Home Histories

612 is a deep red brick house with hipped roof. The symmetrical center block has a one-story entrance projection onto a terrace extending three-fourths of the way across the front. The massive stone coping on the parapet over the door is distinctive. The wing to the east is two stories with a porch on the ground floor.

J.R. Benzel 1929-44
Johnston Murray 1945-46
E. Peter Hoffman 1948-57
Donald R. Cathey 1957 -

Mr. Benzel was general manager of Southwestern Bell Telephone Company. He was a president of the Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce.

Johnston Murray, an attorney and son of the late Governor "Alfalfa Bill" Murray, served as Oklahoma's 14th governor from 1951 to 1955. He carried his "just plain folks" campaign slogan into his administration, inviting the people to the Governor's mansion for Sunday open houses planned by his wife, Willie Murray, an accomlished musician who later made her own unsuccessful bid for the governorship. The pair divorced prior to her death. Governor Murray had been a consulting attorney for the State Department of Institutions, Social and Rehabilitative Services at the time of his death in 1974.

Mr. Hoffman was a vice president of the First National Bank. His wife was Marian Briscoe of the Briscoe Oil Company.

Donald Cathey was an accountant with Kerr-McGee Oil Company. Mrs. Cathey's mother, Mrs. Reeves, a teacher and widow of Dr. Claude Reeves, also lived with the Catheys.