Robbers Cave State Park - History

History

The area surrounding the present-day park has been a hunting ground for hundreds of years. Archaeological evidence suggests that the earliest people were related to the builders of the Spiro Mounds. By the 1600s, the Osage and Caddo tribes dominated the area. French hunters and explorers also visited, leaving their mark by naming some of the prominent geographic features, which are still used.

After the Civil War, this area became legendary for sheltering fugitives from the law. Some of these included Jesse James and Belle Starr. Other fugitives included the Dalton Gang, the Youngers and the Rufus Buck Gang.

In 1929, Carlton Weaver, an editor and politician from Wilburton, donated 120 acres (49 ha) of land near Robbers Cave to the Boy Scouts of America for a campground. The warden of the Oklahoma State Penitentiary arranged for skilled prison inmates to construct camp improvements, including a kitchen and several other buildings, from rock quarried nearby. The new facility was named Camp Tom Hale, for a McAlester resident and Boy Scout supporter. The camp was adjacent to a tract of land that Weaver had leased to create a game preserve. Weaver later donated the preserve to the Oklahoma Fish and Game Commission.

The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was organized in 1933. Supervised by the National Park Service, the CCC built a bathhouse, cabins, trails, group camps, shelters, and roads. In 1937, CCC and the Works Progress Administration (WPA) created Lake Carlton, named for Carlton Weaver.

In 1987, the park initiated the first annual Robbers Cave Fall Festival, and the Robbers Cave Bluegrass Festival began in 1988. In 1994, Oklahoma converted the bathhouse to a nature center. The park was added to the National Register of Historic Places (NR 96000489) in 2002.