For the most part, I think the majority of us take the turnpike from Lawton to Oklahoma City for granted. Or, some of us mumble and grumble about the tolls and why money is still be collected since the roads have long since been “paid for.”
For the most part, I think the majority of us take the turnpike from Lawton to Oklahoma City for granted. Or, some of us mumble and grumble about the tolls and why money is still be collected since the roads have long since been “paid for.”
However, digging through newspaper archives turned up a March 1, 1964, article that captured the excitement of the turnpike opening. Reporter Bill Crawford wrote in The Lawton Constitution and Morning Press that “today’s opening of the 61- mile route from Lawton to Oklahoma City means a dream come true at long last.”
Crawford began the article almost poetically by writing:
“A new era dawns today on the horizon of Lawton and southwest Oklahoma with the opening of the $56.6 million Southwestern Turnpike.
“With it comes unlimited opportunities in economic development, tourism, and improved transportation, placing Oklahoma’s third-largest city on a transcontinental highway system.”
LAWTON AREA TO BECOME ‘TOURIST MECCA’
He went on to write that many predicted the turnpike would turn the Lawton area into a “tourist mecca” and pointed to the potential economic value.
Noteworthy names in the article include J. Howard Edmondson, former Oklahoma Governor (1959- 1963) and, at the time, was an appointed United States Senator.
It was “a long hard fight (to obtain the turnpike) in which many people were involved,” Edmondson said.
Two other names mentioned were Ned Shepler and Sen. Fred R. Harris. Shepler was the former publisher of The Lawton Constitution and Morning Press and a former member of the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority.
Harris, now 88, was born in Walters [Cotton County] and served in the Oklahoma Senate from 1956 - 1964, where he authored the 1957-1959 and 1961 Turnpike Acts. He was a former lawyer in Lawton.
“Except for the vision and perseverance of the people of Lawton - who never gave up - the Southwestern Turnpike would still be a dream,” Sen. Harris said in the March 1, 1964, edition of The Lawton Constitution and Morning Press on the opening of the new turnpike. “... I continually had to cope with the questions: How could it payout? and Where does it go?”
FORT SILL WAS CONSIDERED ‘ISOLATED’
At a ceremony opening the turnpike, Shepler reminded citizens that there was a time when Fort Sill was considered “isolated” because of a lack of good transportation.
“This was used as an argument by those who sought to move the Artillery School to the Eastern Seaboard. It was almost effective,” Shepler said in the March 1, 1964, article. “Together with the airlines, the long-sought turnpike gives Fort Sill and Lawton the finest in modern passenger, and to a great extent, freight, traffic system,” he said.
Milton Keating, who was the Lawton Chamber of Commerce secretary-manager in 1964, said the project “required 14 years of patience, discipline and work.”
FIRST USE OF AUTOMATIC TOLL COLLECTION
Staff Writer Ray Atteberry also wrote in the March 1, 1964, edition of The Lawton Constitution and Morning Press that the “opening of the section from Lawton to Oklahoma City marked the first use of automatic toll collection devices on the state’s turnpike system.”
Atteberry went on to describe the “new paving construction technique known as the ‘slip form’ method that was used on the turnpike. “The entire turnpike is of Portland cement concrete construction,” he wrote.
60 CENTS FOR TOLL
“First-day users of the northern section will find the new toll collection plazas near Chickasha and Newcastle. The toll for passenger cars without trailers is 60 cents at each toll gate, making a trip from Lawton to Oklahoma City cost $1.20 for a passenger car,” the article said.
Also, interestingly, the first toll collection baskets accepted pennies, unlike today. Sixty pennies could be used in 1964 to pay the toll. Drivers might have been a little more patient 55 years ago to wait while a motorist counted out 60 pennies.
In 2018, the Chickasha toll plaza was relocated a little farther south from Chickasha and the toll is $2.25. The gate near Newcastle charges a passenger car toll of $2.00, now making a trip from Lawton to Oklahoma City $4.25.
H.E. BAILEY NAME CHANGED AT ONE TIME TO CHISHOLM TRAIL
Fast-forward from the March 1, 1964, edition of The Lawton Constitution and Morning Press to April 12, 1967, edition and an interesting article distributed by the once-thriving UPI wire service outlines the controversy over naming the new toll road.
The short-take on it is that the turnpike was originally called the Southwestern Turnpike and then in 1963 was named the H.E. Bailey. Digging through the Oklahoma Department of Transportation “Celebrating 100 years” archive, I found that Harry “H.E.” Bailey became the General Manager of the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority in order to oversee the construction of the Turner Turnpike.
Archive pages from The Oklahoman show that Bailey died in 1976. It was noted that he was the dominant force in the development of Oklahoma’s turnpike system. His highway career spanned four decades.
So, back to April 12, 1967, UPI article:
In 1963, with the backing of then Gov. Henry Bellmon, Sen. Boyd Cowden of Chandler led a successful senate fight to pass a resolution naming the Southwestern Turnpike the “H.E. Bailey” Turnpike.
In 1967, with neither Cowden nor Bellmon still in office, the Senate changed the name to the “Chisholm Trail” Turnpike, after the famous cattle trail. Sen. Tony Massad of Frederick helped sponsor the change. The amendment carried by a slim margin of 22-20.
In the 1963 fight, Sens. Don Baldwin of Anadarko and then-State Sen. Fred R. Harris of Lawton tried to head off the Bellmon-Bailey move and name the Oklahoma City- Lawton - Wichita Falls toll road after the late Sen. Bill Logan from Lawton. They failed in a close vote.
In 1965, Massad tried and failed on the amendment to remove Bailey’s name. In 1967, Massad again authored an amendment to change the name from the H.E. Bailey to just “Southwestern” Turnpike. Massad joked that Bailey’s name on the toll road was a “typographical” error.
Sen. H.B. Atkinson of Midwest City authored a new amendment to change the name to the Chisholm Trail Turnpike.
“Let’s give it a name famous throughout the world,” Atkinson said.
The articles show there was a lively effort to remove Bailey’s name from the southwest portion of the turnpike.
However, an Associated Press (AP) article in the April 20, 1967, edition of The Lawton Constitution and Morning Press reported that a state legislative conference committee voted to continue the name “H.E. Bailey Turnpike” for the toll road extending southwest from Oklahoma City, overriding the state senate’s name change to Chisholm Trail Turnpike.
Personally, from a historical standpoint, I wish the name Chisholm Trail Turnpike would have stuck.