Published: May 15, 2008 11:58 pm            

Kid from Muskogee challenges status quo

“Football’s still the roughest thing on campus. And the kids here still respect the college dean,” goes one stanza in the 1969 Merle Haggard classic “Okie From Muskogee.”

A college kid at the University of Oklahoma on Tuesday won a landslide election victory as the new mayor of Muskogee.

John T. Hammons, a 19-year-old OU freshman, was elected 3,703 votes to 1,616 votes as Muskogee’s mayor. Hammons defeated Hershel Ray McBride, a 70-year-old businessman who has served as both mayor and councilmember in the past.

Congratulatons to Hammons, a cleancut kid who majors in political science. Hammons campaigned on a platform of better communications between city staff and citizens, acceptance of diversity, addressing Muskogee’s crime issues and more openness in city government.

Mayor of Muskogee is an unpaid position. Well, the mayor does receive $1 per year in salary and free office space at city hall, so, yeah, it’s an unpaid job.

Hammons told the media shortly after his stunning victory — Hammons garnered 70 percent of all votes versus 30 percent to McBride — he will transfer to a university closer to Muskogee, maybe even inside Muskogee itself. Hammons will continue his college education, he said, while simultaneously serving as mayor of Muskogee, a small city of 38,000 citizens, about 50 miles southeast of Tulsa, and about 55 miles due west of Oklahoma’s border with Arkansas.

Hammons is considering a transfer to the Muskogee campus of Northeastern State University, which is based in Tahlequah.

Mayor of Musk-ogee is not a figurehead position. The mayor oversees a nine-member city council and supervises an annual city operating budget of $27.83 million. So the kid has his work cut out for him.

Hammons is not the youngest mayor in the U.S., believe it or not. Michael Sessions, current mayor of Hillsdale, Mich., was a high school senior and had just turned 18 years old when he was elected Hillsdale’s mayor last year.

It’s a touch inspirational to hear a very young person won a mayor’s race. A quick search on the web pulls up a few TV news bites of young Hammons, who is all full of enthusiasm and bristling with confidence and a desire to serve the Muskogee citizenry well.

That Hammons so thoroughly defeated an experience city politician is even more noteworthy. This state, this country, need young people, who are enthusiastic about the American government, to step forward and lead.

Hammons will be sworn in as mayor of Muskogee next week. The outgoing mayor, Mrs. Wren Stratton, opted to not run for a second term. Stratton reportedly kept regular daily office hours as mayor and worked the position like a full-time-plus job, even with only $1 of salary annually.

It will be interesting to see how young Hammons juggles his mayor’s post and his university studies.

Here’s a well-meant cheer that Hammons scores a big success during his first term as mayor of Muskogee.

Keep the inspiration coming.



Kinnamon is online/special projects editor of the News & Eagle. Contact him at davidk@enidnews.com.