COVID-19 Threatens Country Living

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18 miles off Interstate 35, down a straight loose gravel road sits Tatums, Oklahoma. The farming community was established in 1895 but they fear 2020 might be their last.

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Tatums has seen hard times before, the all-black settlement was built on hard times. The town was founded by freed Chickasaw slaves, it was one of fifty African-American settlements that stretched across the farm lands in Oklahoma. Today, only 13 all-black towns in the state have survived, as a result of the Great Depression — Turning many of the all-black settlements into ghost towns as farmers went looking for work in the big city.

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Tatums has always survived.

The farming community only stretches three streets, with three churches to match. The locals joke their town motto is “Blink and you’ll miss it.” It’s just that small.

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As of the 2010 United States Census, there were 151 people, 68 households, and 45 families residing in the town. The median income for a household in the town of Tatums is $21,083, and the median income for a family is $21,500.

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There are no shops, no restaurants, and some paved roads. Like many rural communities, Tatums does not have access to broadband Internet.

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It’s a difficult life to imagine in the year 2020, but according to the Federal Communications Commission more than 18 million Americans, 5.6 percent of the country, lack access to high speed internet. While poor connectivity is not foreign to low-income communities, rural areas generally experience slower speeds and have fewer providers to choose from.

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This can make learning from home an impossibility. With the pandemic restructuring lives in a matter of weeks, it’s the children Tatums worries about. The lives of the adults have remained unchanged — they’ve worked the farms for generations but they wish their children to have the equal access to Internet. Without that access, distance learning from home is not an option.

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Information Technology Disaster Resource Center received a request for a Homework Hotspot in Tatums, Oklahoma through its projectConnect initiative. After a brief interview with a community member, ITDRC enlisted the assistance of Dish Network to provide a satellite Internet connection to power a WiFi hotspot at a local church.

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“We were hoping someone would hear us and we just thank God we are alive” Mayor Ella Deshazer Lawson says “I think ITDRC is a very good thing and it’s a very good thing to get Internet to our children, something to grow their minds.”

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The town is isolated from noise, light pollution, and most of the world’s troubles. But the new pandemic that’s stopped the globe has finally reached their rural community. Like their lack of stores, Tatums does not have the resources to face a pandemic. They do not have testing sites, or hospitals, nor Internet to collect data. They do have their first case of COVID-19.

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Help Has Arrived

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The ITDRC van rolls into the Indian paintbrushes that top the fields in front of Tatums’ white church. Before region 4 volunteer Kate Norem flung open the doors, the hollering outside the van began.

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A group of women in sun hats shouted their greetings and thank yous as Norem carried a box of equipment towards the Free Pentecostal Holiness Church.

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One woman waves and shouts “Oh, they here!”

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“Change is coming” proclaims Carolyn McConnell from the covered church porch.

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It was a surprisingly hot April day but these women weren’t going to let sun keep them from getting connected. Carolyn has been waiting all morning on the porch, phone in hand, ready for WiFi. “Oh it’s here, change is here!”

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Her friend Bonnie Hooks, a local pig farmer is excited too. Hooks’ phone has never been connected to WiFi before, she flips it open and holds it up. “Does mine do that?” She asks as Norem walks the ladies through their settings and to the WiFi.

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Bonnie leans over the church railing watching Norem search for access points. “And aren’t we thankful, we are thankful ladies” she says, attempting to smile through her mask.

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This is the news of the week, but not much happens in a farming community.

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Making sure these communities have a chance is important work to ITDRC. “Unless we do something, there’s not going to be any connectivity out there,” says ITDRC Operations Director, Joe Hillis.

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Experts have predicted that COVID-19 could wipe out small towns. A combination of unemployment and the need for resources will drive people to bigger cities. ITDRC is tunneling in on these rural communities — or what Tatums residents call “God’s country.”

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People Don’t Know We Are Here

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Herbert McConnell, a local farmer in Tatums, throws a bag of goat feed over his shoulder. “Whelp, the Coronavirus gon’ change America forever,” McConnell says, strained under the weight of the corn.

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“My father killed all his meat and sang the rivers for fish,” he says over the sound of corn pinging the bottom of the trough. McConnell points next to his homestead, he was born and reared right there, just a few yards over from his house now.

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McConnell has no desire to go anywhere else, he doesn’t like to leave his family farm and says he doesn’t need to travel. Tatums, OK, is all he needs.

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“I’ve got it better than most, got my own meat, raise my own vegetable” McConnell says.

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McConnell is worried about his little town and from his childhood he’s known hard living but he’s never seen something like this.

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“We don’t know what tomorrow holds,” McConnell says “I would hate to go back to that way of living, it’s cold.”

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McConnell fell on hard times a couple of years back and lost 32 head of cattle. In the eyes of a farmer, that’s a small trial compared to a global pandemic.

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Now with 18 cattle and the first COVID-19 death in his town, McConnell knows Tatums simple way of living is going to change.

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For the ladies outside the church, they cheer on the change that has arrived and the WiFi that stretches all the way to the street. Sitting happily on their phones they believe Tatums will be better because of the change the pandemic brought.

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Bonnie’s flip phone didn’t have access to the internet, but sitting on the church steps talking to the women she’s known all her life she says any progress is good, even if it happens in the middle of a global pandemic.

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“You know Satan doesn’t like progress,” she says “But here it is!”

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Her church friends nod their heads in agreement and offer up Bible verses for the times they face.

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“If you want to see change,” Bonnie continues “sometimes you have to ask others for help.”

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