speaker 4: a town named after one of the latest American hero
Speaker 4: So it's got all.
Speaker 2: Those uniqueness things to it.
Speaker 4: But the city of Dewey has gone all out and
Speaker 4: supporting our efforts to know, do these activities that we do,
Speaker 4: our family Film Festival, and that's been very successful.
Speaker 3: I've been hearing great reviews.
Speaker 4: Yeah, everybody gathers, we have a good time. We have
Speaker 4: heaters outside that warms people up with the popcorn. But
Speaker 4: it's really taken off. I mean you drive by and
Speaker 4: there you see this big crowd out there watching a
Speaker 4: movie beside the hotel. And now we've got and then
Speaker 4: we had our Haunted House for kids, and that took
Speaker 4: a lot of doings. You know, it's you don't disturb
Speaker 4: the spirits of the hotel. They've been there forever and
Speaker 4: they're very nice spirits, and they do exist, and we
Speaker 4: just leave them alone. But during COVID, we had to
Speaker 4: figure out ways to come up with money, so we
Speaker 4: opened the doors for the first time in over one
Speaker 4: hundred years to paranormal tours, and nobody went away disappointed.
Speaker 4: But the spirits did their share of clocking in and
Speaker 4: making sure everybody got their money's worth. But you know,
Speaker 4: they don't scare people, but wonderful things happen and telling stories,
Speaker 4: and we've got great stories. We got the little girl
Speaker 4: who died there of mosquito bites. She was on her
Speaker 4: way from Ohio back to Colorado, and they swung down
Speaker 4: through Dewey because they had all these Fourth of July
Speaker 4: activities and it was an entertainment place. But I guess
Speaker 4: she had gotten lost somewhere along these river bottoms. But
Speaker 4: parents don't allow their children to get eaten up by
Speaker 4: mosquito bites, so we just think she probably got lost.
Speaker 4: The newspaper article didn't really say, but she died in
Speaker 4: the hotel from too many mosquito bites.
Speaker 2: The doctors couldn't save her, but her little spirit is.
Speaker 4: There and we didn't know about it for years, but
Speaker 4: the clairvoyance would come through and they would say, do
Speaker 4: you have a little girl in here? It's like, what,
Speaker 4: we don't know. We don't have any records of it.
Speaker 4: And so someone sent us a newspaper article on there.
Speaker 4: It was the story of the little girl and the
Speaker 4: whole town of Dewey came to her funeral.
Speaker 2: I thought that was very touching.
Speaker 4: So it's got wonderful stories and so all of these
Speaker 4: activities that we're doing were very careful that we have
Speaker 4: first class way of doing it so that it's people
Speaker 4: who are very traditional in the area. People didn't like
Speaker 4: mausolem stories at the cemetery, even though it was handled
Speaker 4: very respectfully. They're extra things that people do to anyway,
Speaker 4: the hotel is make doing its share to keep the
Speaker 4: doors open, to make things happen for the community, but
Speaker 4: really to raise the awareness that to young people in particular.
Speaker 4: I guess if you get used to a museum, going
Speaker 4: to the symphony, going to a play or a ballet,
Speaker 4: the same thing as going to a football game, you
Speaker 4: learn the process of supporting it and that's how the
Speaker 4: arts continue indeed, and that's how the Dewey Hotel will
Speaker 4: survive one hundred years from now, is you know, promoting
Speaker 4: it to young people who want to come there, who
Speaker 4: want to bring their guests.
Speaker 2: There, and it works.
Speaker 4: It's working it and making the place special for you know,
Speaker 4: our families in the area, which are mainly blue collar workers,
Speaker 4: you know, who just regular everyday people, and they feel
Speaker 4: very special when they come in there and they're treated
Speaker 4: very special. They want to dress up. It's not in Macy's.
Speaker 4: It's just a very comfortable place to go visit center.
Speaker 3: You know. I go to the hotel a couple of
Speaker 3: times a year, one just goof around, you know and
Speaker 3: having fun, and then the other I do the from
Speaker 3: upstairs of the balcony, we do the radio bronches of
Speaker 3: the parade. And every time I go through there, I
Speaker 3: tes my mind just races with what kind of stories,
Speaker 3: what kind of folks were staying in those rooms that
Speaker 3: I passed by, What was their purpose for being in town,
Speaker 3: what did they do for a living, how did they
Speaker 3: entertain themselves? And you know something, every time you go
Speaker 3: in there, different thoughts go through there, and your imagination
Speaker 3: kind of takes hold and you know that there. For me,
Speaker 3: it's never going to get old going to the hotel
Speaker 3: and just walking around and hearing the.
Speaker 4: Stories and hearing the stories and feeling them. I've been
Speaker 4: there eight years. The lobby is just that is so rich,
Speaker 4: rich with history. It is, and I'll tell some of
Speaker 4: the visitors, some of the visitors are really into the
Speaker 4: history thing, and this history of Indian territory. It's not
Speaker 4: even Oklahoma's history. It's Indian territory, sure, but where the lobby.
Speaker 4: The sinking of the Lusitania that helped start World War One,
Speaker 4: Harbor nine to eleven, Insurrection Day, all the major events
Speaker 4: in our history have been discussed in that lobby, and
Speaker 4: that just it's saturated with stories and sides and discussions.
Speaker 4: And that big porch now, I love that part of
Speaker 4: the building. It's just alive with history and you can
Speaker 4: feel it. And then you hear some of the stories.
Speaker 4: We were talking today about the rodeo days and oh yes,
Speaker 4: from eight to forty.
Speaker 2: Eight, nineteen o eight to nineteen forty.
Speaker 4: Nine, Yes, and seventy five years ago, a rainstorm, a
Speaker 4: biblical rainstorm that only Cessiped the Mial could come up with,
Speaker 4: send it our way, and it saturated the rodeo grounds
Speaker 4: and made it sand and mud, and all those people
Speaker 4: in the stand the horses were tied to the pilings.
Speaker 4: A clown shot off a gun in a clown act
Speaker 4: and the horses bolted and it started a shimmy.
Speaker 2: An effect, and the whole thing just collapsed on people.
Speaker 4: But nobody died, you know, it was just a lot
Speaker 4: of injured. But the city decided, you know, we're just
Speaker 4: not going to rebuild. I think it was probably because
Speaker 4: of insurance and my abilities.
Speaker 2: But you know, that was the.
Speaker 4: Third largest rodeo in North America for for many years. Yes,
Speaker 4: and everybody camped. Forty thousand people came to three rodeos
Speaker 4: over the fourth and they all camped.
Speaker 2: You know, I can see them. We're going to the rodeo.
Speaker 2: Don't forget the skellet, all.
Speaker 4: The good cookie and they wanted to They look forward
Speaker 4: to it every year. And I think that's a to
Speaker 4: see all the pictures of those people. And the old
Speaker 4: rodeo grounds are down where the high school is now
Speaker 4: along the Highway seventy five. But Dewey's a rich community
Speaker 4: and it's always been very separated from Bartlesville.
Speaker 2: It's never been a suburb of Bartlesville, No, it never.
Speaker 4: I remember years ago, I think the two towns were separated.
Speaker 4: In football. Little old Dewey was tough. You know, you
Speaker 4: cannot play Bartlesville anymore. And I think that's that rivalry
Speaker 4: is there. But the rivalry that was started by Jake Bartleson.
Speaker 4: You know, he had a very successful grocery store in
Speaker 4: Bartlesville and he put it on rollers and moved it
Speaker 4: five miles north to do Yea, his own town. Well,
Speaker 4: he had managed to bring the railroad through the area
Speaker 4: and the stagecoach and then they changed the railroad route,
Speaker 4: and I said, you know, I'll just move up north
Speaker 4: five miles. And then when he put his store down
Speaker 4: where the Tom Mixed Museum is now, he was just
Speaker 4: a block from a railroad stop. Easy psy, easy pasy
Speaker 4: and very smart man. And Nanny, lets not forget her.
Speaker 4: She was the chief of the Delaware's daughter.
Speaker 2: She was.
Speaker 4: Educated, had money and that was her land allotment. And
Speaker 4: back then women were not allowed to own property or
Speaker 4: of business until the eighteen seventies. That woman was ready
Speaker 4: to be an entrepreneur. And so the two of them
Speaker 4: made excellent business decisions anyway, we're getting ready to celebrate that.
Speaker 3: This year Thursday. What time do we want folks to
Speaker 3: start huddling around, Well.
Speaker 4: They throw the switch at six pm. Santa throws the switch,
Speaker 4: he goes inside the and the business begin. So you
Speaker 4: want to be there before six pm. And it's not
Speaker 4: an entertainment thing. They just open up the Christmas tree
Speaker 4: and then the highlight is you get to go visit
Speaker 4: Satday a beautiful hotel.
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh. But you know what, it's a celebration
Speaker 3: of small town is and you bring a little history
Speaker 3: to life, and you bring a lot of smiles to them,
Speaker 3: but a lot of little ones.
Speaker 4: I take pictures and then I put them out on Facebook.
Speaker 4: Because the parents that bring their kids, even in the
Speaker 4: there's nothing going on, they bring them just to experience it.
Speaker 2: You know, those are smart parents.
Speaker 4: Kids that go to museums and attend events. They make
Speaker 4: better grades, better citizens of the community. They just it's
Speaker 4: all all well around and good citizen ry.
Speaker 3: Well, when you get around things like that and you
Speaker 3: start asking questions of that next thing, you know, you're
Speaker 3: asking questions of everything, which makes you a real good student.
Speaker 4: Well, we've got some neighborhood boys that just don't have
Speaker 4: anything to do. And I recruited them one day and see,
Speaker 4: you guys want to help out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And now a year and a half.
Speaker 4: Later, we have a crew of high school students that
Speaker 4: just come down to help. We started off with two
Speaker 4: and we're built up to seven of them, and so
Speaker 4: things will recruit themselves, but they kind of look upon
Speaker 4: it as their hotels in their neighborhood. They invested in it,
Speaker 4: they are and it gives them self esteem a project,
Speaker 4: you know, the rewards of applause and look what you did,
Speaker 4: and we.
Speaker 2: Did it together.
Speaker 4: And you know, some of them, you know, even had
Speaker 4: they been in with the police at any time, you
Speaker 4: got the chief Jimmy Gray and people looking at him going,
Speaker 4: you know, I've never seen that side of you.
Speaker 2: So it's all, it's all good. It's all very good.
Speaker 3: Joe. I want to thank you for coming in as always,
Speaker 3: thank you for sharing with us today. If folks get
Speaker 3: out to Dey, get there a little bit before six,
Speaker 3: light up the tree and you get to visit Santa Claus.
Speaker 2: Yes, it's it's worth it. Presidential and Commercial Plumbing, Colin
Speaker 2: Mason's Plumbing, we're serving you with their Priority
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