History
The southern boundary followed the Red River, the western boundary the 100th meridian while the nothern boundary ran along the 37 degree North Latitude, separating the Osage and Cherokee nations. The Eastern boundary with Arkansas was delineated in 1825-1828 with treaties between the Choctaw and Cherokee nations. The area forming the Panhandle was finalized in 1850 when Texas was admitted to the Union.

Starting in the 1820s, the Five Civilized Tribes from the southeastern United States were relocated to Indian Territory over numerous routes, including the Cherokee "Trail of Tears." Forced from their traditional lands by both State and Federal government, the tribes suffered greatly during their trips west.

After the Civil War, Oklahoma became a part of the booming cattle industry and western expansion reached the territory in the late 1800s, sparking controversy over the fate of the land. Furthermore, the U.S. government forced the tribes to give up their communal lands for individual property allotments to make way for growing expansion. There was talk of using Indian Territory for settlement by African Americans emancipated from slavery. However, the government relented to pressure, much of it coming from a group known as "Boomers," who wanted the rich lands opened to non-Indian settlement.

Oklahoma is the only state in the Union that wasn't settled by a gradual infiltration of immigrants. Rather, the western half of the State was opened to settlers in a series of "Land Runs" between 1889 and 1906 that saw thousands of people flooding the land. The only areas exempt from these runs were old Greer County and "No Mans Land" the area now known as the "Panhandle. When Congress created Oklahoma Territory in 1890 "No Mans Land" was included with the clause "that portion of the United States known as the Public Land Strip."