On April 11, 1940, the State of Oklahoma issued a Certificate of Incorporation to the Okmulgee County Conservation District making it the forty-first incorporated conservation district in the State of Oklahoma. Since that time The District has endeavored to provide a high standard of conservation related services to the citizens of Okmulgee County.
Okmulgee County covers 448,000 acres and is located in central Oklahoma in primarily the Cherokee Prairies land resource area.
The District is partially financed through appropriations by the Oklahoma Legislature to the Oklahoma Conservation Commission for allocation to the districts. These funds are used mainly for district employee salaries and the operation of the office. The district also earns funds from renting of equipment such as grass drills and other equipment provided to cooperators as a service. These funds are mainly used to maintain and replace the equipment. Additional funds are earned on reclamation projects on abandoned mine land and areas damaged by early day oil exploration activities. These funds are used to pay salaries on the projects and for equipment and equipment maintenance.
In 1943, as the southern plains were trying to recover from the Dust Bowl, the Okmulgee County Conservation District and the banks of Okmulgee County partnered to honor land owners who were implementing conservation practices. The District and the bankers host a banquet biennially where the achievements of the honorees are showcased and the Award of Honor is presented.
The first known Conservation Award of Honor certificate for Okmulgee County is framed and hanging in the conservation district office.
Okmulgee County has enjoyed a long line of directors and land owners who were dedicated to conservation. These individuals have given of the time and resources to further the conservation cause. We enjoy a land today that is much repaired from the damages done during and in the years prior to the dust bowl largely because of the work of the local conservation district's board of directors and the people who have worked with them through the years.
Below are two such individuals. These gentlemen both served lengthy terms on the Okmulgee County board of directors and served as members of the Oklahoma Conservation Commission.
The name Okmulgee comes from a Creek word meaning, "boiling water". Created at statehood from lands in the Creek Nation, Indian Territory, the county seat, Okmulgee, has been the capital of the Creek Nation since the Civil War. The Native Americans chose the site in the belief that tornadoes would not strike the area and so far history has proven them correct. Two local lakes furnish most of the water for the county. Major highways are I-40, east-west, and S.H. 75, north-south. Burlington Northern Railroad maintains a station for shipping.
Points of interest are: the Creek Council House Museum (former meeting place of the Intertribal Council of the Five Civilized Tribes); the Creek Tribal Complex, Samuel Checote gravesite; Oklahoma State University Technical School, Nuyaka Mission and Okmulgee State Park. A Pecan Festival is held mid-June annually in Okmulgee and a Labor Day celebration is observed in Henryetta each year.
