Stove Point on Alberta Creek

The launching ramp on the north side of Alberta Creek is on Stove Point. I'm sure that not many of the current users of that area known the name and the origin of that name. It was sometime prior to 1949 that it acquired the name "Stove Point".

Alice (McCuan) McWilliams moved us six kids to Kingston in August of 1949. Prior to that we lived in Dark Corner on what is now known as McDuffee Road on part of the property where Marvin and Elaine Joiner now reside. The "White House" as we called it, was later moved and the old well is all that is left to indicated where the house was located. The Ernest Robertson family and also Denver and Myrtle May Norris lived in the "White House" after our tenure.

Electricity came to Dark Corner about 1947. We all remember my sister Dorothy coming in from school one day and checking to see if our electricity was on. When to her surprise the bulb gave off a radiant glow she cried out, "I've discovered electricity!"

Dot as we call her relates to this and many more of our childhood memories in her book "Dot's Thoughts". She refers to the book as: "Inspirational Thoughts and Parables t Ponder." Her book is available at www.dots.mybisi.com and is a great book.

In addition to having electric lights, we also acquired a butane tank and a new cook stove. The old wood cook stove that my mom had used for so many years suddenly became obsolete. (I can remember when she would make 24 biscuits, three times a day in that old stove.) The stove was taken to the camping area on the north side of Alberta Creek and left there for campers to use in they so desired. People who lived in cities that had never used a wood cook stove found it to be a great novelty. Many campers enjoyed it and the campground became known as "Stove Point".

The road that led to Stove Point was on property owned by my grandfather, Moody McCuan. He had to cut a road thought the trees so people could get to the lake. At that time there was a very limited access to the lake. This was the only road leading to Alberta Creek. All of the natives called this creek Lizzy Orberson, and it didn't set too well when the Corps of Engineers labeled it Alberta Creek. There has been much discussion concerning the two names. Sometimes, we think we know something then find out we were wrong. (Like some religious and political views, "If you disagree with me, you're wrong!") Well, I admit that I was wrong. In visiting the Historical & Genealogical Society on east main in Madill I found an old map of Marshall County dated 1902. Low and behold the name on the map was "Alberta Creek".

However, old maps don't always steer you in the right direction. There has been some controversy on the correct spelling of McDuffee Road. I thought it was McDuffie and at one time I think the sign had McDuffee. I visited the Knob Hill Cemetery and checked the headstones of the McDUFFEE'S that are buried there to ascertain the correct spelling. Later I discovered that a map of Lake Texoma on the wall at Jack's Diner in Kingston had it incorrectly spelled as McDeffee. Some map company out of Dallas had erred in naming it.

Incidentally, Jack's Diner has recently been purchased by Rick & Shirley Bland. They have other businesses in Marshall and Bryan Counties and will no doubt now have a first class eatery in Kingston. LaWanna (Tucker) Cooper has been working at the diner ever since she got off the Ark. (She's not really that old, because she is younger than me and I'm just a little whippersnapper in the eyes of a favorite cousin, Trevy (French) McElheny.) My mother and Trevy were first cousins. So, technically that would make me Trevy's first cousin once removed. LaWanna and Trevy along with Bootsie (Buck) Herndon are some more of my friends who share a taste for coffee.

The road to Stove Point was not much more than a trail, just wide enough to allow one vehicle at a time to navigate it. If two cars met, someone had to back up or drive out into the trees. Every time it rained numerous mud holes appeared at the low spots in the road. Daddy Moody, as we affectionately called him, would hall rock in his old 1937 V-8 Ford Pickup and put them in the mud holes. Many times on the weekends or during the summer my siblings and I would help him fill the holes. At one time, he had bought a load of coal to burn in his wood heater. The coal made such a hot fire he feared that it might ruin his stove so he quit using it. When he got a butane cook stove and a Dearborn Heater he had no need for the coal. We then hauled the coal and filled in the deep ruts in the road with it. I've often wondered if someone since that time has found some of the coal and thought that there was a vein of coal in the area.

The picture accompanying this article was taken in 1939 on the north side of the Kingston Drug Store. (There were no pharmacies in those days, just drug stores.) That would have been just south of the present Burger Shoppe. It shows Moody McCuan selling a watermelon to Julian Smith, who owned the drug store. Eunice (Sullivan) McCuan is looking on.

I feel I must insert something here about my grandmother Eunice. I was the manager of the cable television company in Ponca City, OK from 1970 until 1976. Two of my children, Phillip and Marla were born in Ponca City. John was enrolled at Trout Elementary School and had a great teacher. However, I wanted my kids to go to school at Kingston where I had graduated in 1956. I felt compelled to give up the best paying job I ever had to move back to Kingston and Lake Texoma.

While in Ponca City, Mary Loyce and I met and became friends with Fred and Velma Roush. Velma told me, "I remember your grandma. My daddy was the pastor of the Holiness Church in Woodville. Your grandparents invited us to go out to Dark Corner for dinner one Sunday. When we got ready to leave to go back to Woodville you grandma went into a bedroom and came out with a little handkerchief tied up at the corners. She took some of her butter and egg money and gave it to my mother and told her, 'You buy that girl some shoes.' Yes, I remember your grandma."

The significance of the picture of Moody, Eunice and Julian is that it ties to the road. It also shows the aforementioned pickup. That old V-8 1937 model pickup with a custom-made camper top hauled many loads of watermelons and pecans out of the Washita River bottom. Moody McCuan first owned a Model T Ford truck, then the 1937 truck, after that he bought a 1950 Model Ford. I think that all three were purchase at Woody Motor Company in Madill. He made three vehicles last him a lifetime. Now, kids wreck more cars than that before they get out of high school.

Julian Smith was County Commissioner for a few years and while he was in office he helped in opening up some of the roads to the lake. He brought in a bulldozer and grader and widened the road to Stove Point. Limestone creek gravel from the Buncombe Creek quarry, which is now covered by Lake Rex Smith, was hauled and placed on the road in the low spots.

Through the efforts of many civic-minded individuals over the past 50-plus years, lake access was slowly but surely established. Now it seems that the Corps of Engineers are determined to shut off all access to the lake except at points where they can exact a toll from those wishing to visit it. As you drive around the lake there is now one constant, which is "ROAD CLOSED" signs.

Incidentally, the Corps of Engineers doesn't own the property around the lake. It belongs to all of us and the Corps of Engineers are supposed to be our servants in maintaining the property for our benefit. What happened?