OKLAHOMA e TULSA, DIOCESE OF. - In the United States of America. The diocese comprises the State of O. and has (1950) a total population of 2,230,253 inhabitants, of whom 75,748 are Catholics. The clergy consists of 124 diocesan priests and 93 religious of 15 different congregations. There are 108 parishes, 85 chapels, 79 missions, 22 congregations of women, 2 seminaries and religious scholasticates, 1 diocesan seminary, 2 colleges, 1 orphanage, and 12 hospitals.
The first whites came from the diocese of Mexico in 1540 with Francesco Vásquez de Coronado and 300 Spaniards. From 1611 onward p. Juan de Sales and other Spanish missionaries worked among the indigenous tribes, and in 1682 La Salle took possession, in the name of Luigi XIV, of the country of which O. forms part. The territory was therefore called Louisiana.
On 22 Apr. 1889, the country, previously reserved for the indigenous peoples, was opened to white settlement, and the territory was constituted a State in 1907.
Before 1889 only a few religious carried on the apostolate there. Mons. Isidoro Rabat, O. S. B., a Frenchman, was appointed first apostolic prefect in 1877, and Catholicism owes much to this Benedictine. By a bull of 29 May 1891, the apostolic vicariate of the Indian territories was established, and mons. Teofilo Meerschaet, a Belgian, was elected bishop. On 23 Aug. 1905, Pio X created the diocese of O. and transferred the see from Gunthrie to O. Finally, Pio XI altered the territory on 14 Oct. 1930 in order to create the diocese of O. City and T.