Flipper's Ditch

Flipper’s Ditch is a historic network of drainage trenches that were created around 1880 to eliminate swampy conditions and end a malaria epidemic on post. They were originally designed by Lieutenant Henry Ossian Flipper, the first African American graduate of West Point and a formerly enslaved person. After graduating from West Point in 1877, he was stationed in a series of western forts including Fort Sill, where he engineered earthworks and drainage channels as important public health infrastructure to combat the malaria epidemic. Our landscape master plan identifies strategies for preserving Flipper’s historic engineering work while restoring drainage functionality, which has been compromised due to siltation and the introduction of new structures. In lieu of the existing WPA-era stone walls, which require considerable maintenance, the design calls for the sides to be regraded and planted with low-maintenance grasses and forbes as a lush, ecological corridor for insects and reptiles connecting the watersheds of Sitting Bear and Medicine Creeks.

2021 Recipient MD-OK ASLA Merit Awards