By 114 years ago today, Oklahoma voters approved Oklahoma City as the new capital.
At the stroke of midnight on June 12, 1910, then-Oklahoma Gov. Charles N. Haskell signed a document declaring the capital of the 2-year-old state was now in Oklahoma City, and the state seal was whisked out of Guthrie for a “wild 30-mile automobile ride” to the new capital.
The action came slightly more than 24 hours after Haskell had ordered the state militia to arrest Logan County Sheriff J.W. Mahoney, disarm him and throw him in jail because Mahoney had posted guards in an attempt to prevent the removal of the capital from Guthrie.
“I have simply done my duty,” Haskell was quoted in the June 14, 1910, Tulsa World. “The capital is now in Oklahoma City.”
While the state’s voters voted on a capitol city, there was no Capitol to house the state government at the time, and it had to be lodged in the Huckins Hotel. Opponents, including the Tulsa World, cried foul, claiming the capital was stolen from Guthrie.
The World’s story about the move said a pledge repeated “in every speech and in its own and hired newspapers” in Oklahoma City was that no attempt would be made to move the government until after 1913 and a suitable Capitol would be ready.
“This is the first repudiation of plighted word,” the World said and warned, “Watch for the next.”
On the state’s 95th birthday in 2002, officials dedicated Oklahoma’s Capitol dome.
Take a look back at the state Capitol through the years
