Ida was born December 23, 1864, in IN or IL, to Mary Ellen Beem and George Washington "Wash" Robertson. She married Zachariah Wilkerson in the fall of 1880. About 1898 "Ma", as she was called by everyone, came to Cleveland County, Oklahoma, from Camden County, Missouri, with her husband, Zachariah, six daughters and a baby boy. Soon after their move, Zachariah died and left her with these seven children. With only one boy - the youngest - the future looked very bleak. Her parents were back in Missouri. But she stayed. She and the children moved to Oklahoma Territory, OK (at least by 1900.) Ma worked the land, and canned anything and everything she had excess of. She cooked crow. She was tough, and she got tougher.
I restored this photo to try to improve it. There are still some flaws, but it's better than before. Run your mouse over to see the (colorized) original.
I remember the story well of when two Indians were trying to steal cabbages from her garden. One was talking to her, trying to keep her attention, while the other was trying to get the cabbages out of the garden without her noticing. She did notice, and hit at least one of them in the head with her hoe, injuring him and bringing blood. The Indians ran. She fed the family.
There were many tales of bringing up seven children with no husband. Her daughter "Lula" told about how, when strangers came to the door and asked for the husband whoever answered the door would say "he's asleep" and yell "Papa, someone wants to see you" and she would reply in her deepest voice to send them away. Oklahoma Territory was yet untamed.
The whole family worked hard, and played hard. Ida remarried a man named Riley, or Wiley Burke. I don't know exactly when that was, but Lula relayed to us the story of how she took after him with a butcher knife, and then ran away to her grown sister's house and never went back! Lula laughingly told us she (Lula) was "as mean as a snake". Anyway, one day Riley rode to town with Ida's son-in-law, Tom Lowe, and disappeared. He showed up about seven years later, ill and needing care. Ida let him stay the night, sleeping on the couch, with a chaperone there, and made him leave the next day. The family used to joke about how Riley went to town for a loaf of bread, didn't come back for seven years, and when he DID come back, he didn't even bring the bread!!
When I first remember her, she was well into her 80's. She lived in Meeker, OK. Her home was an old Victorian style house (not large as that implies) with a large porch. You walked into the front door, and straight ahead led you down three or four stairs into the living area, or turn right, and go up two or three stairs into the kitchen. She had a large metal enamel bowl with water and a dipper sitting on the table. If you were thirsty, you dipped yourself a drink and drank from the ladle before putting it back into the bowl. There was a pump at the sink. She did have water to the house. That was probably around 1949. Ma was of small stature, at least in her old age, with a course, gravel sounding voice. She only had one eye in her later years, so she often wore a black eye patch. I remember her always wearing a big, dark hairnet on her long white braided hair, which was pinned up in the back. In retrospect I think her as a kind of "Mammy Yoakum". Brave, weathered, and as tough as a boot. In her later life she lost her home twice. Once to fire, and once to a tornado. Life, though long, was never easy for her. After breaking a hip, she told my mother " I just can't die, my heart's too strong!" But she did, at 93.
- by Great-granddaughter, Joy Dupy.
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This is a very typical photo of "Ma", probably in her 80's. It shows the black hairnet she always wore, and in her living room. I don't remember ever seeing her without an apron, except at church or funerals. The photo on the home page of this site has Ma in her youth, and very old age. It was only a graphic interpretation of "Whispers of our Past". Ma never dressed in fancy clothes, or lived in a fancy house. She is forever embedded in my mind as the original pioneer woman stereotype. And a role model we have always used in our family for when things got tough. We were descended from "Ma" and could stand up to it!
Ma is buried in a lone grave near Wilkerson family members in Meeker OK New Hope Cemetery.
Bankston | Beem | Burt |Cothern |Curtis| Dupy |Franklin |Harris |Holt |Kisner |Learned |Lockman |Lowe | McDonald |Robertson|Stansberry |Thornhill |Wilkerson
