"Then, the East Coast Railroad came in over there in Fort Pierce and it became easier to drive oxen and wagons to Fort Pierce to get merchandise than it was to get it by steamboat. My brother, Ed, was 10 years older than me, but he was known at that time as an expert ox driver. He had been handling oxen since he was big enough to climb up on the ox wagon. So, by brother and one other fellow had two ox wagons and the would leave here before daylight and by night they would get over there to Ten-mile Creek, that’s ten miles this side of Fort Pierce. There was a place there where they could cross. Just before you crossed, there was a bluff with lots of trees where you could get dead wood to burn. They would get there after dark that night, stop over, have their fire and camp out.

By daylight the next morning, they would be on their way again. They would drive on into Fort Pierce, load up their merchandise and drive back there (Ten-Mile Creek) that night, and camp again. "They would leave there the next morning and drive on in here that night. The would come in sometimes at 10 o’clock at night. They would drive those wagons of merchandise to the store on Southeast Fourth Street. The would just drive up there, unlock the oxen, and just leave the wagons of merchandise there," he recalled.

His uncle moved from Fort Drum and build a big two-story house down in there where the Boromel’s lived. I guess it would be Southeast Third Street where the old ice plant used to be. He put up a sawmill there. He went into business of hauling merchandise from Fort Pierce to Okeechobee with a mule and wagon. He had a bunch of mules and two or three wagons, and that was faster," he said.

"He was the first sheriff here when the county started. Of course, he was appointed sheriff. He was never elected. Pogy Bill was the first one who was elected to office. Smith Drawdy was my mother’s brother. He, and his wife, and little boy named Otis, died all within a week during the flu epidemic in 1918." Ossie recalled. He said people began to move into Okeechobee, a few at a time. They would homestead just like Pete Raulerson had. He said there were several families who lived in a settlement called Opal. It was located seven or eight miles north and he said the site is now the pasture of the Williamson Cattle Company.

He said that was where Henry Hancock first settled before moving to the east side of Taylors Creek. At Opal, he cleared eight to ten acres of land and planted a citrus grove, as did many of the other families living there. Mr. Hancock build a little log house at Opal and it had just one room.

"I don’t know why they put in citrus then, because there wasn’t any sale for it. There was no way to get it to the market." Mr. Raulerson said. Later, the steamboats provided a way of getting the citrus to market.

When William and Merida Drawdy Raulerson moved their family from the Wood Landing on the Kissimmee River into the village of Tantie (Okeechobee), the community with only five or six houses did not offer a lot of job opportunities. William Raulerson first went to work at the local sawmill owned by peter Raulerson, the community’s first settler. William Raulerson had experience since he had been operating a sawmill at the Wood Landing.

The family lost their first home shortly after moving in the community when a storm blew it off its foundation. In 1988 the late Ossie Raulerson recalled those early days as a young boy growing up in Okeechobee. When they lost the first home, they moved into a house built by a man named Douglas which contained three rooms. Mr. Raulerson said there was one big room where everyone slept, and a little room with a shed roof over one side where the cooking and eating of meals was done. Later on, he said his father added another room in an L-shape that became the kitchen-fining room.