Murdered for oil money
David Grann tells the tale of Oklahoma Osage killings
If you haven’t yet come across the work of David Grann, consider yourself lucky: you have much to look forward to. This includes his latest and third book, Killers of the Flower Moon, a resplendent and gripping true-crime tale about a string of murders nearly 100 years old.
These killings, beginning in the early 1920s, involved the “Osage Indians” in Oklahoma, who at the time were some of the richest people in the U.S.: Their land sat atop an ocean of oil, earning them millions each year, which was dispersed among those in the tribe holding “headrights.” A headright — essentially a share of the oil money — was the equivalent of a winning lottery ticket, though it could neither be bought nor sold. You could only inherit one, which naturally meant someone had to die. This began happening with alarming frequency in May 1921, and continued for five years, either by bullet, bombing, car crash or the slow death of poison.
It was called the Reign of Terror and there were plenty of suspects. Many Osage weren’t seen fit to handle their own money, so a white guardian was assigned to manage their finances. Needless to say, not all had their ward’s best interest in mind — even when they were also their husband. (As one love-struck husband put it, “I don’t work. I married an Osage.”) A logical place to begin looking for a suspect or two, but given the level of corruption among officials and the racist ideas of the day, little was done.
Grann spends about a third of the book teasing out the story of the murders, largely focusing on Mollie Burkhart and her dwindling family. He then switches over to FBI Special Agent Tom White, who is sent by J. Edgar Hoover to get involved. It is 1925, the FBI is in its infancy, and the mercurial Hoover is determined to showcase his organization. White’s story is fascinating, and he proves to be a doggedly single-minded pursuer of the truth. As it turns out though, neither White nor the FBI got everything right, or even every one of their men; Grann ends up making a few discoveries of his own.
This is not surprising. Grann, who has been a staff writer at the New Yorker since 2003, is an obsessive reporter who has made a stellar career of chasing down the strange and rendering the results in page-turning stories brimming with novelistic touches. As with his previous book, The Lost City of Z, this one provoked fierce Hollywood interest, eventually earning him a $5-million advance. It is a tale expertly told but one that is soaked in Indigenous blood. James Macgowan is a frequent contributor to The Star’s book section.