Here are 40 Interesting Oklahoma facts.
1-5 Oklahoma Facts
1. Oklahoma declared watermelon a vegetable and made it their official state vegetable. – Source
2. In Stringtown, Oklahoma, population 400, 76 percent of the town’s 2013 budget came from traffic tickets. After a state investigation into excessive speed trapping the town’s police department was disbanded. – Source
3. The Tulsa Center of the Universe is an acoustic anomaly located in Oklahoma. When one stands in the center of the circle and makes a noise, that noise is echoed back several times louder than it was made, but no one standing outside the circle can hear a thing. – Source
4. A few days after the Oklahoma City Bombings, a severed left leg was found in the rubble. DNA evidence showed that it from a victim, Lakesha Levy. When they went to return her leg, it was found that she was already buried with one. It is unknown who the buried leg belongs to. – Source
5. There’s a town in the Oklahoma panhandle named “Hooker” and its slogan is “it’s a location, not a vocation”. – Source
6-10 Oklahoma Facts
6. The descendants of black slaves owned by the Cherokee Indians in Oklahoma are still battling with the tribal leadership in a fight to be recognized as full and legitimate members of the tribe after about 25,000 were disenfranchised in the early 1980s. – Source
7. In 1957, Tulsa Oklahoma buried a Plymouth Belvedere to commemorate Oklahoma’s 50th anniversary. In addition, citizens entered guesses as to what Tulsa’s population would be in 2007, closets person would win the car. When the vault was opened it was filled with water and the car was ruined. – Source
8. In Oklahoma there exists a ghost town so polluted from lead mining that leftover minerals have caused the rivers to turn red. Children who went swimming in the arsenic-filled water thought they were just getting sunburnt in reality, they were being covered in chemical burns. – Source
9. The former band Hanson, founded a beer company in Oklahoma, calling their beer “Mmmhops Pale Ale”. – Source
10. The Bank of Oklahoma building in Tulsa, OK is a half-size replica of the World Trade Center buildings. It was designed by the same architect and completed 3 years after WTC. – Source
11-15 Oklahoma Facts
11. Oklahoma experiences more earthquakes than anywhere else in the world. – Source
12. In Oklahoma in the 1920s, ranchers, lawyers, and public officials conspired together to murder 60+ Osage Indians in order to secure the rights to their oil-rich land. Only two men were ever convicted. Both were paroled and one pardoned by the governor of Oklahoma. – Source
13. In 1943, an Oklahoman courthouse was mistakenly bombed by the U.S. Air Force during a training mission. For many years, the city was thought to be the only U.S city bombed by its own military. – Source
14. There is a free-market surgery center in Oklahoma that lets you know what the price is for a procedure ahead of time. – Source
15. A completely blind atheist was Oklahoma’s first U.S. Senator. – Source
16-20 Oklahoma Facts
16. The FCC had a ban on TV/radio media releasing tornado warnings until 1954 when Harry Volkman broadcast the first televised tornado warning in Oklahoma City, due to his belief the ban was costing lives. – Source
17. The “state meal” of Oklahoma is fried okra, squash, cornbread, barbecue pork, biscuits, sausage and gravy, grits, corn, strawberries, chicken fried steak, pecan pie, and black-eyed peas. – Source
18. During a deadly 2002 bridge collapse in Oklahoma, a convicted felon impersonating an Army Captain took control of the disaster scene for two days. – Source
19. Until 1976, Oklahoma had two different drinking ages, based on sex: 20 years old for men and 18 years old for women. – Source
20. On Jan 3, 1970, residents in Oklahoma saw a fireball cross the sky. Within 4 days researchers had a possible landing zone. 2 days later, Gunther “Skip” Schwartz, was driving when he noticed a dark object sitting on the road. Schwartz had found a 9.83-kg chunk of the Lost City meteorite. – Source
21-25 Oklahoma Facts
21. 2,000 feet or higher defines a mountain and the world’s tallest hill, at 1,999 feet, is in Poteau, Oklahoma. – Source
22. A cement truck crashed in Oklahoma over 40 years ago, and the mixer is still sitting by the side of the road. – Source
23. The name for the state of Oklahoma literally means “Red People” in the Choctaw language, from the words “Okla” and “humma”, suggested by Choctaw Chief Allen Wright in 1866. Equivalent to the word “Indian”, “okla humma” was a phrase in Choctaw used to describe Native Americans as a whole. – Source
24. The longest lightning bolt ever recorded occurred over Oklahoma in 2007. It spanned 321 km/199.5 miles and lasted 5.7 seconds. – Source
25. In Cherokee, Oklahoma, July 11th, 1909: at 3:00 in the morning, a heat burst reportedly caused the temperature to rise briefly to 57.8 °C (136.0 °F), desiccating crops in the area. – Source
