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Oklahoma Counties

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Oklahoma Counties

There are seventy-seven counties in Oklahoma. Oklahoma is ranked 20th size and 17th in the number of counties, between Mississippi with 82 counties and Arkansas with 75 counties.

Oklahoma originally had seven counties when it was first organized as the Oklahoma Territory. These counties were designated numerically, first through seventh. New counties added after this were designated by letters of the alphabet. The first seven counties were later renamed. The Oklahoma Constitutional Convention named all of the counties that were formed when Oklahoma entered statehood in 1907. Only two counties have been formed since then

Harper County, Oklahoma

Harper County History, Geography, Demographics, Cities and Towns, and Education

County Seat: Buffalo
Year Organized: 1905
Square Miles: 1,039

Court House:

PO Box 369
County Courthouse
Buffalo, OK 73834-0369

Etymology - Origin of County Name

named for O. G. Harper, a clerk in the Constitutional Convention.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

History

The parcel of Oklahoma land now called Harper County began with the Cherokee Outlet Opening in 1893; the county itself came from the northwest section of Woodward County in 1907. It is now surrounded on the north by Clark and Comanche counties in Kansas, Woodward and Woods counties on the east, Beaver County on the west, and Woodward and Ellis counties to the south. In 1907 the population reached 8,089 and peaked with 8,189 in 1910

The area was once a part of the Cherokee Outlet, set aside for that nation in treaties of 1828 and 1835. The Outlet was opened for non-Indian settlement in September 1893. Created at 1907 statehood and named for a local pioneer resident, teacher, and clerk of the Oklahoma Constitutional Convention of 1906, Oscar Greene Harper from Missouri, Harper County encompasses a total land and water area of 1,040.9 square miles. Two rivers flow through the landscape of rocky, red canyons in the east and high plains and rolling hills in the west: the Cimarron and the Beaver (North Canadian). Dolby Springs Park, replete with a golf course and an artesian well, rests ten miles northwest of Buffalo, the county seat. The county produces wheat, cattle, petroleum, natural gas, and gypsum. Early-day residents supplemented their farming and ranching livelihoods by selling dry bison bones. Sinclair Prairie Oil Company drilled the county's discovery well in 1930. Presently, education, oil and gas, and government services employ the majority of workers...HARPER COUNTY

Neighboring Counties:

Insert Counties Here

Cities and Towns:

- Buffalo (County Seat)	town	Incorporated Area
- Laverne	town	Incorporated Area
- May	town	Incorporated Area
- Rosston	town	Incorporated Area

County Resources:

Enter County Resources and Information Here

County Resource Guide

Counties: US Map

The history of our nation can be seen as a prolonged struggle to define the relative roles and powers of our governments: federal, state, and local. And the names we've given our counties, our most locally based jurisdictions, reflects the "characteristic features of our country!"

But age, size and colorful names of our counties isn't the only reason to explore counties' role in American history, or the history of county government itself. In fact, the story of county government reflects the larger meanings of American history.

Today's counties are the most flexible, locally responsive and creative governments in the US. They are the most diverse, varying in size, population, geography, and governmental structure. In their politics and policies, they express a 1990's political slogan "Think globally, act locally."

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