Inductees 1989

Clayburn Straughn was born in 1923 and grew up during the Great Depression of the 1930s. Clayburn’s mother, Frances Carlton Straughn, was an original Chickasaw enrollee and his great-grandfather came from the Old Chickasaw Nation during the Great Removal of 1837. Clayburn was also a direct descendant of Governor William Guy, who was Chickasaw governor from 1886-1888. Like millions of Americans during the 1930s, Clayburn’s family managed to get by during a time of great financial hardship. The Straughn family home was located in Wilson, Oklahoma—a tiny community just west of Ardmore. As The Grapes of Wrath taught us, the depression affected everyone’s way of life, but it was especially hard in small-town Oklahoma “dust bowls.”