Day 3 Tours

We woke up to a rainy and cool day so decided on a couple of inside options for the day. After a slow and lazy start we headed to the Drummond ranch to tour “The Lodge”. The Lodge is the where family dinners and reunions are held, and it also serves as the production location for Ree's Food Network show. They usually film for about 12 days, 2 or 3 times a year. 

Pantry

Gorgeous view of the ranch 

Prep kitchen

Now this is a pantry - prep pantry

Prep kitchen. Everything Ree is doing while filming is being done by two others in the prep kitchen in case they need to reshoot a scene. 

In Ree’s kitchen

I really hope this video will play for you so you can see how incredibly beautiful this ranch is. When it zooms in on the white houses, that’s where the Drummonds live. 

Mud room

She has a junk drawer too. The lodge is 7200 square feet, has four huge bedrooms, all with very large, beautiful bathrooms. 

So much for that car wash

Beautiful and unusual tulips 

After touring the Lodge, we headed to Ponca City to tour  EW Marland’s Mansion. 

We stopped at the real “Pioneer Woman” statue. The Pioneer Woman Statue commemorates the enduring legacy of the pioneering women of Oklahoma. It was voted on by 750,000 people across the nation in 1927. Bryant Baker's "Confident" was selected and was dedicated in 1930, with over 40,000 people in attendance.

The statue is of a sunbonneted woman holding a Bible in one hand and leading a child by the other hand. It was donated to the State of Oklahoma by millionaire oilman E. W. Marland.

Ernest Whitworth Marland was a multi-millionaire oilman, the founder of Marland Oil Company. During the early 1920's, he controlled 10% of the known oil reserves in the world. He was a United States Congressman and the tenth Governor of Oklahoma.

E. W. loved beauty, the arts, and elegant living. He introduced fox hunting and polo to Oklahoma. It was his dream to live in a palace, and his dream came true ...for a time. In 1928, the year the mansion was opened, Marland was forced out of the Presidency of his company by J. P. Morgan. He was the victim of a hostile takeover.

The oil baron was a pioneer, not only in the petroleum industry, but also in providing employee benefits such as health care, education, housing, and recreation. He was a man who enjoyed his wealth and readily shared it with others. He spent his money freely for a hospital, a children's home, and churches. The famous Pioneer Woman Statue was his gift to the state of Oklahoma and all her people.

As Governor, Mr. Marland's outstanding accomplishments included the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, reforming business law, drilling for oil on the State Capital grounds and WPA/State Park projects. 

The mansion is 78’ wide by 184’ long, contains approximately 43,560 square feet over four levels with 55 rooms, including 10 bedrooms, 7 fireplaces, 13 baths and 3 kitchens. 

1925-28 mansion constructed at a cost of $5.5 million

1928-31 Home to E. W. and 2nd wife, Lydie

1931-41 Unoccupied, opened for special occasions.

1941 Sold to the Carmelite Fathers for $66,000

1948 Sold to the Felician Sisters for $50,000

1975 Purchased by the City of Ponca City & Continental Oil Company for $1,500,000

1976......Opened to the public for tours by The City of Ponca City

Ceiling with 14k gold leaf. There were two Waterford crystal chandeliers also. The cost of the ceiling and chandeliers was $80,000 at that time. 

This ceiling is Chinoiserie (shin-wah’-seree), or Chinese Chippendale. It was painted on canvas in the lower level of the mansion and then applied to the plaster overhead without any distortion to the painting. 

The Lalique lighting fixtures in this room were much more costly than the Waterford chandeliers above. 

Stained glass hunting scenes in the dining room.

The original whole body vibration machine 😁

A Dictaphone

Dumbwaiter

Sauna in his bathroom

The main kitchen - when the mansion was built, this room  was a modern wonder. Furnished with the latest appliances and Monel counters, it was a luxury. Meals for Marland’s formal dinner guests were cooked in this kitchen, then transferred to the service kitchen by dumbwaiter for presentation.  There was a steam dishwasher, similar to commercial kitchens today, and an ammonia powered refrigerator in the service kitchen. 

Dumbwaiter

The hunt kitchen where they served breakfast after the fox hunts. 

The tour lasted much longer than any of us wanted. The mansion is truly unbelievable and he was so far ahead of the times with his technology that it was hard to comprehend. However, the docent who was leading the tour talked way too much and far too long. It was exhausting. 

After having a good break at the house we went to P-town Pizza for dinner, another of the Drummond restaurants. We thought the pizza shaped napkins were worth a photo. 

I had the Italian chopped salad. It was delicious! 

Colleen had the wedge salad and shared a lotsa meat pizza with Vicki. See below. 

Kody had vegetarian pizza and said it was good too. I think I forgot to mention that we ate lunch at the Mercantile on Monday and none of us were impressed with the food. Maybe that’s why I forgot to mention it. 

Back to the house to call it a day. 

To my sister sojourners in Christ, “I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus, that in every way you were enriched in him in all speech and all knowledge - even as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you - so that you are not lacking in any gift, as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.” 1 Cor 1:4-9