Waurika is a city in and the county seat of Jefferson County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 1,837 as of the 2020 United States census.
An article from 1985 in The Oklahoman claimed that Waurika promoted itself as "The Parakeet Capital of the World," while giving no explanation for using this slogan. The Waurika Chamber of Commerce website in 2020 echoed that the town was "once a parakeet paradise," but currently seems to be promoting the motto On The Trail, By The Lake, complete with a logo of a cowboy bronc-riding a fish.
City name
The name is the anglicized version of the Comanche compound woarɨhka ("worm eater") from woa ("worm") + tɨhka ("eat") and presumably refers to early European settlers whose plowing humorously resembled digging for worms. Without indicating the source of their opinions, the City of Waurika and the Oklahoma Historical Society say the name means "clear (or pure) water" in some unidentified "American Indian language".
History
right|thumb|Former First Presbyterian Church transformed into a city office building. Listed on the US [[National Register of Historic Places.]]
Waurika was settled after the Comanche, Kiowa, and Apache Reservation was opened to non-Indians on August 6, 1901. The first white settler was James McGraw, who homesteaded on the present town site after moving from Burlington, Iowa. The first sale of town lots was held on June 18, 1902. Nearly three thousand people attended the sale.
The Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railway came to Waurika in January 1902 after the railroad superintendent "designated the town as a flag station." where the Kell House Museum is located today.