Woolaroc is a museum and wildlife preserve located in the Osage Hills of Northeastern Oklahoma on Oklahoma State Highway 123 about southwest of

Bartlesville, Oklahoma Bartlesville is a city mostly in Washington County in the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The population was 37,290 at the 2020 census. Bartlesville is north of Tulsa and south of the Kansas border. It is the county seat of Washington County. The Ca ...

, and north of

Tulsa, Oklahoma Tulsa () is the second-largest city in the state of Oklahoma and 47th-most populous city in the United States. The population was 413,066 as of the 2020 census. It is the principal municipality of the Tulsa Metropolitan Area, a region with ...

. Woolaroc was established in 1925 as the ranch retreat of oilman Frank Phillips. The ranch is a wildlife preserve, home to over 30 different species of native and exotic wildlife, such as bison, elk and longhorn cattle. Woolaroc is also a museum with a collection of

Western art The art of Europe, or Western art, encompasses the history of visual art in Europe. European prehistoric art started as mobile Upper Paleolithic rock and cave painting and petroglyph art and was characteristic of the period between the Paleo ...

and artifacts, American Indian material, and one of the largest collections of

Colt Colt(s) or COLT may refer to: *Colt (horse), an intact (uncastrated) male horse under four years of age People * Colt (given name) *Colt (surname) Places *Colt, Arkansas, United States *Colt, Louisiana, an unincorporated community, United States ...

firearms in the world. Also on display is ''Woolaroc'', the aircraft that won the ill-fated Dole Air Race in 1927. Woolaroc features a nature trail and a living history area inviting visitors to experience the natural environment of Woolaroc, the life in a pre-Civil War 1840s mountain man camp.

Name

The name Woolaroc is a

portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of words501(c)(3), is headed by a Board of Trustees. The mission of Frank Phillips when he built Woolaroc in 1925 was to preserve the history of the West, educate, and entertain.

Museum collection

''Woolaroc'' aircraft

The museum started out as a hangar in 1929 for the ''Woolaroc'', a single-engine, single-wing

Travel Air 5000 The Travel Air 5000 was an early high-wing monoplane airliner and racing monoplane designed by Clyde Cessna and is chiefly remembered for being the winner of the disastrous Dole Air Race from California to Hawaii. Design and development Cessna ...

airplane built by Cessna, that Frank Phillips sponsored in the Dole Air Race from

Oakland, California Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast of the United States, West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third ...

, to

Honolulu, Hawaii Honolulu (; ) is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Hawaii, which is in the Pacific Ocean. It is an unincorporated county seat of the consolidated City and County of Honolulu, situated along the southeast coast of the island o ...

, in 1927. ''Woolaroc'' is the only plane from the race that still survives. It stands in its hangar at the Phillips Museum. Its sister plane, ''Oklahoma'', also sponsored by Phillips, aborted the race at San Francisco because of mechanical problems. Over the years Phillips continued to receive gifts, and made art acquisitions, and the museum grew room by room. The museum is and now has over 600 paintings, 300 bronzes, over 2,300 pieces of Native American art and artifacts, as well as many pieces of taxidermy that decorate the walls of the museum and lodge. The galleries feature some of the premier Indian and Western artists in America's history:

Remington Remington may refer to: Organizations * Remington Arms, American firearms manufacturer * Remington Rand, American computer manufacturer * Remington Products, American manufacturer of shavers and haircare products * Remington College, American c ...

, Russell,

Leigh Leigh may refer to: Places In England Pronounced : * Leigh, Greater Manchester, Borough of Wigan ** Leigh (UK Parliament constituency) * Leigh-on-Sea, Essex Pronounced : * Leigh, Dorset * Leigh, Gloucestershire * Leigh, Kent * Leigh, Staf ...

, Moran, Couse,

Johnson Johnson is a surname of Anglo-Norman origin meaning "Son of John". It is the second most common in the United States and 154th most common in the world. As a common family name in Scotland, Johnson is occasionally a variation of ''Johnston'', a ...

Sharp Sharp or SHARP may refer to: Acronyms * SHARP (helmet ratings) (Safety Helmet Assessment and Rating Programme), a British motorcycle helmet safety rating scheme * Self Help Addiction Recovery Program, a charitable organisation founded in 19 ...

, Balink, Hennings, Ufer, Berninghaus, Bierstadt, and others.

Woolaroc Ranch Historic District

Woolaroc Ranch Historic District, also known as Rock Creek Game Preserve, Frank Phillips Ranch, Phillips Osage Park and Woolaroc Museum and Wildlife Preserve, was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

on December 5, 2008. It is significant as a reflection of the time period and for its role in the petroleum industry of the time. It is also significant for its landscape architecture. Contributing resources include 18 buildings, 22 sites, 115 structures, and 17 objects. (70 pages including photos, maps and figures) It was listed as a featured property of the week in a program of the National Park Service that began in July 2008.

The ''Pioneer Woman'' models

In 1928, E. W. Marland, founder of Marland Oil Company (later to become Conoco) and at that time one of the wealthiest men in the world, commissioned twelve miniature sculptures that were submitted by US and international sculptors as models for the

Pioneer Woman The ''Pioneer Woman'' monument is a bronze sculpture in Ponca City, Oklahoma, designed by Bryant Baker and dedicated on April 22, 1930. The statue is of a sunbonneted woman leading a child by the hand. It was donated to the State of Oklahoma by ...

statue. The commission that Marland paid each sculptor has been variously cited as $10,000The Ponca City News. "Pioneer Woman Models Return to Ponca City" by Louise Abercrombie. May 23, 2000
/ref> and as $2,000 for each submission. The miniatures traveled to twelve cities where they were viewed by 750,000 people who cast votes for their favorite. The twelve submissions included ''Protective'' by John Gregory; ''Determined'' by

Maurice Sterne Maurice Sterne ( lv, Moriss Šterns, 1877 or 1878 – July 23, 1957), was an American sculptor and painter remembered today for his association with philanthropist Mabel Dodge Luhan, to whom he was married from 1916 to 1923. Biography Ster ...

; ''Challenging'' by

Hermon Atkins MacNeil Hermon Atkins MacNeil (February 27, 1866 – October 2, 1947) was an American sculptor born in Everett, Massachusetts. He is known for designing the ''Standing Liberty'' quarter, struck by the Mint from 1916-1930; and for sculpting ''Justi ...

; ''Affectionate'' by James E. Fraser; ''Self-Reliant'' by

Alexander Stirling Calder Alexander Stirling Calder (January 11, 1870 – January 7, 1945) was an American sculptor and teacher. He was the son of sculptor Alexander Milne Calder and the father of sculptor Alexander (Sandy) Calder. His best-known works are ''George Washi ...

; "Fearless" by

Wheeler Williams Wheeler Williams (November 30, 1897 – August 12, 1972) was an American sculptor, born in Chicago, Illinois. Life and career Williams studied sculpture at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He attended Yale, where he graduated ...

; "Heroic" by

Mario Korbel Mario Joseph Korbel (March 22, 1882 – March 31, 1954) was a Czech-American sculptor. Biography He was born in Osík, Bohemia (now Czech Republic) on March 22, 1882 to a clergyman, Joseph Korbel and his wife Katherina Dolezal Korbel. He began ...

; ''Adventurous'' by F. Lynn Jenkins; ''Sturdy'' by

Mahonri Young Mahonri Mackintosh Young (August 9, 1877 – November 2, 1957) was an American social-realist sculptor and artist. During his lengthy career, he created more than 320 sculptures, 590 oil paintings, 5,500 watercolors, 2,600 prints, and thousand ...

; ''Faithful'' by Arthur Lee; ''Trusting'' by

Jo Davidson Jo Davidson (March 30, 1883 – January 2, 1952) was an American sculptor. Although he specialized in realistic, intense portrait busts, Davidson did not require his subjects to formally pose for him; rather, he observed and spoke with them. H ...

; and ''Confident'' by

Bryant Baker Percy Bryant Baker (July 8, 1881 – March 29, 1970) better known as Bryant Baker, was a British-born American sculptor. He sculpted a number of busts of famous Americans (including five presidents). In 1910, Queen Alexandra of the United Kingdom ...

. The ''New York Times'' reported on March 27, 1927, that the exhibition had arrived in New York City and that it had attracted "more interest than any exhibition of sculpture New York has known in a long while." The twelve models were exhibited for three weeks in the Reinhardt Galleries and Bryant Baker's model was the winner of the first place in the New York balloting. The Times Reported that "Baker not only won first honors, but was the last man to enter the contest having no more than a month to prepare his model and obtain a casting." Marland pronounced himself pleased with the models. "I believe all of the sculptors have done well," said Marland. "We could select any one of the twelve figures and get an excellent interpretation of the frontier woman. The decision will be a hard one to make. I expect to be guided largely by public taste, but the final decision will be my own. This national vote is going to show exactly what the American people think about one of the greatest of their women," Marland added.''New York Times''. "Pioneer Woman Seen in Bronze." March 20, 1927. The exhibition touched a popular chord in American culture of the time. The ''New York Times'' reported on March 27, 1927, that among those who visited the exhibition at the Reinhardt Galleries was 91-year-old Betty Wollman who as a young bride had journeyed from St. Louis to Leavenworth, Kansas, in 1855 and had once entertained Abraham Lincoln as a dinner guest in the Wollman household in Leavenworth long before Lincoln was a candidate for president. Wollman spoke about women's role during pioneer days in the old west and congratulated Marland for his proposal to erect a statue to the Pioneer Woman. "Mr. Marland is to be congratulated for doing this in commemoration of these early women of the West," said Wollman. "The hardships were many, and the courage and self-denial of the women who worked side by side with their husbands and sons and brothers in those primitive days are largely responsible for the development of the Middle Western States, now so rich in everything that goes to make life worth living."''New York Times''. "Statue of the Pioneer Woman Stirs Memories of Long Ago." March 27, 1927. The winning statue nationwide was ''Confident'', produced by British-born American sculptor

. It is believed that Marland's personal favorite was ''Trusting'' by Jo Davidson who had also sculpted statues of Marland, his wife Lydie, and his brother George. ''Time'' magazine ran a story about the competition and compared the competing designs:

The pioneer woman selected was not the ugly one executed by Mahonri Young; it was not the demure one executed by Jo Davidson; it was not the brawny one of James Earle Fraser, nor the placid one of Arthur Lee, nor the fragile one of F. Lynn Jenkins. Nor was it Maurice Sterne's, Hermon A. MacNeil's, Alexander Stirling Calder's, although these artists too were among those who made models for the competition. It was not John Gregory's sturdy female, snatching a musket from her moribund husband, although this one ran second in the balloting and won first place in three cities. Instead, it was Bryant Baker's striding figure of a woman whose skirts are blown backward in a prairie breeze, who carries a Bible in one hand, leads her scampish belligerent little boy with the other. This had received most votes in eleven cities; by far the largest total out of the 123,000 votes cast.

Baker's sculpture was unveiled in

Ponca City Ponca City ( iow, Chína Uhánⁿdhe) is a city in Kay County in the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The city was named after the Ponca tribe. Ponca City had a population of 25,387 at the time of the 2010 census- and a population of 24,424 in the 2020 ...

in a public ceremony on April 22, 1930, when forty thousand guests came to hear Will Rogers pay tribute to Oklahoma's pioneers. President Hoover addressed the nation over a nationwide radio network for the commemoration of the statue. "It was those women who carried the refinement, the moral character and spiritual force into the West," said Hoover. "Not only they bore great burdens of daily toil and the rearing of families, but there were intent that their children should have a chance, that the doors of opportunity," added Hoover.''New York Times''. "The Pioneer Woman Praised by Hoover." April 23, 1930. The finished statue of the Pioneer Woman Statue was high and weighed .PoncaCity.com "The Pioneer Woman"
/ref> After financial reverses that included the loss of his company

Marland Oil Company Marland Oil Company was a major American oil company that manufactured and marketed gasoline, motor oils and other petroleum products.

, E. W. Marland wrote a letter to his friend Frank Phillips on March 11, 1940. "My financial condition compells icme to sell objects of art, tapestries, bronzes, rugs, and paintings acquired by me in more prosperous years," wrote Marland. "I will sell at a price approximately 25 per cent of their cost to me... And will consider it a kindness if you will come yourself or send someone to look them over with the object of buying anything you fancy."''Frank's Fancy: Frank Phillips' Woolaroc'' by Gale Morgan Kane, published 2001 by Oklahoma Heritage Association, page 147 Phillips sent art expert Gordon Matzene to inspect the bronzes and began bargaining with Marland for their purchase. In the end Phillips offered Marland $500 for each of the twelve miniatures. Matzene declared that the purchase was a wonderful bargain and the miniatures were removed from Ponca City along with other statues and artwork to become part of Phillips' collection at Woolaroc where they are on display.

Visiting Woolaroc

Woolaroc is open year-round from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. CST Wednesday through Sunday and is closed on Monday and Tuesday. During the summer (

Memorial Day Memorial Day (originally known as Decoration Day) is a federal holiday in the United States for mourning the U.S. military personnel who have fought and died while serving in the United States armed forces. It is observed on the last Monda ...

through Labor Day), it is also open on Tuesdays. Bicycles are prohibited from entering the preserve.

Notes

References

External links

Official Site

Woolaroc Ranch, Museum and Wildlife Preserve information, photos and video on TravelOK.com
Official travel and tourism website for the State of Oklahoma
Marland's Pioneer Woman Statue competition

Voices of Oklahoma interview with Elliot "Chope" Phillips.
First person interview conducted on May 5, 2009, with Elliot "Chope" Phillips, nephew of Frank Phillips. Original audio and transcript archived wit

{{DEFAULTSORT:Woolaroc Museum and Wildlife Preserve American West museums in Oklahoma Art museums and galleries in Oklahoma Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Oklahoma National Register of Historic Places in Osage County, Oklahoma Wildlife sanctuaries of the United States Museums established in 1925