Oklahoma history, poetry and anti-communism: the writings of Zoe Tilghman

Abstract

Zoe Tilghman was one of the early women writers in Oklahoma. Throughout her career she used her own experiences and those of her husband, the famous U.S. Marshal William Tilghman, to write stories that portrayed the West as a place of excitement and adventure. Most of her works were centered around western themes such as outlaws, lawmen and Native Americans and were easily accessible to most age groups. She strived to preserve Oklahoma history through her books and articles. Over the course of her eighty-four years she published thirteen books and at least five articles, as well as holding the job of literary editor at Harlow's Weekly and serving as assistant director of the Oklahoma Writers' Project. She was an important part of the Oklahoma community. She founded and was a part of several organizations that sought to provide encouragement and support to writers, poets and other artists. Tilghman wrote at the same time as some of the most notable women writers in the state. Where did she fit in with other writers in not only Oklahoma, but the West as a region? Her lack of discipline and formal training barred her from the scholarly ranks of authors such as Angie Debo, Alice Marriot, and Muriel Wright, and her lack of an original voice kept her from joining fiction writers such as Willa Cather and Helen Hunt Jackson. She gained a certain amount of popularity during her lifetime, but was not able to sustain the notoriety through to the present day.