Muskogee was formed in 1872, when the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad (MKT or the Katy) established a depot on an open plain just a few miles to the south of the confluence of the Arkansas, Grand, and Verdigris Rivers in Indian Territory. A small settlement there soon grew to become the center of political and commercial activity in the territory prior to Oklahoma becoming a state in 1907. Muskogee, once known as the Queen City of the Southwest, enjoyed...