Discreet Biohazard Cleanup Near North Gerty Gerty, OK

Gerty is a small town in southern Hughes County, about eight miles south of Calvin and one mile west of U.S. Highway 75, roughly seventeen miles southeast of Holdenville, the county seat.

The community's original name was Buzzard Flop, when it stood in the Choctaw Nation, Indian Territory.

In 1893 Choctaw allottee James S. Raydon built a log cabin and grocery store and established a post office, which the federal government approved on June 15, 1894, under the name Guertie, for Raydon's daughter; Raydon served as the first postmaster.

After the townsite was surveyed and lots were sold, the name was changed to Raydon in December 1907; in the year of statehood the booming town claimed about 600 people, with four general stores, three hotels, three drug stores, a hospital, a bank, a sawmill and a newspaper, the Guertie News.

Because residents kept receiving mail meant for Ragan, the Post Office Department changed the name back to Guertie in June 1910 and then respelled it Gerty to avoid confusion with Guthrie in Logan County.

Gerty's outlying school districts consolidated into it over the years — Gatewood and Lawrence in 1923 and Social Hill in 1947.

Gerty first appeared in the U.S. census in 1910 with 305 residents, and after a century of ups and downs its population had fallen to 92 at the 2020 census.