Killers of the Flower Moon: Osage County's Reign of Terror

Gray Horse is one of the communities of the Osage Nation, and it is where Mollie Kyle grew up. Born in the Osage Nation in 1886, she attended Catholic school in Pawhuska and by the 1900s was wealthy from her Osage headright, though federal law had her declared incompetent and placed under a guardian. In 1917 she married Ernest Burkhart, a nephew of the rancher William King Hale. Gray Horse, Fairfax and Pawhuska would all be drawn into the murders that followed. Mollie died in 1937 and is buried at the Greyhorse Indian Village Cemetery in Osage County.

Pawhuska was the site of big-money public auctions of oil and gas leases during the Osage oil boom. In November 1912 leases were sold under an elm tree; when more than $1 million went in a day, it became the Million Dollar Elm. The town had eight lawyers for 8,000 residents — the same number as Oklahoma City, which had 140,000. In 1921 Congress required courts to appoint guardians for Osage of half-blood or more, choosing them from local white lawyers and businessmen who managed their wards' royalties. For the film, Scorsese turned Kihekah Avenue, Pawhuska's main street, into 1920s Fairfax, taking over a three-block stretch and about 50 businesses.

Location precision: The original elm died in the 1980s and its replacement was felled in 2024; the pin marks downtown Pawhuska, where the lease auctions were held.

Fairfax saw the majority of the Osage murders. On 10 March 1923 a bomb destroyed Rita Smith's home, killing Rita and her housekeeper Nettie Brookshire; Rita's husband Bill died four days later. Investigators later found the bomb had held five US gallons of nitroglycerin. That February, Henry Roan had been found shot in his car after meeting John Ramsey on a road outside town. For the film, Scorsese shot in Fairfax and blew up a house on North 4th Street about four blocks from the real bombing site.

Location precision: The Smith house is gone and its exact site is not marked; the pin places the stop in Fairfax, where the bombing happened.

Visitor guidance: Fairfax is about 28 miles southwest of Pawhuska.

George Bigheart, son of the last hereditary Osage chief, was put on a train to an Oklahoma City hospital after drinking poisoned whiskey. Lawyer W. W. Vaughan met him there and took a train back to Pawhuska with documents that would prove Bigheart's suspicions. Vaughan was missing when the porter came to wake him. His body was found beside the railroad tracks near Pershing, about five miles south of Pawhuska, his skull crushed and the documents gone. The coroner called the death suspicious but not murder. Bigheart died in the hospital that morning.

Location precision: Vaughan's body was found beside the tracks near Pershing, not in the community itself; the pin marks Pershing.

In July 1926 Hale and John Ramsey were tried in Guthrie for the murder of Henry Roan. The jury began deliberating on 20 August; five days later it was deadlocked. The case moved to Oklahoma City, where they were convicted, but appeals and further retrials followed, taking it through Guthrie, Oklahoma City, Pawhuska and Bartlesville between 1926 and 1929. Guthrie's historic downtown, with more than 2,000 buildings, is about 32 miles north of Oklahoma City.

Location precision: The sources place the 1926 trial in Guthrie but do not identify the courtroom; the pin marks the town.

Visitor guidance: Guthrie is about 32 miles north of Oklahoma City; its historic downtown is a National Historic Landmark district.

On 20 October 1926 Hale and Ramsey went on trial again, this time in the second-floor courtroom of Oklahoma City's historic federal courthouse. Nine days later both were convicted of Henry Roan's murder and sentenced to life in prison. The building, completed in 1912, had housed the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma; today its restored first-floor lobby holds the Federal Judicial Learning Center & Museum. The courthouse is at 215 Dean A. McGee Avenue.

Visitor guidance: The Federal Judicial Learning Center & Museum is in the restored first-floor lobby at 215 Dean A. McGee Avenue.

The Osage Nation Museum in Pawhuska is the oldest tribally owned museum in the United States, founded in 1938. Its exhibits trace Osage history from origins through forced relocation to Oklahoma and the oil boom, and visitors can view microfilm records and congressional testimony from the FBI investigation into the murders. The museum stewards Osage culture and history from the tribe's own perspective. It is at 819 Grandview Avenue, open Tuesday to Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; admission and parking are free.

Visitor guidance: The museum is at 819 Grandview Avenue, open Tuesday to Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; admission and parking are free.