Harold Carver Capshaw was born on October 20 1889 at the foot of Blunt Mountain in St. Clair County in Alabama. "Cap" as he is called by his friends comes from a different era, a time when a man's hands were his trade and a strong back was a necessity. He and his family first settled near Banty. "We knew no one but we finally found a man by the name of Jim Rea, who had cotton to pick, corn to gather and plenty of work to do, so we went with him down about 3 miles Southeast of Utica." said Carver.
"We didn't have any way to stay except in the covered wagon so we pulled out under a big oak tree and set out what we had. We stayed there until the 9th or 10th day of December when there came a big snow. We had rented some land from a widow lady by the name of Thomas so we stayed with her until we could do better. Later, we found an old cabin, no floor or door, but, we camped there until we could build another cabin. In 1899 we made our first crop there, It was about a mile and a quarter West of where Albany is now."
Carver's father raised corn and hogs that first year in the Indian Territory and was doing well but, the schools were so poor that it was decided to go back to Texas. Carver said, "The folks stayed one more year in Texas, then we all came right back to where we had been, near Albany. Some of my people have been there at Albany eversince."
In 1906 Carver was 17 and the Katy Railroad was being double tracked through this part of the country. Carver said, "I was just a big over-grown boy when I went up to Durant and got a job on the Katy railroad with the B and B department, (Builders and Bridge Department)." Carver moved all around the county with the railroad but, was bothered with chills so he struck out for a dryer climate.
In the Fall of 1906 he found himself in Memphis, Texas picking cotton. In the Spring he was in Hamlin, Texas where his people had moved. There he and a young man named Henry Greer took jobs digging wells. "I started out helping a one legged man named John Ferrier dig a cistern and then helped him dig four more." said Carver. "Henry had been helping us, he pulled the dirt up. Henry and I then went to Post, Texas, old man C. W. Post had started this town and we helped dig the ditch to run the water from the reservoir to Post. But, I took typhoid fever and had to go back home."
With all his traveling Carver had still not been over 80 miles from home. In 1907 when Oklahoma was declared a state, Carver was on the bank of the Red River picking cotton. The next Summer the gin at Albany was moved to just North of Hollis, Oklahoma and coal wagon from Teacross, Oklahoma to Mangum, and then back again." said Carver. "Along about Fall all the cotton was picked and the gin was closed down, I decided I had better head back home."
Carver had received a letter from his sister saying Albany finally bad a school teacher that was really trying to teach and, since be was 19 he thought he had better get some schooling. After a year of school, Carver's 8th grade class went to Durant to take the 8th grade examination passed and went to Normal at Durant to get his 3rd grade teaching certificate.
"In the Winter of 1910 I taught school at Empson Prarie East of Bokchito. I then went back to Normal and got my 2nd grade certificate and taught at Bray until 1912." said Carver.
About that time the government opened up an examination for the Caddo Rural mail carriers job. The Smith bothers got him to take the examination with them. "You may know of Theodore Smith, he ran the post office at Banty for a long time and then took over his father's Store at Banty. Henry Smith later worked for the government and helped bring in the boot leggers. John Smith and I started working for the post office in Durant for fifty dollars a month In 1912." explains Carver.
When Carver started working for the post office be married Vada and his days of roaming the country were over and his bride settled in Durant and Carver stayed with the post office for 39 years. He and Vada live in a stone house he and a friend, Bill Miller, built in 1935.
Carver no longer has milk cows but his garden is still worked and be sleeps outside on his cot in the Summer and he can still build or repair almost anything. Time has been good to Carver and at 88 he is still an active gentleman with a special kind of humor, and a love for his fellow man.
Many of you may know Harold Carver Capshaw through his work at the First Baptist Church or his 62 years of membership in the Masonic Lodge.
"Cap", is a man who grew up in a time when a man's hands were his trade and be has done everything from jack leg plumbing to clerking in a store.
H. C. Capshaw's 84, but for all appearances, the lively, rather stout, 180 pound octogenerian is as fit and sturdy as the sandstone home he built himself back in 1935.
The house--like the man--looks as if it's going to last forever. Its walls are 13 inches thick, the original shingles are still on the roof and will probably be there as long as the house, and the steel reinforced foundation might be the only one of its kind anywhere. "I get the steel for the foundation from a junk yard," Capshaw said, rapping against the cement wall. "I bought a pile of old automobile frames for a few dollars and used them with the cement. There are still a few ofthe frames out in the barn."
Capshaw also built the barn he was referring to built every structure on his property: a stone workshop-storage shed, the wooden barn and a log cabin with--naturally enough--a stone foundation.
Cap--as friends call him--saw his first stone building when he came to Durant in 1898. As he remembers, there was only one brick structure in town--a bank at 3rd and Main!
The first stone buildings he took a liking to were up in Atoka. "I saw some stone homes up there and really liked the way they were built," Capshaw said. "It was then I decided to build one of my own."
Building a stone home was described by Capshaw as, "sort of like putting together a giant jigsaw puzzle. Keep all the straight edges pieces at the outside, and fill in the middle with all the rest.
"Most stones were used in their natural shapes and textures," Cap said running his hand along the outside of the home, "but I did have to do some shaping. I used a stone hammer. Some people used chisels, but I didn't have one."
Helping Capshaw with the home was co-postal worker and stone building enthusiast W. A. Miller. "I helped him put in a few service stations on N 1 and build his home on Fifth helped me with my house.
"We never charged each other," Capshaw said with a smile. "We just helped one another when he needed it."
The home went up quickly. The first stone was set on April 1, 1935 and Capshaw, his wife Vada and children began moving in October that year. Material and labor costs far the home were nearly impossible to beat. "All the stone came from the Boggy river at Lane, about 15 miles east of Atoka," he said. "The only cost was hauling it."
Labor involved $48 to a brick layer, who put in 12 eight hour days and eventually a few more dollars to a plasterer to do the inside of the home. Capshaw and Miller did the stone and carpentry work.
When construction neared the roof of the house, things got tough. "We lifted all those stones by hand," Capshaw said. "We'd build a platform, set the rocks on it and work from there till we needed to go higher. Then we'd do the same thing again."
When completed, the home was one huge room with a water well out back. "This was out in the country then," Capshaw said, referring to his N 9 street address near the college. "I had hook up to the city water lines once they came out here though. "I'll tell you, that well's still good: good soft water. It's tough on pipes though."
The house, however, is a sturdy as ever. It even has the original shingles--put on 39 years ago--still on the roof and in excellent shape.
"You probably never saw any shingles like these," Capshaw said, taking one off a stack in the basement. "They're made out of cement and asbestos. I had to get them from Sherman. Nobody up here could--or would--get them."
"I've only had to replace one or two over the years. They were damaged in hail storms. I'll tell you though, they'll last 100 years--at least."
The stone home is likely to be around at least as long too. Sandstone, while very soft fresh out of the ground hardens the longer it's exposed to air and Cap's home has been up for 38 years now.