Captain
David L. Payne, is a veteran of the Civil War for whom Payne County,
Oklahoma is named. Captain Payne is also known as the Father of Oklahoma
and led several groups of settlers into the area of Indian Territory, now
the site of Stillwater, Oklahoma. Payne served in the 10th Kansas Infantry
Regiment during the war. A memorial has been erected over his burial site
in Stillwater's Boomer Lake Park. The site is marked by the original
gravestone erected by the James Shield Post #57 of the Grand Army of the
Republic of Wellington, Kansas where he was originally buried.
Payne
County was opened to settlement in the Oklahoma land run of 1889.
Stillwater is the county seat.
