Lu Celia Wise Dies at 92

Oklahoma author LuCelia Wise dies

By Staff Reports 6/11/2006 View in Print (PDF) Format

LuCelia Wise, author of Oklahoma's official book honoring the American bicentennial, died Friday. She was 92.

Services will be held 2 p.m. Monday at Moore's Eastlawn Funeral Home Chapel.

LuCelia Rose (Roberts) Wise was born Nov. 7, 1913, in Kingston to Rose and John Roberts. After graduating from Kingston High School, she attended a teachers college in Durant. Wise began teaching in Putnam City.

She married George Wayne Wise on Dec. 22, 1940. After teaching art and social studies in Oklahoma City for several years, the couple moved to Tulsa. Wise took a job at Sinclair Oil Corp. and was the first female draftsman in the engineering and geological drafting department. Wise worked there until 1959, when she created her own business, Oil Originals by LuCelia.

Her background helped her design promotional items and gifts, such as an oil drop paperweight and a miniature working model of an oil pumper. She also created brass etchings of Western art displayed in the Gilcrease Museum.

Eventually, Wise began writing children's books focusing on the state and its heritage.

When America's bicentennial celebrations were being planned, Wise was asked to write Oklahoma's official bicentennial book. She traveled more than 100,000 miles, visited 43 Oklahoma museums and spent 11 years writing "Oklahoma's Blending of Many Cultures." In 1973, she told the Tulsa World that she chose the title to reflect Oklahoma's status as "the melting pot of the United States."

Her goddaughter, Penny Tipton, said Wise was a "real innovator" whose career flourished because of her creativity. "She had a real entrepreneurial mind," Tipton said.

Wise was a board member of the National Hall of Fame for Famous American Indians and the Oklahoma State Historical Society, organizing that group's Indian Heritage Committee. She also served as state president of Pro-America and International Club of Tulsa president.

Wise is survived by goddaughters Francie (Marks) Ward of Grant's Pass, Ore., Joanne Marks of Portland, Ore., and Penny (Marks) Tipton of Tulsa.

Friends are contributing to the Tulsa Historical Society.

Source. http://www.tulsaworld.com/NewsStory.asp?ID=060611_Ne_A20_Oklah64556_0

Woman who wrote Oklahoma book honoring bicentennial dies

TULSA, Okla. LuCelia Wise, whose travels across Oklahoma helped inspire her writing of the state's official book honoring the nation's bicentennial, has died.The 92-year-old Wise died yesterday. Services will be held Monday in Moore.

Wise was born in 1913 in Kingston, attended college in Durant and later taught in the Putnam City school district. After she married George Wayne Wise, the couple moved to Tulsa.
She became the first female draftsman to work in the engineering and geological drafting department at Sinclair Oil Corporation, and later opened her own business, Oil Originals by LuCelia.

After she was asked to write Oklahoma's official bicentennial book, she traveled more than 100-thousand miles while compiling information for the book she called "Oklahoma's Blending of Many Cultures."

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Source. http://www.kfsm.com/Global/story.asp?S=5015017

NOTE: She also authored Mini myths and legends of Oklahoma Indians (Oklahoma State Dept. of Education, a collection of 17 Indian legends taken from several tribes living in Oklahoma), Indian values : past and present (Oklahoma State Dept. of Education, which discusses the traditions and contributions of the Indian people living in Oklahoma), Indian cultures of Oklahoma (Oklahoma State Dept. of Education), Tiny Bat and the Ball Game (Portals, March 1996, 0916620190), Race of Flitty Hummingbird and Flappy Crane: An Indian Legend (Portals, March 1996, 0916620212), Oklahoma's First Ladies (Evans Pubns, June 1984, 0934188106 - photos and bios of First Ladies of Oklahoma from Lillian Gallup Haskell to Donna Skinner Nigh), Oklahoma's First Ladies: Activity Coloring Book (Evans Pubns, June 1983, 0934188114), and illustrated Alli Gator Gets a Bump on His Nose by Maragret Zehmer Searcy.