Founding year: the first Fairfax post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓
History grade
What drives Fairfax’s History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Fairfax is more historic than 65% of U.S. towns. Its share of homes from before 1940 holds the grade up; its age pulls it down.
B
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Fairfax’s overall grade.
Oklahoma towns list more on the Register than most of the country (a typical Oklahoma town has 5.9 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Fairfax’s 37.2 sits above most of its state (86% of Oklahoma towns have fewer) while its 4 listings outnumber those of 68% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would range from C to A. The pre-1940 share is a Census survey estimate (±6.1 points). The founding year is the first post office, not a stated founding date.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
What stands out about Fairfax’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
When the Santa Fe Railway chose to go up Salt Creek valley and bypassed the village of Gray Horse (which continues to exist today as the home of one of the Osage tribe's three major historic bands) the present day town of Fairfax was created. Local merchants, including Lew A. Wismeyer, moved buildings from Gray Horse and leased 40 acres (16 ha) acres for a townsite. Wismeyer rejected the name Coda proposed by the railroad and convinced them to call the depot Fairfax after a hotel he had stayed at in Washington, D.C. The Osage tribe retained title to the townsite until March 3, 1905, when Congress provided for the land to be sold at public auction, with the proceeds credited to the tribe. Fairfax had 470 residents at the time of statehood in 1907. Fairfax is also the site of the majority of the Osage Indian Murders that took place in the 1920s in Osage County, Oklahoma. The murders occu…
The Fairfax post office opened in 1903, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
How does Fairfax rank for history?
Fairfax is more historic than 65% of U.S. towns. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
What is on the National Register in Fairfax?
4 listings: 3 buildings and 1 site.
How old are the homes in Fairfax?
34% of Fairfax’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±6.1 points), against a typical 7.0% for an Oklahoma town; the median home was built in 1953.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
From Wikimedia Commons (4), Wikidata (2), the National Register of Historic Places (4), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock) and the USGS Geographic Names Information System. Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
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