Choctaw Country  Choctaw Country is the Oklahoma Department of Tourism and Recreation's official tourism designation for Southeastern Oklahoma. The name was previously Kiamichi Country until changed in honor of the Choctaw Nation headquartered there. The current definition of Choctaw Country includes ten counties, being Coal, Atoka, Bryan, Choctaw, McCurtain, Pushmataha, Le Flore, Latimer, Haskell, and Pittsburg counties. The Department created the term as one of six designated travel regions within the state. However, other definitions of Southeastern Oklahoma may include additional counties. The original name of Kiamichi was applied by French explorers who came to the area in the early 18th century. They discovered, among other things, a very large, noisy woodpecker that they called "Kiamichi", their word for "raucous bird." This name was also applied to the Kiamichi Mountains (Choctaw: "Nʋnih Chaha Kiamitia"), a subset of the Ouachita Mountains. Due to an influx of southerners seeking less expensive frontier lands during the post-Civil War Reconstruction era, Choctaw Country developed a culture that is more southern than the rest of the state. This region has also been called "Little Dixie". Lightly populated, heavily mountainous and forested, the region is popular for outdoor recreation. It supports water sports, mountain biking, hiking, hunting, horse back riding, fishing, and national scenic drives. The area of jurisdiction of the Choctaw Nation covers much of this territory. After this area was acquired by the United States from France through the Louisiana Purchase of 1803, it was organized as part of the new Arkansas Territory. On April 1, 1820, Arkansas created Miller County, which included most of the land that would be classified as Little Dixie. A post office at Miller Courthouse was established on September 7, 1824. In the meantime, the United States was organizing to remove the Five Civilized Tribes from the Southeast, in order to make their lands available for development by European Americans. There was great pressure on these tribes as settlers encroached on their lands and competed for resources. Some Choctaw had started moving into the region from Mississippi since the Treaty of Doak's Stand in 1820. Per a treaty signed by the United States on January 20, 1825, with the Choctaw, the land west of a line "one hundred paces east of Fort Smith, and running thence, due south, to Red river" was ceded to the Choctaw.