A Father's Legacy
Citizen of Century
by - Ernest D. Martin - erndmart@sbcglobal.net
Interstate 35, The southern Oklahoma Vo-Tech Center. The Ardmore Higher Education Center. Highway Patrol Headquarters Troop F. The National Guard Armory.
These are just some of the items Ernest Martin, a pharmacist by occupation, can list as accomplishments he helped bring to Ardmore.
Then there's the countless jobs he helped people obtain by virtue of his position as a democratic state senator for 18 years, of which the last two he spent as majority leader.
And that's from someone who never expected to spend more than one term in office.
"I never did regard myself as a politician," Martin, now retired, said from his home near Springdale.
Martin, a 1940 Ardmore High School graduate, said his ascent into politics was due to planning commission issues dealing with Springdale schools.
"They recognized me as being a mouth," Martin said, who served in the Oklahoma Senate from 1964-1982.
In office, Martin served as chairman of the Public and Mental Health Committee for 16 years. He also co-authored a bill to make it possible for Interstate 35 to be finished and pass through the area.
"They had finished the interstate to Ardmore and after Ardmore but there was the gap between the mountains," Martin said.
In addition to his political accomplishments, Martin, who graduated from the University of Oklahoma in 1950 with a doctorate in pharmacy, was recognized in 1976 for Outstanding Community Service in Pharmacy" by A. H. Robins, a distinction given to one person in each of the 50 states.
But Martin's greatest accomplilshment is one many may overlook or forget to question about. It's the one thing when he looks at it makes his eyes glow and his posture straighten -- the picture of his wife, Nita, who passed away six years ago.
"Now, wouldn't you take notice if she walked by?" Martin said with a grin.