Tullahassee is a town in Wagoner County, Oklahoma, United States. As of the 2020 census, Tullahassee had a population of 83. It was the location of Tullahassee Mission, an Indian boarding school that burned in 1880. Because their population in the community had declined, the Muscogee Creek gave the school to Creek Freedmen, paying to replace the main building, and relocated with their families to the area of Wealaka Mission.
Tullahassee is considered the oldest of the surviving all-black towns in former Indian Territory. By 1880 Creek Freedmen and their descendants dominated the community population.
History
The town began in 1850, when the Creek Nation approved the Tullahassee Mission School at this site on the Texas Road. It was founded by Robert McGill Loughridge, a Presbyterian minister who had been serving in the Creek Nation since 1843 and had founded another mission that year.
In the years before the Emancipation Proclamation, many Creek citizens of the town had Black slaves. The Creek paid to have the school's main building replaced.
The residents opened a post office in 1899, and the town was incorporated in 1902. The Tullahassee Town Site Company was established to aid developing the town, and it both platted the town in 1907 It was a period when private, municipal and state junior colleges were being founded. Flipper-Davis College was then the only private, higher-level education institution for African Americans in Oklahoma. This junior college closed in 1935 during the Great Depression.
Geography
Tullahassee is located at (35.837758, -95.439295). It is northwest of Muskogee.
According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of , all land.
Demographics
Racial and ethnic composition
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"
|+Tullahassee town, Oklahoma – Racial and ethnic composition<br><small></small>
!Race / Ethnicity <small>(NH = Non-Hispanic)</small>
!Pop 2000
!Pop 2010
!
!% 2000
!% 2010
!
|-
|White alone (NH)
|30
|23
|style='background: #ffffe6; |20
|28.30%
|21.70%
|style='background: #ffffe6; |24.10%
|-
|Black or African American alone (NH)
|71
|67
|style='background: #ffffe6; |27
|66.98%
|63.21%
|style='background: #ffffe6; |32.53%
|-
|Native American or Alaska Native alone (NH)
|1
|9
|style='background: #ffffe6; |17
|0.94%
|8.49%
|style='background: #ffffe6; |20.48%
|-
|Asian alone (NH)
|0
|0
|style='background: #ffffe6; |1
|0.00%
|0.00%
|style='background: #ffffe6; |1.20%
|-
|Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander alone (NH)
|0
|0
|style='background: #ffffe6; |0
|0.00%
|0.00%
|style='background: #ffffe6; |0.00%
|-
|Other race alone (NH)
|0
|0
|style='background: #ffffe6; |0
|0.00%
|0.00%
|style='background: #ffffe6; |0.00%
|-
|Mixed race or Multiracial (NH)
|4
|7
|style='background: #ffffe6; |17
|3.77%
|6.60%
|style='background: #ffffe6; |20.48%
|-
|Hispanic or Latino (any race)
|0
|0
|style='background: #ffffe6; |1
|0.00%
|0.00%
|style='background: #ffffe6; |1.20%
|-
|Total
|106
|106
|style='background: #ffffe6; |83
|100.00%
|100.00%
|style='background: #ffffe6; |100.00%
|}
2020 census
As of the 2020 census, Tullahassee had a population of 83. The median age was 53.3 years. 15.7% of residents were under the age of 18 and 25.3% of residents were 65 years of age or older. For every 100 females there were 144.1 males, and for every 100 females age 18 and over there were 141.4 males age 18 and over.
0.0% of residents lived in urban areas, while 100.0% lived in rural areas.
There were 30 households in Tullahassee, of which 40.0% had children under the age of 18 living in them. Of all households, 33.3% were married-couple households, 23.3% were households with a male householder and no spouse or partner present, and 30.0% were households with a female householder and no spouse or partner present. About 20.0% of all households were made up of individuals and 10.0% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older.
Education
Students are zoned to Porter Consolidated Schools.
Tullahassee Manual Labor School
The Tullahassee Manual Labor School, located in Tullahassee, Oklahoma was originally used as a Creek boarding school and became a school for Creek Freedmen to gain education beyond an elementary school level. The institution was one of very few designated for Creek Freedmen and operated as such from 1883 to until it was sold to Waggoner County in 1914. Tullahassee Manual Labor School was reopened in 1883 primarily serving Creek Freedmen in Tullahassee. After Oklahoma gained statehood, it was owned by the government until 1914 when it was sold to Waggoner County and became Flipper Key Davis College, an institution primarily serving African Americans. As of today, Flipper Key Davis College is no longer in operation.
See also
- Boley, Brooksville, Clearview, Grayson, Langston, Lima, Redbird, Rentiesville, Summit, Taft, Tatums, and Vernon, other "All-Black" settlements that resulted from the Land Run of 1889 in Indian Territory.