Tulsa was
originally part of Indian Territory and was first settled by the Lochapoka and
Creek tribes in 1836. They established a home under a large oak tree at the
present day intersection of Cheyenne Avenue and 18th Street, and named their
new settlement Tallasi, meaning "old town" in the Creek language,
which later became "Tulsa". On January 18, 1898, Tulsa was officially
incorporated and elected its first mayor, Edward Calkins.
When Tulsa was a small town near the banks
of the Arkansas River in 1901, Tulsa's first oil well, named Sue Bland No