Euel E. Balkcom was the second of four children of John Ira Balkcom and Ida Lucinda (Baldwin) Balkcom.  John and Ida migrated from Dale County, Alabama to east Texas in around 1901.  Euel was born May 14, 1903, in Grand Saline (Van Zandt County), Texas.  He had an older sister Mae, born in 1899 in Alabama, a younger sister Thelma born while the family was still in Texas, and a younger brother Jake.  When Euel was age 4 or so, in 1906, they along with one of Ida’s brothers and family moved further west to Greer County in Oklahoma Territory.  Son Jake was born there.

Whether known to the family or not, this southwest part of Oklahoma Territory was until 1896 a disputed region, having been claimed by Texas when surveyors mistook the North Fork of the Red River for the Red River itself.  In 1896 the Supreme Court awarded Greer to the Oklahoma Territory.  However, the Choctaw Nation claimed the area as well and it remained disputed until Oklahoma statehood in 1907.  Shortly after statehood, Harmon County was split off from Greer.  The Balkcom family lived near Hollis, in the area that would become Harmon County.

In 1917, when Euel was 14 years old, the family bought a 160 acre farm about 25 miles north near the town of Erick in Beckham County.  Euel had completed 8th grade and after the move worked the farm and did not enroll in further school.  In the 1920’s Euel met Zela Franks, a high school classmate of his younger brother Jake.  Euel and Zela were married in Texola, Oklahoma on Christmas Eve in 1926.  Four sons were born to them between 1927 and 1945.

Euel worked the farm and nearby farms for the first ten years of their marriage.  Over much of this time though crop losses from the extended drought of the Dust Bowl were severe, and with the region’s persistent high winds and loss of topsoil farming became unprofitable for most. 1934 was one of the most intense drought years, followed by another in 1936, and that year they moved with sons 9 year old Loren and 5 year old Don to Florence, Arizona to work the irrigated cotton fields. It’s not known now whether they were exploring a permanent move or only intending to do migrant work for a season.  At any rate they worked for a year then returned to Beckham County.  Euel remarked in later years about the “taller than your head” size of the irrigated cotton in Arizona.  Oklahoma cotton was at that time no more than knee high.  The chopping, irrigation, and picking of this cotton depended on large numbers of migrant workers.  Based on stories from son Loren, many of these workers were seasonal workers from Mexico.

On return to Oklahoma Euel got work as a laborer with the Oklahoma Highway Department, maintaining U.S. Highway 66 and the other roads in Beckham County. With the economy in Oklahoma still poor this was an important job for the family. He was later appointed Maintenance Supervisor of Beckham County and the family moved 16 miles east to Sayre. This writer remembers as a boy going to work with Dad in his truck when he was called out during a sandstorm, to near Texola at the Texas border, where the animals and reptiles at a U.S. 66 roadside attraction ran free when the enclosures blew down. He closed the road for a while, maybe more due to debris than to animals. At any rate it seemed no great hardship to highway travelers given the dangerously low visibility during the storm. On another occasion the State Highway Patrol called him to report that drivers at a detour were being stopped by the Highway Department teenage flagmen and told there was an Indian uprising ahead and to drive fast and keep their windows closed. I don’t recall the disposition of this.

For a period Euel was District Maintenance Supervisor in Clinton. He did not like the work, citing dissatisfaction with the amount of paperwork and in particular what he felt was weakness in writing and math. He came back to finish his career as County Supervisor, retiring in 1970.

For much of his work life the Highway Department job was a political patronage job, and Euel’s sponsor was Charles Wilson, an attorney of some local prominence who later became a District Judge. It was a relief to Euel in 1959 when Oklahoma adopted the merit system. When Euel retired Judge Wilson asked him to work in the court system as bailiff or the like but Euel decided on full retirement.

Euel was healthy for most of his life and rarely saw doctors. He did develop Type II diabetes in later life that he tried to control with diet and his daily walks. The walks came to an end as he tired of dealing with the many loose dogs in town.

Euel’s personality did not tend toward the chatty, which could also be said of his brother Jake and father J. I. Socially Euel and Zela had a friend circle that they exchanged house visits with. Some of these friends were Euel’s coworkers. Zela had her own circle which was quite different and consisted of people from her Nazarene church. Most Sundays after Zela and the children came home from church the family went to one or the other houses of the Balkcom family in Erick for Sunday “dinner”, a major lunchtime meal that featured most often chicken fried steak, mashed potatoes, and vegetables either fresh or from the summer’s canning.

Euel and Zela were well-informed about local and national news, subscribing to home delivery of the morning and evening editions of the Oklahoma City Times newspaper, the Sayre Daily Headlight-Journal, and the Beckham County Democrat. Euel had no use for politicians, and if Zela or a family member had something positive to say about the actions of one Euel would deny that good motives were ever a factor.

Euel was age 78 and eight years into retirement when he died unexpectedly, at home in his sleep of a heart attack on October 1, 1981.

See the Detailed Genealogy for more on Euel’s life.

Jerry Balkcom

2024