Turner Falls | |
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Location | Turner Falls Park, Interstate 35, Davis, Oklahoma, United States |
Type | Fan |
Total height | 77 feet |
Turner Falls is a waterfall on Honey Creek in the Arbuckle Mountains of south-central Oklahoma, United States, 6 miles (9.7 km) south of Davis. [1] [2] With a height of 77 feet (23 m), Turner Falls is locally considered Oklahoma's tallest waterfall, [3] although its height matches one in Natural Falls State Park. [4]
Turner Falls and the blue hole are dangerous and have claimed people's lives every year.[ citation needed] Only experienced swimmers should swim there. [1]
Mazeppa Thomas Turner, a Scottish immigrant farmer who married Laura Johnson, a Chickasaw woman, settled in the area in 1878 and discovered the falls. The falls were named for him. [2] [5]
Recreational use began in or before 1868. At the time, Turner Falls was located in Pickens County, Chickasaw Nation. [6]
Today, the falls are part of Turner Falls Park, a city park operated by the city of Davis, Oklahoma. [5] The Falls cascade into a natural swimming pool, one of two such pools within the park, [3] and these are popular tourist destinations in the summer. [7]
The city of Davis acquired the park in 1919 and operated it until 1950. It then leased the facility to other interests until 1978, when it resumed control. [2]
The park covers 1,500 acres (6.1 km2), and also contains nature trails, caves and other interesting geological features. It also has a walk-in castle, [3] originally built in the 1930s as a summer home for Dr. Ellsworth Collings, a professor and later Dean of the School of Education at the University of Oklahoma.
...several waterfalls could surpass Natural Falls and Turner Falls as Oklahoma's tallest.