Vikings in Oklahoma!

by Richard Seifried

Signal Hill Musings

March, 2006

Jean (Richard’s second wife) has been engrossed in a series of novels, around a dozen of them, all consisting of fictionalized accounts of pre-historic American peoples.  The authors, archaeologists, are Kathleen O’Neal Gear and her husband W. Michael Gear.  Jean has become fascinated with the portrayals of those early Americans.

The authors indicate that mankind has been in the Americas for a far longer time than believed.  Too, the scientists convince the readers that Caucasoid, Negroid, and Pacific peoples visited our shores long before Columbus or even the Vikings.

Since adolescence, I have been enthralled with mythological hints of ancient visitations to our shores by Europeans, Chinese, perhaps even Polynesians.

I think that I have already reported on the Caucasian skeleton found near the mouth of the Columbia, and of huge Chinese urns buried in the sands just off of that shore.  They predated modern discoveries by hundreds of years.

Lewis and Clark puzzled over the origin of the White Indians, the Mandans.  Their benefactor, Thomas Jefferson, was intrigued by the legends of Murdoch, the seventh century Irish monk who sailed westward, his expedition disappearing from known European history. 

Harold Foster (1892-1982), an extraordinarily talented artist, drew a comic strip entitled “Prince Valliant.”  Foster’s pictures were masterpieces of authenticity.  Castles, interior décor, armaments, clothing, and social life, all were drawn and described with magnificent detail and accuracy.

Once, my hero, Prince Valliant, traveled to America with Vikings and, according to the story, traveled all the way up the St. Lawrence River to Niagara Falls.  The story excited me and resulted in my thinking that perhaps Minnesota’s Viking artifacts were authentic, that Norsemen did penetrate North America much further than archaeologists acknowledged. 

The Gears placed the Viking’s most southern penetration at L’Anse aux Meadows, Vinland, known by us as Newfoundland in far eastern Canada.  Some years ago, National Geographic indicated that Norsemen spent the winter on the south shore of Cape Cod, hauling their ship across the dunes to winter safety.

There must have been other voyages, later ones, unrecorded by Norse history.  Many of the adventurers were refugees from political oppression.  They would have little incentive to return to their homeland to face death.

A little more than a three-hour drive from Signal Hill, in Oklahoma, there is a state park named Heavener Runestone Park.  The location is impressive, the site up from the Poteau Valley, protected from southern incursions by the high, rugged Winding Stair Mountains.

Within a wooded hollow on Poteau Mountain is a huge slab of stone.  It stands, on end, twelve feet high, ten feet wide, and around sixteen inches thick.

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There is considerable controversy over the stone’s history.  One theory is that the peculiar carvings record the birth, death, and location on the Poteau River where French explorer Robert Cavelier de La Salle was murdered.

The earliest recorded European to witness the stone was in 1874.  In 1923, the lettering was sent to the Smithsonian Institute and there, scientists identified the letters as very old Norse runes.

Three decades later, a Norse cryptanalyst determined that the phenomenon was created by ancient Vikings, and the date inscribed on the stone was the equivalent of November 11, 1012.

Other stones with rune markings, five in all, were found in a straight line, miles apart.  The markings are from the most ancient twenty-four rune Futhark alphabet, used in Scandinavia between 300 and 800 A.D.  Interpretations claim that the Heavener runes read G – LO – M – E – D – A – L.  Translated, the inscription reads “Glome’s Valley,” a Viking land claim.

Speculation is that the Norsemen explored down the East Coast and entered the Gulf of Mexico.  Then, near present-day New Orleans, the explorers, realizing that the muddy waters were from a great river system, traveled up the Mississippi River to the Arkansas and Poteau Rivers.  If true, they arrived in the area around 750 A.D.

I, sitting here on Signal Hill, speculate that there may have been women and children in the expedition.  In time, they may have intermarried with Skraelings (natives to a region), perhaps the Osage.  Or, they either died off or were killed.

Stretching my imagination further, I imagine that the Norsemen may have heard about the curative waters of Eureka Springs and sought them out.  When we look over the King’s River Valley from Signal Hill, Jean and I might be observing land that was once visited by Viking warriors.  Perhaps they climbed our very mountain and enjoyed the view that we experience each day.

As I often write, “Well, why not?”