Woolaroc

Can you kind of tell me a little bit about the herd, if you know anything about that?

Absolutely.

So when Frank created Woolarock in the 20s, he decided that he wanted to bring the buffalo and the bison down from South Dakota.

These, of course, were lands where they used to naturally roam, but due to westward expansion, they were, of course, pushed out of this area.

So Frank created Woolarock Museum and Wildlife Preserve in part to have these herds back here in the state.

So we've had that herd now from South Dakota now here for almost 100 years.

That's the original lineage.

So I really encourage visitors to try to come out earlier in the day, especially if it's warmer season.

We've got the full holiday season.

Uh, we've got the, the, uh, Christkindlmarket, uh, at Woolaroc on, uh, Nos- on Dec- November 27th through the 29th.

December 1st we've got the experience of, uh, with the extraordinary talent, Katie Mahan, at OK Woo, uh, Fine Arts Center, and that's on Giving Tuesday, December 4th, Ambler Hall.

We're gonna have a good time out there, as we just mentioned.

Okay.

Yeah, my grandma had a, a Woolaroc book when I was a kid that I used to pull out and look at all the time like that.

Yeah.

And so then once I was older, I was like, "Oh, we have to go to Woolaroc," 'cause I remember all the cool stuff in that book.

[laughs]

[laughs]

We still filmed some of it in Osage County.

We filmed the Indian camp out at Woolaroc.

Uh-huh.

Bob Frasier let us come out there and use those teepees.

He had chosen his aircraft carefully, a Travel Air 5000 monoplane, a well-built and proven design, modified for the crossing with additional fuel capacity and the best navigation instruments he could obtain.

He called her Woolaroc after the Oklahoma ranch of his sponsor, Frank Phillips, the oil man.

The name was a contraction of woods, rocks, and lakes, the features of the land Phillips had built his estate on.

Flying with Goebel was Navy Lieutenant William Davis as navigator.

It was an entirely different undertaking than what James Dole had sponsored.

The Dole Derby was not the right tool for opening the Pacific, but it was part of what eventually pointed in the right direction by showing with terrible clarity what the Pacific actually required.

Woolaroc survives.

She sits at the Woolaroc Museum in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, in the building named for the same Phillips ranch that sent her west over the water nearly a century ago.