Oklahoma, where people see the future!

If I remember correctly, Mr. Grimes the hangman said that he was from Oklahoma. In 1867.

He said he was one of the Oklahoma Grimes, implying his family had been settled there for decades, and that he came from Oklahoma City, founded April 22, 1889 - 22 years in the future.

As far as I know the name Oklahoma was first proposed by Choctaw chief Allen Wright in 1866 in discussions with federal officials. Oklahoma is from the Choctaw phrase okla humma, or red people. The region was known as The Indian Territory and over thirty Indian tribes were moved from their homelands to Indian Territory by 1890.

The Indian Territory included all of modern Oklahoma until the western part became Oklahoma Territory in 1890. Oklahoma Territory and Indian Territory became the state of Oklahoma in 1907.

It was certainly possible and not unheard of for white persons to live in Indian Territory in 1867 - some of them legally. But it was unusual for someone to come from a place that was not open to white settlement, and rather strange that he expected other people to know what the name "Oklahoma" meant as early as 1867.