Madalea Russell

Charles “Chuck” Russell Jr. of Dover when asked recently what he was up to during a chance service station visit reported he was working on his late parents’ house.

Then he pulled out his iPhone and showed a photo of the baby bottles his mother kept after his and his two sisters’ childhood.

He found them while he was working on the family home at 810 S. 8th St. in Kingfisher.

Chuck Russell, Sr., a well-known auto body repairman in Kingfisher, grew up in Okmulgee and became acquainted with Kingfisher and his future wife, Madalea Adams, when he moved here with his brother, Richard, to reside with their grandmother, Ruth Russell, and help their uncle and aunt, Claude and Ardalene Trindle, on their farm and with their custom harvesting business.

When Chuck told his sister, Melanie Russell Cluck about the find and that the Times and Free Press was interested in doing a story about their mother, Melanie offered to write some remembrances of her own in addition to what Chuck had said.

The Russells became the parents of a son, Charles Russell “Chuck” Jr. and two daughters, Melinda (now Zettle) of West Branch, Mich., and Melanie (now Cluck) of Kingfisher.

Additionally, Madalea was a long-time affiliate in the local ASCS office in Kingfisher and a member of and volunteer at Sts. Peter and Paul Catholic Church in Kingfisher.

(Madalea Adams Russell passed away on March 19, 2025 at the age of 87 and memories of her remain strong with her children.)

Melanie when learning of plans to do a news story about her late mother’s dedication to her children wrote the following tribute.

By Melanie Russell Cluck Madalea Adams Russell was raised on a farm on the outskirts of Crescent with nothing but love from her parents when an “outhouse” was the norm.

Her father, William Newton Adams, mentored Hubert Ausbie as a young man. Hubert became the “Geese” Ausbie with the original Harlem Globetrotters. Ausbie grew up in Crescent where he attended school.

As an avid newspaper subscriber, she would save anything of importance from history of the Chisholm Trail to Father Stanley Rother with notes attached “to keep.” Her clippings of Father Rother’s life will be delivered to the Stanley Rother Shrine in Oklahoma City.

She always wanted to be a librarian, yet it seems she was more of historian as her two local children now sift through many years of “treasures” with some over six generations old and some items being older than Oklahoma itself, having been part of “The Land Run.”

So here we are going through our family heritage, finding our glass baby bottles, now vintage toys still in their original boxes, to our grandfather’s Veteran War Flag that draped his casket over 65 years ago.

She was a donor to causes she cared for deeply— Veterans, Wounded Warriors, American Cancer Society, and Catholic Charities.

She was a well-known seamstress who made several prom dresses for others as well as her girls.

Her children are carrying on her legacy of donating, finding the perfect new homes, taking items to nursing homes, churches, and other worthy charities.

We are still looking for a “new home” for the many boxes of material she saved. We are seeking a non-profit or trade school or program that teaches young children how to sew.

If anyone has an idea to help us locate such an entity please contact 405-3687792/405-368-7667.