Oklahoma Redbud in Spring bloom The Fritschers in Oklahoma

 

 

 Town of Harrah

Holy Name Church

St. Joseph School

Town of Chickasha

 

 

In 1922, Charles Joseph Fritscher and his wife Dorothy moved their  family of five children by covered wagon to Harrah, Oklahoma, a small community with a significant Polish population, just east of Oklahoma City, in Oklahoma County.  The four oldest children attended school in the local schoolhouse, a large white clapboard building.  The Fritscher family was not Polish, but there was a small segment of the population that was German and they became members of the St. Teresa of Avila Catholic parish.   

 

They lived in Harrah only a few years before being encouraged by Dora's sisters to move to Hereford, in Deaf Smith County Texas. They shipped their belongings ahead by train, and piled the family into a Model T Ford for the trip.  The children loved being in Hereford near their cousins, but the move was apparently not a good financial choice for Charles and Dora.  In 1926, after several moves, Charles and Dora  Fritcher, had an auction in Hereford, Texas to sell all but the most necessary of their belongings, and then  moved by train with their five children to begin life in a small community called Chickasha, which was the County seat of Grady County. 

 

The family remained there for several generations.  They became members of the Holy Name of Jesus Catholic Church, and all five of their children attended school at the Saint Joseph Academy.  After arriving in Chickasha, Mrs. Barney Lubbers, a long time friend of the family, found them a big two-story house on Florida Avenue. Charles and his oldest son, Rudolph, went to work at Bitsche's Nursery.  Charles worked there about a year.  Then they moved to a house on a hill by Shanoan Springs Park. From there they moved North of the city of Chickasha about 10 miles out.  Charley and another man bought cotton fields and made a good profit. 

In 1930, the Charles J. Fritcher family was recorded on the census in Chickasha, Grady County, Oklahoma. E. D. 13, page 1-B family #11/13, image 2 of 45.
Charles J. Fritcher 46, MN married at age 24
Dorothy wife 40 NE married at age 19
Rudolph J. son 20 TX
Laura M. daug. 18 TX
Julius A. son 17 TX
Albert F. son 14 TX in school
Frances M. daug. 11 TX in school

In 1937 Charles went to work for Fowlers Grocery. They lived at 1111 Colorado. Three years later he put in his own little grocery store on Choctaw Avenue across from the old Chickasha General Hospital.  He worked there until his health began to fail. Eventually Charles and Dora moved to the house at 1512 South 6th Street, next door to his youngest daughter, Frances Morris and her family, and built a store on the driveway. He operated it until he had a stroke and had to sell out.

After a celebration of High Mass at Holy Name Catholic Church, Charles Joseph was buried in the Catholic section at Rosehill Cemetery, Chickasha, Oklahoma in the Fritscher family plot.

 


 

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* Note that the Fritscher family changed to Fritcher some time between the 1920 and 1930 census.

   All later records of the Charles and Dora Fritscher family show the name as Fritcher.