Bartlesville is a city in Washington County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 37,290 at the 2020 census. Bartlesville is north of Tulsa and south of the Kansas border. It is the county seat of Washington County. The Caney River runs through Bartlesville.
Bartlesville is the primary city of the Bartlesville Micropolitan area, which consists of Washington County and had a population of 51,843 in 2018. A small portion of the city is in Osage County. The city is also part of the Tulsa Combined Statistical Area, with a population of 1,151,172 in 2015.
Bartlesville is notable as the longtime home of Phillips Petroleum Company. Frank Phillips founded Phillips Petroleum in Bartlesville in 1905 when the area was still an Indian Territory. The company merged with Conoco as ConocoPhillips and later split into the two independent companies, Phillips 66 and ConocoPhillips. Both companies have retained some operations in Bartlesville, but they have moved their corporate headquarters to Houston.
It is one of two places in Oklahoma where a Lenape Native American tribe lives, the other being Anadarko."Delaware (Lenape)." USGenWeb. January 2, 2015. Retrieved February 24, 2015.
History Jacob Bartles, son-in-law of Delaware chief Charles Journeycake, moved from Wyandotte County, Kansas, to Indian Territory in 1873. He settled first at Silver Lake, a natural lake south of the present city of Bartlesville. In 1874, he opened a trading post and post office on Turkey Creek, in what is now East Bartlesville. In the following year, he bought a grist mill on the Caney River and modified it to produce flour. Bartles then built a two-story general store and residence, and added a rooming house, a blacksmith shop and a livery stable. Other settlers soon moved into the immediate area, which was then called Bartles Town. In 1880, Bartles moved his Turkey Creek post office to this town. Bartles then provided the community with electricity, a telephone system and a water distribution system.May, Jon D. "Bartlesville." Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture. Retrieved January 15, 2012.
Development of the present city began after William Johnstone and George B. Keeler opened a general store on the south side of the Caney River in 1884. The first newspaper, The Weekly Magnet, began publication in March 1895. The town was incorporated in Indian Territory in January 1897. The town was surveyed and platted in 1898, and eighty acres were offered to the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad for a depot. The railroad, through its Kansas, Oklahoma Central and Southwestern Railway subsidiary, reached the town in 1899. The post office was moved from "North Bartlesville" in 1899. Bypassed by the railroad, Jacob Bartles moved his store to what became Dewey, Oklahoma.
Bartlesville was also home to Frank Phillips (November 28, 1873 – August 23, 1950) who along with his brother, Lee Eldas "L.E." Phillips Sr founded Phillips Petroleum in Bartlesville in 1917 and made Bartlesville the headquarters of Phillips 66. The new company began with assets of $3 million, 27 employees and leases throughout Oklahoma and KansasPhillips: The First 66 Years, 1983, Phillips Petroleum Company, P. 19-20. but grew to become a multi-billion dollar oil company. Although Bartlesville is no longer the headquarters, the company still has many employees in the community. In 2002, Phillips Petroleum merged with Conoco Oil Company and became ConocoPhillips.
Bartlesville was originally a sundown town where African Americans were not allowed to live. By 1907, the restriction had been lifted, and newspapers noted the town's first natural death of an African American, a man named Robert McGee.
In 1957, Bartlesville was the test site for the first experiment in pay cable television. The Bartlesville Telemovie System debuted with the film The Pajama Game, starring Doris Day, and aired it to an audience of 300 homes. The headline of the September 4, 1957, issue of Variety read, "First-Run Films Now at Home". However, after only nine months of operation, on Friday, June 6, 1958, Telemovie signed off forever.
Bartlesville was struck by an EF4 tornado that also heavily impacted Barnsdall on May 6, 2024. Debris cleanup and other recovery efforts were ongoing as of July 2024.
Geography
According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which is land and (0.09%) is water.
The Caney River flows through Bartlesville, separating the downtown area from the east side. The river flooded in October 1986 as a result of unusually heavy rainfall. The city was split in half for several days, and the flood caused considerable property damage. The river broke its banks again in June 2007, cresting five feet below the 1986 level. The Pathfinder Parkway, a paved trail for walking, running, and cycling, runs alongside the Caney River.
Climate Bartlesville is familiar with both very hot conditions in the summer with a record high of and with very cold conditions with a record of low of . However, even with this record of extremes, the climate of Bartlesville is considered humid subtropical (Köppen Cfa) with cool winters and hot summers, with the majority of precipitation falling in spring, between the months of April and June. Bartlesville lies in Tornado Alley, meaning that severe weather, including tornadoes, can occur. Severe weather occurs most often in the spring months, and occurs with much less frequency throughout the rest of the year. The city lies within USDA plant hardiness zone 7a ().
Demographics
2020 census
As of the 2020 census, Bartlesville had a population of 37,290. The median age was 38.6 years. 23.6% of residents were under the age of 18 and 19.9% of residents were 65 years of age or older. For every 100 females there were 92.9 males, and for every 100 females age 18 and over there were 88.5 males age 18 and over.
96.4% of residents lived in urban areas, while 3.6% lived in rural areas.
There were 15,136 households in Bartlesville, of which 29.7% had children under the age of 18 living in them. Of all households, 46.2% were married-couple households, 17.0% were households with a male householder and no spouse or partner present, and 30.2% were households with a female householder and no spouse or partner present. About 30.8% of all households were made up of individuals and 14.4% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older.
There were 17,140 housing units, of which 11.7% were vacant. Among occupied housing units, 66.3% were owner-occupied and 33.7% were renter-occupied. The homeowner vacancy rate was 2.4% and the rental vacancy rate was 12.0%.
+ Racial composition as of the 2020 census Race Percent White 68.4% Black or African American 3.3% American Indian and Alaska Native 9.0% Asian 2.4% Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander <0.1% Some other race 2.7% Two or more races 14.2% Hispanic or Latino (of any race) 7.5%
2010 census
As of 2010 Bartlesville had a population of 35,750. The racial and ethnic composition of the population was 79.0% White (76.1% non-Hispanic), 3.1% Black or African American, 8.7% Native American, 1.4% Asian (0.4% Indian, 0.3% Chinese, 0.2% Vietnamese), 2.1% reporting some other race, 5.7% reporting two or more races and 5.9% Hispanic or Latino (4.5% Mexican, 0.3% Spanish or Spaniard, 0.2% Puerto Rican).2010 population report for Bartlesville, Oklahoma
2000 census
As of the census of 2000, there were 34,748 people, 14,565 households, and 9,831 families residing in the city. The population density was . There were 16,091 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the city was 82.09% White, 3.20% African American, 7.18% Native American, 0.96% Asian, 0.02% Pacific Islander, 1.02% from other races, and 5.54% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino people of any race were 3.02% of the population.
There were 14,565 households, out of which 30.1% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 54.9% were married couples living together, 9.7% had a female householder with no husband present, and 32.5% were non-families. 29.5% of all households were made up of individuals, and 14.0% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.35 and the average family size was 2.89.
In the city, the population was spread out, with 24.9% under the age of 18, 8.1% from 18 to 24, 24.8% from 25 to 44, 23.7% from 45 to 64, and 18.5% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 40 years. For every 100 females, there were 90.3 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 85.1 males.
The median income for a household in the city was $47,195, and the median income for a family was $56,432. The per capita income for the city was $27,417. About 17.3% of the population were below the poverty line. Economy Oklahoma's first commercial oil well, the Nellie Johnstone, discovered oil on 15 April 1897 along a bank of the Caney River, near Bartlesville.
Before its merger with Conoco, Phillips Petroleum Company had its headquarters in Bartlesville."Who We Are." Phillips Petroleum Company. January 11, 1998. Retrieved on January 16, 2010."Contact Page." Phillips Petroleum Company. April 20, 2000. Retrieved on January 16, 2010. After ConocoPhillips formed, the combined company established a global systems and services office in Bartlesville."ConocoPhillips Announces Museum Plans For Ponca City and Bartlesville ." ConocoPhillips. May 13, 2005. Retrieved on January 22, 2010. ConocoPhillips spun most of its operations not related to exploration and production to form a new company, Phillips 66, in 2012. The two companies combined employ or contract with more than 3,800 people in the area."Largest Employers in the Area ." Retrieved May 22, 2014. Chevron Phillips also has an office here."CPChem FAQ Page". Chevron Phillips Chemical. 2012. Retrieved on October 25, 2012
Phillips Petroleum had a large presence in Bartlesville. A writer for the Tacoma (Washington) News Tribune said, "I never quite understood why the town where I spent my high school years wasn't named Phillipsburg. Nearly everything else in town was named after the Phillips Petroleum company or its founder".
The Bartlesville area has two industrial parks, the Bartlesville Industrial Park and the Sunset Industrial Park. The Bartlesville Industrial Park landed a multi-million dollar lithium-ion battery recycling plant in September 2023.
Arts and culture
Price Tower, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, stands in downtown Bartlesville. It is Wright's only realized skyscraper, and one of only two vertically oriented Wright structures extant (the other is the S.C. Johnson Wax Research Tower in Racine, Wisconsin).
The nearby Bartlesville Community Center, designed by William Wesley Peters, one of Wright's students, hosts OKM Music, an annual week-long music event in June.OKM Website Retrieved on March 28 2010 Begun in 1985 as the "OK Mozart" International Festival, and organized around the music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the festival featured performances of classical music, jazz, light opera, and more. World-renowned musicians who have performed at OK Mozart include Itzhak Perlman, Joyce Yang, Joshua Bell, and André Watts. Around 2018 the festival renamed itself OKM Music to signify that it was broadening its range beyond the predominantly classical music it had featured for much of its 33-year history. The Community Center also hosts the concerts presented by the Bartlesville Community Concert Association.Bartlesville Community Concert Association. Retrieved September 16, 2013]