Lilah Denton Lindsey

Lindsey lived in Tulsa for 28 years. She led many woman's organizations in the city, and also did individual charity work for years. She visited the sick, personally secured donations for the needy, and practically did the work of a humane officer. She organized the Humane society. Her interest in charitable work attracted the attention of state officials. Oklahoma Governor Charles N. Haskell appointed her as the Oklahoma delegate to the International Tuberculosis Conference held at Washington, D.C., and she was sent to numerous state charity associations. She secured the donation of a tract of land to establish a Florence Crittenton Home for Fallen Girls at Tulsa. Failing health prevented her from completing its construction.^[7]

For years, Lindsey was active in the Women's Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions of the Southwest. She was an ardent church worker and at one time was the oldest member of the First Presbyterian church in Tulsa.

She became a member of the WCTU and organized a union chapter in her city. From that time until statehood, she was president of the Indian Territory WCTU. She later served as vice-president of the Oklahoma organization, president of the Tulsa County and the local union, and for one year edited the official organ of the Indian Territory WCTU. At the World's Convention of the WCTU held in Boston, Lindsey was introduced to the assembly of women from all nations as a "real native of America".^{[citation needed]}

When Lindsey established the Tulsa chapter of the WCTU, she effectively organized the city's first woman's club. The National WCTU was the first woman's club organized in America. She arranged for a police matron to be appointed in the city, also a first for the state, to assist girls being taken to court. When she met with the city council to propose the office, Lindsey had the preliminaries so well planned that the office was approved and the woman she recommended was hired and commissioned to begin work the following morning. She also served as vice-president of the Women's National Rivers and Harbors Congress.^[7]

Lindsey also organized both the Maccabees and the Woman's Relief Corps in Tulsa. She was a member of the executive board of the latter organization. One year, she audited the local chapter's books in Atlantic City. She attended nine national Grand Army of the Republic assemblies.^[7]

Lindsey was strongly interested in the preservation of Native American landmarks, especially the Creek Capitol Building at Okmulgee. She encouraged it to be adapted as a museum for the preservation and interpretation of Creek relics. Her husband built the stone wall around the building and planted trees around it. She taught a term of school in one of its rooms.^[7]

Inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame in 1937, she later died on December 22, 1943, in Tulsa, aged 83.^[8] The Lilah Lindsey School was named in 1957 in her honor.

• This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain: J. B. Thoburn's A Standard History of Oklahoma: An Authentic Narrative of Its Development from the Date of the First European Exploration Down to the Present Time, Including Accounts of the Indian Tribes, Both Civilized and Wild, of the Cattle Range, of the Land Openings and the Achievements of the Most Recent Period (1916)

• Buchanan, James Shannon (1955). Chronicles of Oklahoma. Oklahoma Historical Society.
• Thoburn, Joseph Bradfield (1916). A Standard History of Oklahoma: An Authentic Narrative of Its Development from the Date of the First European Exploration Down to the Present Time, Including Accounts of the Indian Tribes, Both Civilized and Wild, of the Cattle Range, of the Land Openings and the Achievements of the Most Recent Period (Public domain ed.). American Historical Society. p. 1024.
• Thurman, Melvena K. (December 1982). Women in Oklahoma: a century of change. Oklahoma Historical Society. ISBN 978-0-941498-28-9.