Home | Publications| Encyclopedia | Mooney, Ella Ridley

The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture

MOONEY, ELLA RIDLEY (1867–1951).

The first woman pharmacist registered in Indian and Oklahoma territories, Ella Courts Ridley was born on October 18, 1867, in Calloway County, Kentucky, to Robert Courts and Louisa A. Coleman Ridley. Robert Ridley was a physician. On August 12, 1883, Ella Ridley married Jesse Mooney, a physician who practiced medicine among the Five Tribes in Indian Territory. In 1897 Ella Mooney began teaching at the Moral, Oklahoma, subscription school. She was the first woman in Oklahoma to pass the pharmacy board examination and received her license on July 1, 1901. The couple had eight children and operated drug stores in McGee, Moral, Dale, and McLoud, Oklahoma. Jesse Mooney died in 1915, and Ella Mooney married W. H. Shaffer in 1931. Ellaville, a post office named for her, existed from 1901 to 1905 and was located three miles southwest of Maud. Ella Shaffer died in Shawnee on October 17, 1951, and was buried in Riverside Cemetery in McLoud.

Kelly Brown

Browse By Topic

Women

Explore

Learn More

Charles W. Mooney, Localized History of Pottawatomie County, Oklahoma to 1907 (Midwest City, Okla.: Thunderbird Industries, 1971).

Shawnee (Oklahoma) News-Star, 18 and 19 October 1951.

George H. Shirk, Oklahoma Place Names (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1965).

Citation

The following (as per The Chicago Manual of Style, 17th edition) is the preferred citation for articles:
Kelly Brown, “Mooney, Ella Ridley,” The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture, https://www.okhistory.org/publications/enc/entry?entry=MO012.

Published January 15, 2010

Copyright and Terms of Use

No part of this site may be construed as in the public domain.

Copyright to all articles and other content in the online and print versions of The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History is held by the Oklahoma Historical Society (OHS). This includes individual articles (copyright to OHS by author assignment) and corporately (as a complete body of work), including web design, graphics, searching functions, and listing/browsing methods. Copyright to all of these materials is protected under United States and International law.

Users agree not to download, copy, modify, sell, lease, rent, reprint, or otherwise distribute these materials, or to link to these materials on another web site, without authorization of the Oklahoma Historical Society. Individual users must determine if their use of the Materials falls under United States copyright law's "Fair Use" guidelines and does not infringe on the proprietary rights of the Oklahoma Historical Society as the legal copyright holder of The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and part or in whole.