J. B. Milam

J. B. Milam, as he was commonly known, was born on March 10, 1884, near Italy, Texas to Sarah Ellen Couch Milam and William Guinn Milam. His mother's family had fled the Cherokee Nation to Texas in 1863 as refugees from the fighting during the American Civil War. His father's family had immigrated to Texas from Alabama. He was Cherokee through his mother, Milam was a member of the Long Hair Clan. In 1887 his family returned to Cherokee Nation lands, in northeastern Indian Territory and settled near Chelsea, Oklahoma.

Milam attended the Cherokee Male Seminary, a tribally run college in Tahlequah, Oklahoma. In 1901 and 1902, he studied at the Metropolitan Business College in Dallas, Texas. After college, he returned to Chelsea and worked in his father's hardware store. He also worked as a cashier at the Bank of Chelsea. He also ventured into the burgeoning oil and gas business. Together with his brother-in-law, Woodley G. Phillips, Milam founded the Phillips and Milam Oil Company, which grew rapidly.

On April 6, 1904, he married Elizabeth Peach McSpadden. Her Cherokee Dawes Roll number was #12943, while his was #24953. These numbers are from the census rolls of Cherokee citizens from 1899 to 1907 documented by the US federal government's Dawes Commission to allot tribal lands. The couple had two daughters and one son.

In 1915, Milam became the president of the Bank of Chelsea, the first bank in the Cherokee Nation. He later founded the Rogers County Bank in Claremore, Oklahoma.