Eubanks is a former

community A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with commonality such as place, norms, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, tow ...

Pushmataha County Pushmataha County is a county in the southeastern part of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. As of the 2010 census, the population was 11,572. Its county seat is Antlers. The county was created at statehood from part of the former territory of the C ...

Oklahoma Oklahoma (; Choctaw language, Choctaw: ; chr, ᎣᎧᎳᎰᎹ, ''Okalahoma'' ) is a U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States, bordered by Texas on the south and west, Kansas on the nor ...

, United States. It is 13 miles north of Antlers. A

United States Post Office The United States Postal Service (USPS), also known as the Post Office, U.S. Mail, or Postal Service, is an independent agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government responsible for providing postal service in the U. ...

was established for Eubanks, Indian Territory on February 26, 1907, and operated until April 30, 1934. It was named for William Eubanks, local lumberman. During the 1880s the

St. Louis-San Francisco Railway ST, St, or St. may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Stanza, in poetry * Suicidal Tendencies, an American heavy metal/hardcore punk band * Star Trek, a science-fiction media franchise * Summa Theologica, a compendium of Catholic philosophy ...

, more popularly known as the “Frisco”, built a line from north to south through the Choctaw Nation, connecting

Fort Smith, Arkansas Fort Smith is the third-largest city in Arkansas and one of the two county seats of Sebastian County. As of the 2020 Census, the population was 89,142. It is the principal city of the Fort Smith, Arkansas–Oklahoma Metropolitan Statistical Are ...

, with Paris, Texas. The railroad paralleled the Kiamichi River throughout much of its route in present-day Pushmataha County.

Train stations A train station, railway station, railroad station or depot is a railway facility where trains stop to load or unload passengers, freight or both. It generally consists of at least one platform, one track and a station building providing suc ...

were established every few miles to aid in opening up the land and, more particularly, to serve as the locations of section houses. Supervisors for their respective miles of track lived in the section houses to administer the track and its

right-of-way Right of way is the legal right, established by grant from a landowner or long usage (i.e. by prescription), to pass along a specific route through property belonging to another. A similar ''right of access'' also exists on land held by a gov ...

. These stations also served as points at which the trains could draw water. The site of Eubanks was selected because of its proximity to the Kiamichi River, with its abundant water supply. Adjacent station stops were established to the north and south. The sparsely populated area, at that time known as Jack’s Fork County of the Choctaw Nation, in the Indian Territory, was home to

Choctaw Indians The Choctaw (in the Choctaw language, Chahta) are a Native American people originally based in the Southeastern Woodlands, in what is now Alabama and Mississippi. Their Choctaw language is a Western Muskogean language. Today, Choctaw people are ...

who farmed or subsisted on the land.Morris, John W. ''Historical Atlas of Oklahoma'' (Norman: University of Oklahoma, 1986), plate 38. Few roads or trails existed. Transportation was provided by the Frisco Railroad, which offered six trains per day—three in each direction—until it closed to passenger traffic during the late 1950s. It continued freight operations until 1981, when it closed altogether and its rails were removed. The loss of passenger rail coincided with the construction of Oklahoma State Highway 2.

References

{{coord, 34, 25, 19, N, 95, 35, 06, W, type:city_region:US-OK_source:GNIS-enwiki, display=title Ghost towns in Oklahoma Geography of Pushmataha County, Oklahoma Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma

See also

References