From the Okmulgee, Oklahoma
Daily Times (July 1936)
85-Year-Old Twins Are City
Visitors
More than 85
years ago, identical twins were born to the Roberts family in Alabama. The boys
looked so much alike through their childhood and youth that their mother
sometimes had difficulty in distinguishing between them.
Today those same
twins, as mischievous and full of life as a couple of 10-year-olds, are
visiting the home of Mr. and Mrs. J. E. Roberts, 209 East Ninth. [NOTE:
Mr. & Mrs. J. E. Roberts were the grandparents of Tod Roberts and his
siblings.]
They are Perry
Roberts, father of J. E. Roberts, and his brother, Jasper, who will celebrate
their eighty-sixth birthday July 21. Perry is from Young county, Texas, and
Jasper lives in Meeker. They both are visiting relatives in various cities in
Oklahoma, and expect to celebrate their birthday together somewhere in this
state, if they can "stand one another that long." They said last night
that they have been together more in the last two weeks than they have for
the past 50 years.
Still very much
alike in appearance, they talk even more alike. They'd be almost exactly the
same height if, as Perry said, Jasper would "straighten up," but
Perry admits he's 14 pounds the heavier. Each is roly-poly, good natured and
full of fun.
Neither has been
ill beyond having "chills and fever and all the kid diseases" as
Jasper puts it. They can read newspapers without the aid of glasses, and
chide one another about their healthy appetites.
They said they
had been sleeping together on part of their Oklahoma trip, but that they
talked and made so much noise Emmett and his wife decided to give them
separate beds in order that the remainder of the family might rest in peace.
Both have been
members of the Methodist church, South, for 72 years. Perry says he's an old
fogey and believes in the old time religion. He says Jasper is just as old a
fogey, but is too contrary to admit it. Both are ardent prohibitionists.
Jasper says that
being an Oklahoman (Perry says he strayed off from Texas to make a wild-horse
run in the 1880's) he favors prohibition, because if it were repealed, all
the bootleggers would be out of jobs, and would have to go on relief.
Perry's county
in Texas is dry (local option having prevailed there in spite of the state's
repeal) and Jasper says his brother won't even drink root beer. Perry's
comment on that was that he'd never drunk root beer until he came to Meeker
and that Jasper introduced him to the beverage there.
"We've
always been tolerably respectable" Perry said, when asked about his and
his brother's escapades. "At least we've never been in jail. We can't
afford, either of us, to tell off on the other."
"Perry just
missed being in jail though," Jasper put in. "They hauled him
before a judge."
"That was
when they served a subpoena on me, thinking I was Jasper," Perry replied
quickly.
"I guess
that constable just went with you to the courthouse to see that you didn't
get lost," Jasper jibed, and the argument was getting pretty hot when
someone changed the subject.
Each twin has
been married twice, their marriages each time coming in the same years, 1873,
and 1894. Perry has six children, 23 grandchildren, and 12 great-grandchildren.
Jasper has five children, 19 grand children and 20 great-grandchildren.
Jasper came to
Oklahoma territory to live in 1889 although he had been here previously. He
homesteaded six miles south of Choctaw and says he has never been any farther
north than Guthrie.
Perry has lived
in Texas since settling there, farming and keeping store. He says he and
Jasper are both "superannuated farmers." Jasper claims he worked on
a farm until he was 75 years old, but Perry says that all the work he does
now is with his jaws, eating and talking.
Animated and
droll, the two keep their hearers in a constant uproar. They are hard
subjects for an interview, though, because they keep their questioner in such
a state of mirth he forgets his queries as soon as they pop in his head.
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