The Original Red River War Wasn't About Football

On the banks of the Red River, its hard to tell where Texas ends and Oklahoma begins. But if you have an expert, like Michael Dean from the Oklahoma Historical Society, it’s easy to spot.

“I would remind you we're in Oklahoma, we're about four feet from Texas,” says Dean laughing and pointing to the grass on the Texas side of the Red River. “So your on my side of the state now, George!”

Dean knows that territory has always been a big deal between Oklahoma and Texas. If it’s not a geographic dispute, its haggling over who has the best football team.

The OU-Texas game was moved to Dallas in 1912, and to the Cotton Bowl in 1929. Students and fans have enjoyed the neutral site ever since.

Says Dean, “Imagine this, thousands and thousands of Model A's, Model T's, Chevy's, Dodges, all head south out of Oklahoma, and once they got the Red River, there's a big traffic jam.”

Before we had expensive bridges and interstate highways, crossing from one state to another wasn't easy. Texas and Oklahoma had disputes involving boundaries and toll bridges. Call it the original, Red River War, a war which earned worldwide notoriety.

The dispute was over a free bridge build across the Red River on Highway 75, now the south bound lane. The fight started when the owners of a nearby toll bridge, wanted the public bridge shut down.

“There was no bridge across the Red River, you had to get across by Ferry,” says Dean. “By the early 1930's, 1929, 1930, and 1931, a private company in Denison Texas had built a bridge, a toll bridge across the Red River, between Durant Oklahoma, and Denison Texas.”

Pillars from that bridge still stand today. Dean gave us a step by step description as we discovered the Pillars, about a mile East of the Highway 75 bridge.

“I just think this is amazing, the piers are there, they're still parts of them visible,” says Dean. “The structure of the bridge, are still there in the red river, the top part of the abutment is still visible, where the bridge came across and then connected to the road on top of this bank. It’s just amazing that all of this is still here, to be as old as it is, to be constructed in the 1920's.”

To underscore the challenge, issued by the Texas owned Red River Bridge Company, Oklahoma Governor Bill Murray plowed up the entrance to the bridge on the Oklahoma side, so it couldn't be used.

On the Texas side, Barricades were in place, thanks to a court order. And, since Governor Murray said the State Boundary actually put the privately owned bridge in Oklahoma territory, there was only one thing for him to do, seize the bridge.

Governor Murray, the Oklahoma Governor from 1931-35, said, “I feel that I should uphold the power of the state.”

Donna Hunt, who was the Editor of the Herald Democrat in Denison, Texas from 1984 to 1994, said “No bullets were fired, but this is the original red river war.”

“He (the former Governor) walked out on the bridge with a gun in his hand, after the bridge was open, but nobody cared then, they had it open.”

Says Dean, “Governor Murray called out the national guard, and inspected the troops there on the Oklahoma side of the bridge, then led the troops across the bridge, brandishing a pistol in his hand. They marched across the bridge and he seized that bridge and opened it up for public traffic. And we call that the Red River Bridge War, and we like to think that was one of the first times that we beat Baja, Oklahoma, or Texas.”

These days, the game has been changed to the Red River Rivalry, instead of the Red River Shootout, but given the history between the two states, the later may be more appropriate.

“Nobody really won, I don't guess,” says Hunt. But being from Texas we like to think we did, but Oklahoma, I'm sure Governor Murray thought he did too. So, he accomplished his purpose. He got it open.”

“Sometimes, we kind of exaggerate and we say the State of Oklahoma declared war on the State of Texas, and we seized that bridge at gun point,” says Dean. “Well, that part of is true, but there was never a formal declaration of war from the Oklahoma Legislature.”

In 1961, the bridge burned down, and today two giant pillars are the only reminders of the standoff between Oklahoma and Texas, in what has become known as the Original Red River War.