Old Fort Sill

On a recent visit to Oklahoma, Rich wanted to stop by Fort Sill, an Army Post located north of Lawton. While Fort Sill is an Army base, this base is open to the public (you must obtain a pass at the Visitor Control Center) and has some interesting things that are a part of our history.

While our visit this time really centered around finding the gravesite of Quanah Parker who is buried on Chief’s Knoll, we enjoyed visiting other sites while there. For those who may not know, Quanah Parker was chief of the Comanches.  Next to his gravesite is buried his mother, Cynthia Ann Parker and his sister, Prairie Flower. This is a sacred place with many other graves as well.

Quanah Parker-Chief of Comanches Gravesite

We also visited the gravesite of Geronimo, who is buried in the Apache Cemetery, farther down the road. Geronimo was a Medicine Man who was captured and this cemetery is for POW’s. There are others buried in this cemetery as well. Again, it is a sacred place. While there is signage to help direct one to his grave, I suspect there were a few missing as we had difficulty finding the entrance. I was pleasantly surprised to find that when I put Geronimo’s name and gravesite into my phone, that the location came up and we were able to find it easily.  

Geroimo-Apache Medicine Man Gravesite

There are many different buildings that are older and historic in nature, as well as the original Fort Sill, which is currently not open to the public as it is closed for renovation.

There is also an artillery area which features tankers and equipment dating to World War I and World War II as well as more recent wars; some of them were built by other countries and were captured (if that is the best word) during the wars.

Fort Sill Artillery Area

While this visit was more something that Rich was interested in, I also found the Fort interesting and felt awed by the historic nature and the sacred gravesites. If you are in the area, Fort Sill is a great place to visit and holds much history from our past.

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