In the 1920s, the richest people per capita in the world
were members of the Osage Indian nation in Oklahoma. After oil was
discovered beneath their land, they rode in chauffeured automobiles,
built mansions, and sent their children to study in Europe.
Then, one by one, the Osage began to be killed off. The family of an
Osage woman, Mollie Burkhart, became a prime target. Her relatives were
shot and poisoned. And it was just the beginning, as more and more
members of the tribe began to die under mysterious circumstances.
In this last remnant of the Wild West - where oilmen like J. P. Getty
made their fortunes and where desperadoes like Al Spencer, the "Phantom
Terror," roamed - many of those who dared to investigate the killings
were themselves murdered. As the death toll climbed to more than
twenty-four, the FBI took up the case. It was one of the organization's
first major homicide investigations and the bureau badly bungled the
case. In desperation, the young director, J. Edgar Hoover, turned to a
former Texas Ranger named Tom White to unravel the mystery. White put
together an undercover team, including one of the only American Indian
agents in the bureau. The agents infiltrated the region, struggling to
adopt the latest techniques of detection. Together with the Osage they
began to expose one of the most chilling conspiracies in American
history.
In Killers of the Flower Moon, David Grann revisits a shocking
series of crimes in which dozens of people were murdered in cold blood.
Based on years of research and startling new evidence, the book is a
masterpiece of narrative nonfiction, as each step in the investigation
reveals a series of sinister secrets and reversals. But more than that,
it is a searing indictment of the callousness and prejudice toward
American Indians that allowed the murderers to operate with impunity for
so long. Killers of the Flower Moon is utterly compelling, but also emotionally devastating.
