OLD MOORELAND COMMUNITY HOSPITAL (OK)

Mooreland is a small community east of Woodward in northwest Oklahoma.  The hospital at 6th and Krouth Streets (Blocks 4 & 5 of the Matthews edition), sits on about two acres and was built in an art deco style between 1940/41 when the community had some 800 in population and the ten plus miles to Woodward's hospital was too far to drive in an emergency.  Its 180' x 85' size features a flat roof with parapets, concrete construction, classic corner windows, a blue frieze running the higher borders.  The architect was Ed Hudgens and in 1985 it was listed in a Oklahoma Historic building nomination as a "Woodward WPA" site.  In 1989, a bid by a group (Rivers of Life)  to make a 60-bed drug and alcohol abuse facility was denied citing the nearness of similar facilities.

For over forty years the hospital provided crucial care and comfort to the citizens of the area.


Now, according to sources consulted, it is in private hands awaiting renovation. The possibilities are interesting, and possibly endless, for renewal of this historic building into a viable part of the 21st century and a reminder of another day and another time.  Housing, condos, care facility, office space, educational space......We shall see if this survives to enjoy another seventy years...or falls to time.

SIZE IS JUST A NUMBER

Why do women continue to allow this to happen?  A recent battle between a marketing campaign and a Dallas based blogger underscores that society is often biased, sexist, size-st and unfair.   A company was adding "plus size" fashions to its line.  The sizes were 12-14.  I have seen this on various other online catalogs where plus size, full figure, and similar terms were now for sizes under size 20.  How things change.  But have they really?  

In the 1930's "vanity sizes" first appeared as clothing for women became standardized and mass produced.  I have personally seen antique patterns for smaller women carrying the sizing of "16".  I was then a current size "12" and could not have fit in it!   My mother explained sizes changed. To say the least.

According to one source, standard sizes range from:

US    Small (2,4) Medium (6,8), Large (10,12) XL (14,16)

European Small (32,34), Medium (36,38), Large (40,42), XL (44,46)

UK Small (6,8), Medium (10,12), Large (14,16), XL (18, 20)

Note these all refer to the same body measurements!  A 36 1/2 inch bust is going to be either a "10", "40" or a "14" depending on where it was made.  Plus sizes (US sizes 18-28, European 48-58, and UK 22-32) offer equally confusing and disheartening size ranges.  The basic measurement of the 1910-1930 years was based only on bust size and all else adjusted from that.  Then standardization arrived/. 

See some vintage patterns here.

The mystery is what it is within many women which allows them to sign over control of their looks to third parties: a man, designers, fashion industry, beauty magazines?

The realization that "fashion" is a construct designed to help perpetuate an economic system goes far in freeing some women from the clutches of the annual seasonal buying, updating, redoing, and rebuying cycle designed to allow someone's warped visions and unnatural dictates to control how they will look, what they will wear, and how they will live.  Other women, simply have their own style and ignore the voices seeking to control how they look. Some other women know what looks good on them and stick with what works.

http://girlinthepinkprius.com/page/52/
Bones sticking out - yeah really sexy

Why should someone else tell any woman how to wear her hair, what clothes to wear, or how she should feel about herself?  It is the result of centuries of women being taught to need the approval of parents, other women and men.  It is a problem which often leads young women to severely abuse themselves because they have accepted the inference of their inferiority and they believe they are never good enough, small enough, or pretty enough.  Various health and mental health issues result.

While rumbles of revolt against this annual guilt trip affirming a woman is not good enough being herself have surfaced periodically, they are soon beaten back down by the fashion industry and social pressures. Women gleefully abandon themselves to yearly looks ranging from prostitute, uni sexual, and vamp not because they really want to but because it was what Vogue told them to wear, or what they saw modeled in music videos, commercials and movies. Women comprise a significant economic force in society - isn't it time women called the shots and demanded more of what they want based on their self-value and self-respect?

The Places Before the Places

Sometimes people can assume that because they have always known of an area being a certain way, it had no existence before that time.  It was vague, foggy, and a blank canvas before some magic time of development.  The huge sprawling town? Why there was nothing here but waving grass, right?

Anyone who has driven through Oklahoma City has crossed "Council" heading west out of town or into two from the west.  Nice name, has a ring to it doesn't it?   People never realize that it refers to a special portion of land from a time decades before major settlement arrived in runs or land lotteries.

"Council Grove was described as - "The area included all of Bethany south of N.W. 42nd Street and extended southward to a half mile south of N.W. 10th Street and from Council Road eastward for about three miles. It was soon deemed practical to move a sawmill from Darlington (near Fort Reno) to near the present N.W. 10th Street Bridge. (Doug Dawgz Blog)

 In the 1850's until the outbreak of the Civil War, trader Jesse Chisholm and various Native groups would meet at this historic council grounds for business (Stan Hoig. Cowtown Wichita. University of New Mexico Press, 2007, pg.47). On some old maps it is identified as the "Timber Res." and the "Timber Military Reservation". It was part of the "Unassigned Lands."

In a similar vein, Oklahoma City, "born grown" in the 1889 land run, actually replaced a supply depot called Oklahoma Station.

A survey of an old 1920's atlas of the states reveals the names of many a small town that disappeared with time: Morgan, Erwin, Silver City, Moral, Cereal, etc.   Some, never even made it to ghost town status and others were simply swallowed whole leaving evidence of their presence only in street names, depot designations, or housing developments.

It Could Never Happen Here!

Recently earthquakes occurring in out of the ordinary places bring up phrases like "such things never happening" in a certain locale.  Weather and nature, however, tend to make themselves felt where ever they want.

Hurricanes and Typhoons  can come inland to surprisingly landlocked regions.  Tornadoes have cropped up in places which still cause some to shake their heads in wonder.  And....in the 1940's a volcano suddenly appeared in a corn field in central Mexico!

So, with rumbles, whirling winds, and the end of the world forecast for Dec. 2012 - one should not take anything for granted.