October 25, 1861

Outlaw Jim Miller was born near Van Buren (Crawford County). Miller spent much of his life, however, in Texas and Oklahoma, where he earned a reputation as a professional assassin, manipulating the court system to avoid prison. After Miller killed former Oklahoma deputy U.S. marshal A. A. “Gus” Bobbitt near Ada, Oklahoma, in 1909, Miller and three of his associates were arrested and placed in the Ada jail. In the early morning hours of April 19, 1909, a mob overpowered the two jailers, took Miller, Joe Allen, Jesse West, and Berry Burrell to a nearby stable, and lynched them. A photographer was called in, and his photograph of the four men hanging has become an icon in the lore of the Old West.