Patty Sue Reeder

Mass of Christian burial for Pat Reeder will be held on Thursday, March 13, 2025, at 11:00am at St. Cecilia Catholic Church in Claremore, OK. A rosary will be held on Wednesday, March 12, 2025, 7:00pm also at St. Cecilia Catholic Church. 

I majored in journalism to find women journalists were “society” writers. A.L. Douthitt hadn’t told me that when he let me write a teen column for the Nowata Star and was immersed in the Nowata school paper (even did a little of my own investigative journalism, much to the dismay of Mackie Adamson, school paper advisor). And of all things, it was about why there were no girls in FFA.

Born and reared in a Nowata County Cherokee Indian family, I graduated from Nowata High School and Coffeyville (Kansas) Community College (associate degree) and attended classes from Pittsburg State University on the Coffeyville campus (extension classes).

When I was turned down on a job at the Coffeyville Journal, I was told they already had a woman on staff. They offered me a job as a teletype setter, but I settled on a career with an outstanding ophthalmologist whose wife produced radio safety broadcasts. I helped her with radio scripts and broadcasts until the birth of my first child in 1964. When we moved to Claremore in 1965, I worked for an optical house in Tulsa (because I knew the owner), and the move to Claremore was almost an overnight decision.

It was not until after the birth of my second son in 1967 that I knew I was spending way too much time on Highway 66 and into downtown Tulsa. I approached the publisher of the Claremore Progress.

That was the beginning of a 37-year career of doing what I always wanted to do—what I had planned from the time I was chosen editor of my high school paper, worked on the Nowata Daily Star, and on the Coffeyville College Dial.

I started as a general assignment reporter, and at a small-town paper, that meant covering everything from the courthouse to the outhouse. I even had my turn at “society” and kept the books on my day off for a few months.

I was an editor most of the time, but spent a lot of time in the trenches. I often tell people I have more time in the courtroom than any judge, lawyer, or court reporter in this county. I didn’t concentrate on “investigating,” but felt it was our responsibility to keep the public informed about what was going on in Rogers County—from Catoosa to Chelsea and Inola to Oologah, with Claremore in between. I felt my first obligation was to the readers, running interference and serving as an advocate for people in northeast Oklahoma, especially Rogers County.

I hope in some way in my years at the Progress, we made a difference—a difference in many ways—going to the ground in a fight for 911, raising thousands of dollars each year to send the less privileged to summer camp, and feeding the hungry—many of them working poor—at Christmastime. We promoted Claremore’s sister city relationship with a town in the middle of Siberia, making lasting friendships with the people of Muravlenko, Russia, and their government leaders.

When I went to work at the Progress, my typewriter was older than me, and the wire came in on a piece of paper tape about an inch wide, punched with holes that read like braille. I used that typewriter until the 1970s when we got our first computer. The Progress was maybe the first computer newsroom in the state. The computer was responsible for several nervous breakdowns. They had me teaching other papers in the state what to expect when they converted to a computer newsroom.

I was one of the first women in Oklahoma to become a managing editor (the other was Jane Bryant in Norman) who wasn’t a member of the family that owned the paper. Donn Dodd had faith in me, and I spent the rest of my career concentrating on making the paper better for our readers.

As a reporter and editor, I have rubbed shoulders with Bill Clinton (before he was President Clinton); W. R. Howell, president of the JCPenney Company; Lou Boccardi, who retired in 2003 from Associated Press; Pat Nixon; Reagan Press Secretary James Brady; Anwar Sadat’s widow, Jihan; Terry Anderson, journalist taken prisoner; and Larry Gatlin.

I remember the first fatality, my first molestation case, and sitting in the courtroom with the killer of Catoosa Police Chief J.B. Hamby, who I witnessed lying dead on the floor of a laundromat.

But the things most special to me are the kids I watched grow up to be good citizens, the people who were the readers of the Claremore Progress and are still my friends, and the special people I have worked with and for at the Claremore Progress.

It was the best thing that ever happened in my career when Donn Dodd hired me. The next best thing was when Michelle Lefebvre-Carter offered me a part-time job doing public relations for the Will Rogers Museum.

How lucky in life can one person from small-town Oklahoma be?

Some of my involvement (Several have broken gender barriers, but I rarely think of that)

(Current)

Member, lector, and usher at St. Cecilia’s Catholic Church, Claremore

Member of fundraising committee raising more than $17 million to build a campus for Catholic Charities in the Tulsa Diocese

Board of Freedom of Information Oklahoma

Board member of Share the Spirit

Longtime board member and chair of Rogers County Health Board (state commissioner’s appointment)

North Central Association (accrediting agency for schools) public representative for 15 years, member of the national board of trustees, and founding member of the joint board of NCA and South Association of College and Schools (now AdvanceEd)

Member of the first accrediting commission of the new group (53 states, South America, Navajo Nation, and Department of Defense Schools)

Member of Claremore Regional Hospital Women’s Advisory Committee

Board member of Claremore Public Library Friends of the Library

Claremore Reads Together Board member

Member of Cherokee Indian Women’s Pocahontas Club

Mother of two sons, grandmother of four

(Past)

Served on the first three-member editorial board of Cherokee Phoenix (Cherokee Indian tribal publication) after the tribal free press legislation

Served on board and as president of Associated Press Oklahoma News Executives

Served on committees of Oklahoma Press Association

Former longtime member and chair of Rogers County Youth Services

Founding member of Claremore Regional Hospital Auxiliary

I was preceded in death by my parents, Jim and Juanita (Shaw) Riley and my grandson, Alex Reeder.

I am survived by my sons, Tandy and Tracy Reeder; grandsons, Tracy Reeder, Brandon Reeder and Matthew Reeder; sister, Jenna Lee Adkins and husband Dallas; niece Dawn Schmidli; nephew, Sheldon Adkins and wife Christi.

by Pat Reeder