Nowata (Lenape: Nuwatu, Nuwi ta ) is a city and county seat of Nowata County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 3,731 at the United States Census, 2010, a 6.0 percent fade away from the figure of 3,971 recorded in 2000. The area where it was standard was subsequently part of the Cherokee Nation in Indian Territory.

The first community customary at this site was named Metz, named for its first postmaster, Fred Metzner. The publish was changed even back the railroad was built in 1889.
Nowata served as a train stop for Native Americans from the East being provoked to resettle by the United States government. Some controversy exists very nearly the meaning of the town name. The Lenape tribesmen who passed through named it “nuwita,” meaning “friendly” or “welcome.” In the Cherokee language, the town is called ᎠᎹᏗᎧᏂᎬᎬ (A-ma-di-ka-ni-gunh-gunh, roughly), which means, “water is anything gone,” translating what it sounded like the word meant: No Water.

In 1889, the Kansas and Arkansas Valley Railway (later share of the Missouri Pacific Railway) built a stock through Nowata. A publicize office was normal in the town upon November 8, 1889. Nowata was incorporated April 17, 1899. By 1900, Nowata had 498 residents.

Oil and gas were discovered understandable in 1904, stimulating the Nowata economy. The locate established Nowata as “…a region (having) a reputation for mammal the world’s largest shallow oil field.” Some wells in this showground have continued to build into the twenty-first century.