have been here. all these desks shoved over in disarray. the legislature was no longer in the building, they had actually left town, days before the corn fed rat army took over the building opinion this room was used as a barracks, those union sold yishs slept in this room. this building is significant not only to the commonwealth, but to frankfurt, because the ago tour toural features in it, the fact that it was one of the first public buildings. the fact that during the civil war, nothing happened do this building. it was taken over by the confederate army and the union army, it still stands today. there's absolutely nothing happening to this building other than them taking it over. every piece of civil war legislation that was decided on during that period of time was decided on in these two chambers, whether kentucky would remain neutral and enter the war happened in these two chambers. all these things are significant

and not many places can say they have both an old and a new capitol. >> my name is bill parks. welcome into the state capitol of oklahoma. spend a little bit of time taking a look at a beautiful building. start here with solomon layton who was the principle ah, tekt on the capitol. this is a 1915 drawing of the capitol. and i show this to folks so they understand the dome was a part of the plan in the beginning. the building was built without the dome between 1914 and 1917. did not build the dome then, they ran out of money. they built all the substructure for the dome. when we got around to building the dome, beginning in 2001, we were able to start at the roofline and go up the base of

the building is covered with pink and black grahn et that comes from oklahoma, white indiana limestone on the main part. the dome is covered with a man made stone and that's how they were able to match the building as well as they did. chosen for its durability you'll see vermont marble in the baseboards, you'll see it in steps, in pillars throughout the building. through the efforts of senator charles ford we have added some 100 pieces of artwork throughout the capitol this particular piece is by wayne cooper, it's called the magic of petroleum they're taking water that has oil in it to make medicine. this is governor mary fallin's office, she is the first -- not

only the first woman, she was the first woman and first republican lieutenant governor in 1995. right around the corner from her office, lieutenant governor todd lamb's office they're elected separately. they could be of different political parties. they are both republicans this time around and both are elected for four year terms. this is the guardian sculpted by one of our former state senators. this statue represents all of the indians of oklahoma. there are 39 tribes that have headquarters in oklahoma, looking at the general population -- probably something in the neighborhood of 60 tribes. notice that the speer, he has driven the speer through his leg and the ground.

and he says that means he is staying to protect the state capitol. >> is this statue -- >> no, it is generic. it represents everyone. >> where is this? >> this is a hall of the former governors. all of the governors, except for the last three were done by leonard macmurray for our 75th statehood anniversary in 1982. henry has more stories to be told about him than any other group. had to wait a while to become

governor. he called out the oklahoma national guard more than 40 times. over all kinds of things, there was a free bridge built across the red river to texas the folks that had the toll bridges had a court injunction to keep the bridge closed. the price of oil dropped to 18 cents a barrel, he said we're not pumping oil until it goes back to at least a dollar. the problem we had with people scalping football tickets. on football weekends he was sending part of the guard to norman to be sure nobody made money on their football tickets. 20 years after he was governor, his son johnston was governor, and they're the only father and son governors so far. i think it's kind of ironic that

bill opened that free bridge. johnston opened oerk oak's first turnpike. the pain painting in the archway beyond the centennial by carlos te'o. very different in style from all the rest of the artwork in the capitol. it has a lot of oklahoma symbolism. the red figure represents the universal man. oklahoma is two chawktaw words. you have a redbud tree, our state tree our state bird. and by his other hand, an astronaut. there have been more astronauts going into space from oklahoma than any other state in the union.

>> the legislature has to be finished by the last friday of may. they're in session four months out of the year we have 48 state senators elected for four years, the lieutenant governor is the president of the senate, but not active in that role, probably in 70 years now. the president protem really is the leader. the democrats had the majority, so the protem was a democrat. the election of democrats and a republican, they alternated days as to who was conducted the business of the senate i thought if the lieutenant governor was going to be involved that would be it, the first year on that session there were no tie votes at all. in the second year there were only four. the constitutional session.

that was guthrie in 1906 and 1907 there were a number of 12 men that gathered there, in the center case, we have the original oklahoma state constitution. 110 pages long, making it the longest state constitution in the country as it was originally written. the original constitution was four pages long. section 17, roughly half of the document is the description of county boundaries and the method for changing county boundaries. probably will not find that in another constitution in the country. over here we have the great seal

that was used when the capitol was in guj re. i'm of the opinion it was not stealing because we did have an election in 1910. the story about the midnight ride to the state seal, several versions of that story, and all of them seem to say, they had car trouble on the way, didn't get there until the next morning and brought the seal back the next day. this is the supreme court of the state of oklahoma. originally five justices elected by the people. today there are 9. and they are appointed by the governor. once they are appointed in the next general election, their name will be on the ballot, and

we vote whether to retain them for six years, every six years after that, their name will be on the ballot. the woodwork throughout this room was imported from the west indies. the pillars are one piece of solid vermont marble. each of these pillars weighs about 10,000 pounds. brought on the railroad because that was the way to move things in the 1910s. the ceiling and the decktive places along the wall, that's cast plaster done by mcfaulty brothers of chicago. the supreme court meets mondays and thursdays. this division of the court does not meet in the yoom very often. most of their work is based on written records, they need many a conference room only when they have a public case.

this court will handle something in the neighborhood of 2,000 cases per year. most of the work is how the lower courts are doing their work. it's not the kind of thing where you have to have oral arguments. a lot of it can be handled on paper. >> is it common to have the supreme court housed in the capitol building? >> my understanding is, until the people of the court moved out last summer, we were one of the few states where all three branches of government were still in the capitol building. it's unusual for the supreme court to be housed in the capitol. the great seal has a lot of our history in it. there are 45 small stars. stand for the 45 states before oklahoma, the large star symbols of five of the many tribes that were forced to come to indian

territory. the chickasaw, chocktaw. the indian and farmer shaking hands in 1907. on the fourth floor rotunda, this is your best look at the dome, right above the large paintings, there's a purple ring, that marks the beginning of new construction. everything above that line was completed in october of 2002. we've had a dome on our capitol about nine years now. >> how long did it take for them to add the dome? >> 16 months. started in april of '01 and they were finished by october of '02. 16 months. the cost to build this dome was approximately $22 million.

of that, some 20 million is privately financed. from the beginning, there was always a group of people who wanted to finish the capitol and build the dome. through the years, different groups have tried to raise money. governor keating put the right group of people together to raise the money, and liz goal was to have the dome on the capitol by the centennial. so that we would have the capitol looking like it was supposed to look, as it was originally designed. the large paintings are by charles banks wilson, he starts with the history of oklahoma. coronado and the spanish going across the panhandle in 1541 on their way to the lost cities of gold. this is trade on the early frontier. one of the interesting things about wilson, he does not make

things up, all of the people in his paintings are real people, all of the background scenes are actual oklahoma locations. the big end and the middle here is joe bennie mason. i probably will never forget that, because i had his twin granddaughters on tour one day. they made sure everybody knew that was their grandpa. this was the indians coming to indian territory. wilson calls it the indian immigration. which to my made it sound like they wanted to come here, i never have understood that. in the upper right hand corner you'll see a depiction of the trail of tears. the reason, there's a steamboat in the middle of that painting in the background, some of the chocktaw were wealthy enough they were able to come up the arkansas river by boat. the artwork is what draws people -- what draws me to the building, what sets the building apart, and just the stories that

go with the artwork. across the way we have will rogers. will was an accounter, a cowboy a good will ambassador to the world. people need to know, will rogers is from oklahoma. around to the left there we have sequoia, a cherokee who developed the cherokee alphabet. just a wonderful story because he was not literal in another language, and came up with whatling wests say is the best way to write down the cherokee language. i really would say, the stories behind the artwork would be one of the most important things for people to get out of their visit. come to the capitol, the oklahoma state capitol and see this beautiful building. hear the stories, see what's going on in the capitol.