Crime Scene and Trauma Cleanup in Wakita, OK

Wakita is a small town in Grant County, Oklahoma, about 8 miles south of the Kansas border and 12 miles northwest of Medford, the county seat.

Wakita was founded on September 16, 1893, the day the Cherokee Outlet was opened to non-Native settlement, and its post office opened on November 14, 1893.

Wakita's name was disputed from the start — the postmaster and first store owner wanted "Whiteville," but Deputy U.S. Marshal Herbert John Green pushed for Wakita; historian George Shirk said it is a Cherokee word for water collected in a small depression, like a buffalo wallow.

Wakita grew after the Hutchinson and Southern Railroad (later part of the Santa Fe) built through the area in 1897, reaching 405 residents by 1910 and a peak of 545 in 1970.

Wakita became world-famous as a filming location for the 1996 Hollywood blockbuster Twister — in the film the town is destroyed by an F4 tornado, its name-bearing water tower appears on screen, and bricks from buildings demolished for filming were used to build Twister Park.

The Twister Museum, filled with memorabilia from the movie, opened a few months before the film's release and remains Wakita's signature attraction.

Ironically for its movie fame, when real tornadoes struck Grant County on May 10, 2010, the town of Wakita itself was not destroyed or affected.

Wakita was also the setting of a 1984 DuPont/Conoco television commercial about seismograph oil exploration that aired during the 1984 World Series.

Wakita's own school closed after the 2010–2011 school year due to low enrollment, and its students now attend Medford Public Schools or Pond Creek-Hunter High School.

The 2020 census counted 311 people in Wakita in 132 households, and it is an aging town — about 28% of residents were 65 or older.