Medicine Park, OK

Medicine Park began on July 4, 1908, when John William Elmer Thomas laid out a resort on Medicine Creek at the foot of the Wichita Mountains. The town's early promise came from the creek's swimming water, mountain air, and the road west from Lawton. Two dams created Bath Lake for swimming and Lake Gondola for boating and fishing, while the Medicine Park Hotel and Annex supplied lodging and a store. Builders used naturally rounded red granite from the Wichita Mountains, giving the resort its distinctive cobbled walls and bridges. The town became Oklahoma's first planned resort and grew into a weekend destination for southwest Oklahoma.

Today State Highway 49 brings traffic from Lawton and Fort Sill, while the Wichita Mountains National Wildlife Refuge begins at the town's western edge. Bath Lake, Medicine Creek, the Aquarium and Natural Sciences Center, local restaurants, galleries, and cabins make up the village map. Refuge roads lead toward bison, longhorns, granite peaks, and prairie trails, so Medicine Park works as both a small residential town and a gateway for day trips. Its present character still follows the old formula: water in the middle, stone underfoot, and the mountains immediately beyond town.