The subject of this sketch was born March 10, 1847, near Tahlequah, Cherokee Nation, third son of O. W. Lipe, of Fort Gibson. His mother was a Miss Gunter, daughter of John Gunter, a citizen by marriage, and once owner of the town of Guntersville, on the Tennessee River, in Alabama. Clark Lipe attended the public schools until he was fifteen years of age. After the outbreak of the war, he joined the Confederate army (in 1864), and continued in the service until its close. After much difficulty he at last succeeded in bringing together his father’s family, the members of which had become scattered during the war, and they settled down in 1866 at Fort Gibson. In 1868 Clark went to school in Herkimer County, N.Y., and from thence to a commercial college at Syracuse, N.Y., after which he returned to Fort Gibson and opened a mercantile business, which he carried on until 1874. Mr. Lipe then moved to his present home on the Verdigris River, and began farming and stock rising. Mr. Lipe is also in charge of the mercantile business of J. E. Campbell, of Nowata, Cherokee Nation. On November 21, 1870 he married Miss Lizzie Farmore, a New Yorker, who died in childbirth. On August 29, 1873, he married Miss Emma Thompson, daughter of Richard Thompson and Elizabeth Thornton, a daughter of Judge Thornton, of Illinois district. By this marriage they have six living children, Herman, Caspar, Clinton, Beulah, Clark C., and the youngest, less than one year old; Herman, the oldest being sixteen. Mrs. Lipe is a lady of education and refinement, and has taught school for several years in the nation. Mr. Lipe is five feet seven and a half inches in height, weighs 180 pounds, and is a man of fine intellectual appearance. He is well educated and is a superior businessman. He has held the office of district clerk in the Coowescoowee district for four years, and was defeated for the Senate by a small majority in 1881. He was also clerk of the Council for two years and of the Commissioner’s Court for two years. Mr. Lipe owns 160 acres of cultivated land, about 150 head of cattle, 10 head of horses and mules, and a good stock of hogs. He has a good residence on his place, with superior outdoor buildings.
