An 81-year-old woman who said she lost “everything” in a mobile home fire June 28 owns three other homes in Muskogee, according to relatives and county records.

One of the homes Mary Hammons owns is a three-bedroom brick home with a two-car garage on West Davis Field Road that was last assessed for $91,918 in March 2006. A large metal storage building housing antiques also is on the property, said Hammons’ stepdaughter, Peggy Miller of Muskogee.

Miller and a stepgrandaughter, Jodi Downum of Oktaha, questioned Monday whether Hammons sought help under false pretenses. Hammons said she didn’t.

Hammons said she doesn’t plan to move into any of her houses. She said she has one on Emporia Street that she has up for sale because she decided not to give it to her daughter.

She agreed with relatives that she had some clothes in the Davis Field house, but said they weren’t good clothes.

She said she plans to will the Davis Field house to one of her nieces, Connie Brown, who has taken care of her when she was ill.

“She’s overly earned it,” Hammons said.

And her house at 1008 Wood she rents out, she said.

The American Red Cross gave Hammons a debit card after the fire. Director Hope Margarit was not at the office Monday and didn’t know what help Hammons received.

Margarit said Monday the Red Cross gives those in need emergency funds “whether you have money or don’t have money.”

She added people often can’t access money in the bank at the time of a crisis.

The amount of a debit card given to applicants for immediate relief depends on what they say they need and tell a volunteer they lost, she said. The Red Cross is not an investigative agency, she said.

“We believe what someone tells us,” Margarit said.

Miller said she was with Hammons about two or three years ago when she bought a Cadillac and wrote a $35,000 check for it.

Hammons said Monday she paid about almost $40,000 for the 2005 Cadillac. It burned in the recent fire, but it was insured, she said.

Miller said Hammons checked into buying another Cadillac since the fire, but didn’t want to pay the $44,000 asking price.

Hammons moved in with Brown on North L Street after the mobile home fire. She said she had nowhere to go, and Brown took her in.

An account to collect donations was set up for Hammons at First National Bank with Holly Blankenship.

Blankenship expressed surprise that Hammons had paid for a Cadillac that burned along with the mobile home. Despite Miller and other relatives suggesting Hammons had at least a six-figure bank account, Blankenship said, “She does not have a lot of money in the bank with us.

“I don’t have hardly anything with her at all here. I have waited on her at Bank of Oklahoma, Citizens and since I’ve been here. She is my friend, but I would not lie.”

Hammons said she used to have what some people considered a lot of money, but had spent most of it.

“How long does it last?” she said.

Reach Donna Hales at 684-2923 or dhales @muskogeephoenix.com.