Generations ago, the American Indian Osage tribe was compelled to move. Not for the first time, white settlers pushed them off their land in the 1800s. They made their new home in a rocky, infertile area in northeast Oklahoma in hopes that settlers would finally leave them alone.

As it turned out, the land they had chosen was rich in oil, and in the early 20th century, members of the tribe became spectacularly wealthy. They bought cars and built mansions; they made so much oil money that the government began appointing white guardians to "help" them spend it.

And then Osage members started turning up dead.

In 1897 oil was first discovered in Osage County. The United States federal government's Department of the Interior managed leases for oil exploration and production on land owned by the Osage Nation through the Bureau of Indian Affairs and later managed royalties, paying individual allottees. As part of the process of preparing Oklahoma for statehood, the federal government allotted 657 acres (266 ha) to each Osage on the tribal rolls in 1907; thereafter, they and their legal heirs, whether Osage or not, had "headrights" to royalties in oil production, based on their allotments of lands. The headrights could be inherited by legal heirs, including non-Osage.

By 1920 the market for oil had grown dramatically and the Osage were wealthy. In 1923 alone "the tribe took in more than thirty million dollars, the equivalent today of more than four hundred million dollars."

People all across the United States read about the Osage, called "the richest nation, clan or social group of any race on earth, including the whites, man for man." Some Osage used their royalties to send their children to private schools; others bought fancy cars, clothes and jewelry, and traveled in Europe; and newspapers across the country covered their activities. Along with tens of thousands of oil workers, the oil wealth attracted many white opportunists to Osage County; as the writer Robert Allen Warrior characterized them, some were entrepreneurial, while others were criminal, seeking to separate the Osage from their wealth, by murder if necessary.

Believing the Osage would not be able to manage their new wealth, or lobbied by whites who wanted a piece of the action, by 1921 the United States Congress passed a law requiring that courts appoint guardians for each Osage of half-blood or more in ancestry, who would manage their royalties and financial affairs until they demonstrated "competency". Under the system, even minors who had less than half-Osage blood had to have guardians appointed, regardless of whether the minors had living parents. The courts appointed the guardians from local white lawyers or businessmen. The incentives for criminality were overwhelming; such guardians often maneuvered legally to steal Osage land, their headrights or royalties; others were suspected of murdering their charges to gain the headrights.

At that time, 80 lawyers were working in Pawhuska, the Osage County seat, which had 8,000 residents; the number of lawyers was said to be as great as in the state capital, which had 140,000 residents. In 1924 the Department of Interior charged two dozen guardians of Osage with corruption in the administration of their duties related to their charges, but all avoided punishment by settling out of court. They were believed to have swindled their charges out of millions of dollars. In 1929 $27 million was reported as still being held by the "Guardian System", the organization set up to protect the financial interests of 883 Osage families in Osage County.

In his new book, Killers of the Flower Moon, David Grann describes how white people in the area conspired to kill Osage members in order steal their oil wealth, which could only be passed on through inheritance. "This was a culture of complicity," he says, "and it was allowed to go on for so long because so many people were part of the plot. You had lawmen, you had prosecutors, you had the reporters who wouldn't cover it. You had oilmen who wouldn't speak out. You had morticians who would cover up the murders when they buried the body. You had doctors who helped give poison to people."

On how the conspiracy worked

What makes these crimes so sinister is that it involved marrying into families. It involved a level of calculation and a level of betraying the very people you pretended to love. And the way these murders would take place is that people would marry into the families and then begin to kill each member of the family. ... That's exactly what happened to [Osage woman Mollie Burkhart]. She had married a white man, and his uncle was the most powerful settler in the area. He was known as the King of the Osage Hills ... and he had orchestrated a very sinister plot played out over years where he directed his nephew, who had married Mollie Burkhart, to marry her so that he could then begin to kill the family members one by one and siphon off all the wealth.

On how Mollie Burkhart's family was killed

One day in 1921, her older sister disappeared and Mollie looked everywhere for her and couldn't find her. And about a week later, her body was found essentially in a ravine, decomposed. She'd been shot in the back of the head.

Then just a few weeks later, Mollie's mother began to grow increasingly sick. She seemed to be almost disappearing, withering in front of her. And within two months she, too, had died. And evidence later suggested that she had been secretly poisoned.

Not long after that, Mollie was sleeping in her bed in her house with her white husband; they had a couple children. And she heard a loud explosion. She got up in panic and terror. ... She had another sister who lived not far away, and in the area where her sister's house was she could see almost this orange fire ball rising into the sky. It almost looked as if the sun had burst into the night. And her sister's house had been blown up killing that sister as well as her sister's husband and a servant who lived in that house.

On how far the conspirators went to cover up their crimes

Almost anyone who tried to investigate the killings — or at least stop them in the area — they, too, were killed. One attorney tried to gather evidence and one day he was thrown off a speeding train and all the evidence that he had gathered had disappeared. Another time, an oilman had traveled to Washington, D.C., to try to get help. ... He checked into a boarding house in Washington, D.C. ... He was then found the next day stripped naked. He had been stabbed more than 20 times; his head had been beaten in. The Washington Post at the time said what everyone at that point knew, which was there was a conspiracy to kill rich Indians.

On how authorities reacted to the deaths

It's really important to understand back then that there was so much lawlessness. That was one of the things that shocked me when I began researching the story, that even in the 1920s much of America remained a country that was not fully rooted in its laws. Its legal institutions were very fragile; there was enormous corruption, particularly in this era and in this area. And the conspirators were able to pay off lawmen, they were able to pay off prosecutors. There was so much prejudice that these crimes were neglected.

Mollie Burkhart beseeched the authorities to try to investigate, to get help, but because of prejudice they often ignored the crimes. And she issued money for a reward, she hired private investigators, but the crimes for years remained unsolved, and the body count continued to increase. By 1924 there were at least 24 murders alone. ...

Finally, the Osage, in desperation, they issued a resolution, a tribal resolution, beseeching the federal authorities to help. And finally a then-very obscure branch of the Justice Department intervened. It was known as the Bureau of Investigation and it was what ... would later be renamed the FBI.

On the FBI's investigation

J. Edgar Hoover ... was the new director, and it became one of the FBI's first major homicide cases that it ever dealt with. ... The bureau initially badly bungled the case. ... [Hoover] turned the case over to a frontier lawman at the time who finally put together an undercover team that included ... probably the only American Indian agent in the bureau at the time. They went undercover. ... They were able, through some dogged investigation and at great danger, to eventually capture some of the ringleaders. And those ringleaders included not only Mollie Burkhart's husband, it also included [his] uncle, a man who was seen as this great protector of the community.

On what the FBI missed in their investigation

The bureau was so anxious to wrap up the case that they ignored many, many other unsolved crimes and many, many other killers. ... When you begin to look at the documents and you begin to collect the evidence from the Osage, it becomes abundantly apparent. ...

I pulled some of the guardian papers and there was this little booklet that came out. It had a little fabric cover. All it was was essentially identifying the name of a guardian and which Osage they were in charge of. And when I opened up the book, I could see the name of the guardian and when I began to look at the names of the Osage under them I could see written next to many of them simply the word "Dead. Dead. Dead." It was almost like a ledger; it was like this forensic, bureaucratic accounting.

But when you're looking at it, you're beginning to realize you're looking at hints of a systematic murder campaign, because there's no way all these people died in a span of just a couple years. It defied any natural death rate. The Osage were wealthy, they had good doctors. ... And then when you begin to look into each of those individual cases, you start to find trails of evidence suggesting poisonings, a murder. You start to try to trace the money ... and where the wealth went. And what you begin to discover is something even more horrifying than the bureau ever exposed.

GRANN: He did. They went to an old frontier lawman to help take over the case and they did a good job. But Hoover was desperate to wrap up the case. The Bureau missed a deeper and darker conspiracy that remained unsolved. And I think that's very important to understand.

INSKEEP: How do you know that?

GRANN: Well, many of the Osage began to point me in directions to other unsolved cases within their families going back. What this story really is about - it's not about a story of who did it. It's a story about who didn't do it. When I went to the National Archives in Texas, there was this little booklet. It had a little fabric cover. It - all it was was essentially identifying the name of a guardian and who - which Osage they were in charge of.

And when I began to look at the names of the Osage under them, I could see written next to many of them simply the word dead, dead, dead. You're beginning to realize you're looking at hints of a systematic murder campaign because there's no way all these people died in a span of just a couple years that defied any natural death rate.

And then when you begin to look into each of those individual case, you start to find trails of evidence of suggesting poisonings, a murder. You start to try to trace the money and where the wealth went. What you begin to discover is something even more horrifying than the Bureau ever exposed.

INSKEEP: When you've been poking around in this and revealing this information about a bunch of people's ancestors, what have people said to you?

GRANN: So one of the things that you realize when you spend time in Osage County is that the descendants of both the victims and descendants of the murderers still live there. They often live down the street from each other. And one Osage woman told me we try not to hold them accountable for what their ancestors did. Part of that is the story of America, this intertwining and this kind of reckoning with this original sin that is part of our formation of a country.

And I would say this, I spoke with some of the descendants of the husband of Mollie Burkhart and the uncle who was one of the masterminds of the plot. And they were remarkably candid. And after I finished the book, I received a note from one of the descendants who said, I'm so ashamed that this is part of our history. And please, if you see the Osage, will you please tell them that?


Note from me: A nation always need to heal....everyone, no thats not possible, enough people must own up and enough people must say never again.