OKC woman spends holiday rebuilding after flood in 1923
Thanksgiving 2023 is over, and our sights are set on Christmas, but in 1923, President Calvin Coolidge declared Thanksgiving would be celebrated on Nov. 29. h This story appeared in The Oklahoman on Nov. 30, 1923.
While a rift in the clouds Thursday afternoon allowed the sun to put the final golden touch to an otherwise murky day, down on South Robinson street there worked Mrs. John Dingman, perhaps the most thankful person in Oklahoma City.
Thankful not for that caprice of fate which mere mortals are wont to call “good luck,” nor for riches, but because she is well, still has her family with her, and is able to work on Thanksgiving.
While she labored piling lumber, which was once her little home, shiny limousines, luxuriously upholstered and carrying sleek, fatfaced men and women wearing a small fortune in furs, glided past on Robinson street. On her right a sea of mud, with houses half buried, many laying on their tops and sides, presented a dismal view. Little puddles of water and mudholes are the front yards of what were once the homes of happy people. (The aftermath of the October 1923 flood.)
“Yes, it is pretty hard work, and the wind has been cold, but I don’t mind it. We are going to build another house on Ash street. This was
our house once and we are going to use this lumber and my husband traded for some more. I wouldn’t worry so much, but we are living with relatives and are in the way. They are as good as can be, but I like to live in my own home,” Mrs. Dingman declared.
Her husband took the Thanksgiving holiday as an opportunity to put in a few extra licks building their home on Ash street.
“Well, I’ve got to be getting on,” said the woman as she lifted a final ten-foot plank onto the wagon. “It’s getting late and I want to haul another load.”
She gave the horse a tap with a whip, and he roused from his lethargy and moved slowly on, and drivers in the caravan of motors, pounded horns and swore for another one of those “blankety blank” wagons blocking the road.
Mary Dingman lived in the house on Ash (now SW 15) at least until 1941, according to Ancestry.com.
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