While sitting on a bench in Spigner Park, Bessie Harris watched her family decorate her white and purple float.
“Those are my kids from Kansas and Oklahoma City trying to get me ready,” Harris said. “Get this 90-year-old lady ready to ride.”
She was among a stacked lineup of cowboys, old cars, fire trucks and others in the Town of Tatums' 2025 Black History Month Parade over the weekend in southern Oklahoma.
Tatums is one of 13 historic All-Black Towns in Oklahoma. Over the parade’s four years, the Black History Month Parade has grown.
Harris grew up in Tatums and nearby Elmore City and was featured in the parade as one of the remaining members of the class of 1953. Harris said her classmates did a lot for the town over the years, and she took on the role of the class secretary.
Now, she lives in Pauls Valley. But Harris said she has always come home to participate in public festivities. For her, it’s important to be active in her community.
“Well, we all have a duty, and each one of us would do the things that God has appointed us to do, our world would be a much better place,” Harris said.
Harris said she marched with Clara Luper, an Oklahoma City activist known for leading a downtown OKC sit-in in 1958. She said passing on history at events like this parade is overwhelming.
“I can’t even explain it,” Harris said.
Kris Harvey, mayor of Tatums, said the town has been preparing for the event for a few months. Along the parade route there were vendors, and after the parade, music and dancing.
Next year, he said, the town is hoping to add a rodeo.
“The rodeo grounds is under construction right now, so we’re about 80% there,” Harvest said. “So we’re hoping that 2026, late February, early March, we’ll have a rodeo to add to it.”
The last time Tatums had a rodeo was in 2010. Along with the rodeo, Harvey said the town has improved the wastewater system and redid the patios and pavilions in Spigner Park.
He said city officials are attempting to share more information about what’s been happening in the town.
“We're trying to rejuvenate the town and recruit some people, recruit some businesses, build some houses down here, and get the town back self-sufficient,” Harvey said.
Ronald Gaines was one of the cowboys in the parade.
Gaines competed in team roping and is a mentor to others.
“I try to tell them how we had to go through and what we’re doing now, I mean, It’s a miracle,” Gaines said. “It’s close your eyes and open your eyes, but that’s the Lord's work. It’s close your eyes and open your eyes, how it is now and how it used to be.”
His family is ingrained in the town. He remembers when it was bigger and hosted a rodeo. Gaines said he’s thankful for the town's progress and hopes to see the rodeo ring and some of the past glory return.
“It's picking up now, but it used to be in the years, 70s, 60s it was big, and it just fell through, seemed like,” Gaines said. “But thank the Lord, it’s coming back.”
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