Osage Indian Sisters,
Minnie, Anna,
and Mollie Burkhart
(Left to right)
Murders & the Birth of the FBI. The author David Grann is a staff writer at The New Yorker
and is best known for his book The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon.
School Library Journal Review:
"In 1920s Oklahoma, many members of the oil-wealthy Osage Nation were dying
untimely and suspicious deaths. The widespread crimes against the Osage and the
inability to identify those responsible led to the establishment of what is now known
as the FBI. Grann, author of the best-selling The Lost City of Z, makes a complex web
of violence and deception easy to follow by keeping the focus on one Osage woman,
Mollie Burkhart, whose family members were murdered one by one. The gripping title
uncovers a baffling level of corruption. The author points his investigative lens at the
perpetrators of the murders, reveals, cover-ups by authorities all the way up to the
national level, and illustrates that the deception continued almost a century later. There
are plenty of curriculum connections: Native American and Osage tribal history,
economics, law enforcement, and journalism...."
Killers of the Flower Moon is being turned into a movie (release date: end of 2019 or
2020) with director Martin Scorsese, and staring Leonardo DiCaprio. In an interview,
Scorsese stated:
"When I read David Grann's book, I immediately started to seeing it -- the people,
the settings, the action --- and I knew that I had to make it into a movie"
Read the book. Come join the discussion. Share your thoughts and insights.