12 Shocking Things You Had No Idea Happened In Oklahoma

After a deadly bridge collapse in Oklahoma in 2002, a man by the name of James Clark impersonated an Army Captain and took control of the disaster scene for two days, including directing FBI agents and coordinating the rescue efforts, before fleeing the scene. Clark, a two-time felon, was later apprehended in Canada.

in 1997, a woman in Oklahoma became the only known person to have been struck by man-made space debris. Lottie Williams was uninjured when she was hit in the shoulder by a piece of blackened, woven metallic material (shown above) confirmed as part of the propellant tank of a Delta II rocket which launched a U.S. Air Force satellite the year before.

Up until 1942, Oklahoma would surgically sterilize criminals under the belief that bad behavior was hereditary.

In 2000, an Oklahoma schoolgirl was suspended for casting a spell on her teacher, which allegedly made him ill and caused him to be hospitalized.

While playing football in college, Mickey Mantle was kicked in the left ankle and it became infected with osteomyelitis, a crippling disease that was incurable just a few years earlier. A midnight drive to Tulsa, Oklahoma enabled him to be treated with penicillin, saving his leg from amputation.

Oklahoma had the largest population of Socialists of any state in the period before WWI.

In 1921, the "Black Wall Street" of Tulsa, Oklahoma (Greenwood District) was the location of a race riot. Believing that this was the beginning of a black uprising, the local government used biplanes to fire rifles and drop firebombs on buildings, homes, and fleeing black families. The wealthiest black community in the United States was burned to the ground and up to 300 died.

In 1943 during WWII, an American B-17 bomber mistook Boise City, Oklahoma for their target practice bombing range and dropped bombs on the city. Miraculously, nobody was hurt or killed. It was the only continental U.S. city bombed during WWII.

Trooper Charles Hanger, who arrested Oklahoma City bombing suspect Timothy McVeigh, remembers McVeigh fidgeting under the seat of his squad car after being handcuffed and placed in the front passenger seat. Hanger searches the seat and finds a business card shoved underneath. The card belonged to a Military Supply Store in Wisconsin. On the back are notes written by McVeigh: "TNT at $5 a stick. Need more. Call after May 1." Federal investigators used the card to conclude that McVeigh intended to execute more bombings.