Coalgate is a city in and the county seat of Coal County, Oklahoma, United States. As of the 2020 census, Coalgate had a population of 1,667. The town was founded in 1889 in the Choctaw Nation, Indian Territory as a coal mining camp named Liddle. The name changed to Coalgate on January 23, 1890.
History
Coalgate was founded in 1889 as a coal mining camp named Liddle in Atoka County, a territorial-era county in the Pushmataha District of the Choctaw Nation, Indian Territory. It was named for William "Bill" Liddle, a superintendent for the Atoka Coal and Mining Company, who had arrived in the fall of 1888 to locate a site for a new coal mine. The Southwestern Coal and Improvement Company, a subsidiary of the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railway (MK&T) developed the site. A tent city sprung up, followed by company-built houses. Work on the mine started January 2, 1889, and the first shipment of coal left Liddle on April 17, 1889. The town name changed to Coalgate on January 23, 1890. The new name was taken from the steel gate or "coal gate" that separated the trains from the coal mines north of town. Coalgate incorporated under the laws of Arkansas on November 25, 1898. It was platted and approved by the Secretary of the Interior on December 16, 1903. Robinson Publishing Company took over publication of the newspaper in 1988. It has a circulation of 2,300.
Coalgate was the site of the very first bank closing performed by the State of Oklahoma when the International Bank of Coalgate was closed on May 21, 1908, and Herman C. Schultz, acting as an Assistant State Bank Commissioner, liquidated the bank, paying off all depositors in full and returning the excess to the bank's shareholders.
During the May–June 1917 tornado outbreak sequence, at 4 p.m. on June 1, 1917, Coalgate was struck by an F4 tornado. The Westward school building and over 200 homes were destroyed. At least 11 people were killed.
The city prospered until the 1920s, when the coal mines closed because of worker strikes. Since this time agriculture and manufacturing have become the leading industries. From 1921 to 1923, local cotton crops were destroyed by a boll weevil infestation, and all five banks in the county closed.
Geography
According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which is land and (1.27%) is water.
Demographics
2020 census
As of the 2020 census, Coalgate had a population of 1,667. The median age was 40.6 years. 23.3% of residents were under the age of 18 and 20.4% of residents were 65 years of age or older. For every 100 females there were 82.4 males, and for every 100 females age 18 and over there were 77.1 males age 18 and over.
There were 708 households in Coalgate, of which 28.8% had children under the age of 18 living in them. Of all households, 34.0% were married-couple households, 20.2% were households with a male householder and no spouse or partner present, and 39.3% were households with a female householder and no spouse or partner present. About 37.6% of all households were made up of individuals and 16.4% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older.
! Race !! Percent
|-
| White || 62.3%
|-
| Black or African American || 1.2%
|-
| American Indian and Alaska Native || 22.4%
|-
| Asian || 0.4%
|-
| Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander || <0.1%
|-
| Some other race || 1.9%
|-
| Two or more races || 11.9%
|-
| Hispanic or Latino (of any race) || 6.0%
|}
2000 census
As of the census