Okfuskee, OK – Obit - Bernie Warden, - Contributor: Rustie Lang Rlang90547@aol.com 08/11/1999 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- USGENWEB ARCHIVES NOTICE: These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by any other organization or persons. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material must obtain the written consent of the contributor, or the contributor’s legal representative, and contact the listed USGenWeb Archivist with proof of this consent. The contributor has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for free access. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Reprinted with permission from The Tulsa World Bernie Warden For almost half a century, Bernie Warden pounded the pavement hunting for news. Warden, who never told her age, died Thursday in Tulsa. Warden referred to herself as a reporter-photographer, but Okemah residents called her a town character. “I’m a reporter-photographer, that’s what I am,” Warden said in an earlier interview. “That’s what I’ve been all my life and that’s all I ever want to do.” Warden lived in Okemah most of her life. She began her career in journalism as a correspondent for the Okmulgee Daily Times in the early 1940s and covered the community news for almost 50 years. Warden also worked for the Tulsa World, The Tulsa Tribune, Daily Oklahoman, Associated Press and United Press International. Vera Parsons was court clerk at the Okfuskee County Courthouse from 1961 to 1981, and she remembers the nosey newspaper reporter. “Every day, rain, sleet or snow, she walked to the courthouse and back to her house,” Parsons said. Warden would check all the records looking for possible stories. “She never missed getting the news,” she said. “I guess she’s what you call a news hound.” “She was always kind of underfoot, but that was her job,” Warden and her late sister distributed a mimeographed list of all legal transactions recorded daily throughout the city. Residents referred to the list as the “Scandal Sheet.” Warden never drove a car and dictated all of her stories via the telephone or sent them in by mail. At one time Warden had memorized all the car license tags in town. “She knew it all,” said Bettye Grant, who was society editor for the Okmulgee Daily Times when Warden began work there as a correspondent. “I think she knew everyone in Okemah. I used to get photographs that she would send with about 100 people in them, and I bet Bernie knew everyone of them.” Grant said Warden was an aggressive person who knew many people, and if she did not know them, she would meet them. In an earlier interview, Warden said, “Well, if I want to meet someone I meet them.” Onced she wanted to meet Bob Ripley, of Ripley’s Believe it or Not, so she did. “She flew to New York to meet him and he took her to several nightclubs,” Grant said. “She always talked about that.” “She was quite a colorful person,” Grant said. “She was a nice old gal.” When Larry Nation first came to work for the Tulsa World in 1968, the name Bernie Warden was well established around the newsroom. The former state editor of the Tulsa World remembers Warden and her rapid-fire patter when she called in her stories. “Whenever you had to take dictation from Bernie, you had better be ready,” Nation recalls of his 10 years of working with Warden. “You had better have your paper in the typewriter, phone on your ear and be ready. She would be so excited … and consequently dictate extremely fast. Then she would hang up the phone almost immediately. She was one of those delightful characters that made newspaper work fun. The newspaper business is sure going to miss old Bernie.” So will the community of Okemah. Warden once said, “Living in this town is like having a large family.” Survivors include five nieces, Bernie Herbener of Houston, Barbara Hammonds of Dallas, Dorothy Nichols of Denison, Texas, Margaret Ballard of Canton, Texas and Pauline Cox of Amarillo, Texas; two nephews, James R. Warden of Atlanta and Thomas C. Warden; of Hawaii; and one sister-in-law, Mrs. Trevis Warden of Canton.