Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, it's Rachel. It's been a while, but we have
a quick update for you. Last month, I hopped on
a plane from Houston to Tulsa and drove the hour
north to Pohsca. It was my first time on the
Osage Reservation in more than a year. I went back
to cover an important development. In this story. We told
you a lot about how US policies were to strip
(00:21):
O Sage land and money away from families in the
Osage Nation itself. We also told you about how Osage
leaders are trying to buy some of that back, and
last month, the Osage Nation did something big, bringing a
part of this history full circle. Government officials and journalists
(00:47):
were in town, including Alison Edrea, my reporting partner for
this podcast. We all gathered in a big room at
the new O Sage Casino in Pahsca. There was a
podium at the front next to a table with some
official documents on it. Chief Jeffrey's standing there can please
come up. You might remember Chief standing there from earlier episodes.
(01:10):
He's the elected leader of the Osage Nation and the
person who made the call to go all in to
win the more than forty thousand acres billionaire Ted Turner
was selling. But that acquisition was just step one, because the.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Title is going to be changed from Osage Nation to
the United States of America in trust for the Osage Nation,
that's what is on these states.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
This was step two, transferring the land to the federal government,
so that the US would hold the title to the land,
but on behalf of the Osage Nation. In other words,
to establish that fiduciary duty, the highest responsibility in the
US legal system, a way to protect the land from
being sold or lost or stolen. This had been years
(02:04):
in the making. The osh Nation had applied to have
the land put in trust back in twenty sixteen, then
withdrew that application, did a bunch of work, and resubmitted
it in twenty twenty three. Putting land in trust, even
a couple acres is a long bureaucratic process, so for
a massive chunk like this ranch, at times it seemed
(02:24):
like it might not even happen at all. You might
remember that one issue was all the oil drilling that
had taken place on the land. There was a concern
that the BIA, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, might not
accept the liability that came with that damage, even though
it was the US that had overseen the oil production.
Chief Standing Bear said he explained all this to Frank Lucas,
(02:46):
the US Congressman from Oklahoma.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
We told him the situation and he goes, oh, let
me get this straight. Bia. He's a big tallent. He goes,
BIA says, he can't put it in trust, as all
its environmental damage. But all's environmental damage happened when they
were in charge and make sure everything was not damas. Yes, sir,
(03:10):
and he goes, let them make sense. Then I go,
that's what we think.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
So after Chief Standing Bear finished speaking, a new person
came on stage, a regional director for the BIA ed
E Streeter. They were in pretty close contact over the
last several years working on this. There were a lot
of technical details that needed to be hammered out, but
he said it was the right thing for the government
to do.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
Placing land and trust is critical to travel, sovereignty, self
determination and preservation of the history and culture, economic development,
and the well being and tribal citizens. The process also
helped write the wrongs of past policies such as a
lot men as Chief talked about, which removed me as
the makers of lands for travel, ownership and federal protection.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Federal policy any more than a century. After the nineteen
oh six Act that divided up this land, the title
to more than forty thousand acres was officially transferred from
the o Sage Nation to the US government. It's trustee
and perpetuity.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
So congratulations, you are own forty three thousand acres all
forty two thousand sum of federal trust land and it
is owned by Alden.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
After the event, Alison and I caught up outside with r. J. Walker,
the assistant Principal Chief who drove the bid to Kansas
with Raymond Redcorn, the bid that won the Osage Nation
this land nine years ago.
Speaker 4 (04:36):
One of my biggest desires as an Osage as as
an elected official, is to purchase our land back. And
the simple reality is that they're not making any more land.
And we sat in one little spot in this world,
(04:57):
and it's the Osage Nation, the Osa Reservation, and we're
taking it back little by little. In this case, it
was a big bite.
Speaker 1 (05:08):
By all accounts, this was a celebration, but r J said,
this relationship with the US government is still kind of
tense at times. There's a lot of history here of
how the US facilitated this landlass to begin with, how
it breached its trust duty, something we covered extensively.
Speaker 4 (05:27):
It's just a little bit awkward to me to sign
over something that is the Osage Nation and now it
is owned by the United States of America.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
This came up a lot during my reporting for the
first eight episodes of this podcast, how complicated the trust
relationship is and how difficult it can be for the
Osage Nation to put its faith in a government that
has allowed and even facilitated some of the worst chapters
in its long history. I think back to my conversation
with Genie Dennison, the Osage citizen and associate professor of
(06:03):
American Indian Studies at the University of Washington. She explained
how the trust relationship was a tool away for the
Osage Nation to use the US legal system to its
advantage and keep the state out of the Osage Nation.
Speaker 4 (06:18):
This is a historic deal and its interest forever on
behalf of the Osage Nation and the United States of
America now has a responsibility that it is taken care
of and we are taken care of and it can
never be sold.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
As I was leaving Oklahoma, I was struck by how
much had changed since I started reporting this story. During
my first visit here, I'd met Jim Gray, the former chief,
to ask him about head rights and how so many
non Osages got them. I remember Jim telling me all
about the territory the Osage once had centuries ago, how
(07:12):
they bought all of what's now Osage County above the
ground and below, and how the government carved it up
into smaller chunks. On my way out of town, I
met up with Jim again, this time at a diner.
In a lot of ways, this was an effort that
really started back in the early two thousands when Jim
was chief and the Osage Nation reformed its entire government,
(07:34):
setting itself up to do something huge like buy back
tens of thousands of acres of land.
Speaker 5 (07:40):
We lost our land, a lot of it over the centuries,
and this is an attempt to get some of it back,
but not just get it back and stay under the
jurisdiction of the state and the taxation policies of the state.
This gives it back in the best way you can
get it back. The United States government protected on your
(08:02):
behalf from encouragion by local municipal government, or say government,
that's as good as it gets in this business.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Everyone I talked to this last trip said the same thing.
Land prices are high. Putting assets back in trust is hard.
But the Osage nation isn't done. Oce Age leaders want
more land and they're working to put themselves in a
financial position to buy it. Acquiring this land, putting it
back into trust, It's far from the end. It's another beginning.
(08:47):
This episode was reported and hosted by me Rachel Adams,
heard with additional reporting from Alison Edita. It was produced
by Victor Eveyas and edited by Margaret Sutherland and Jeff
Grocottlomberg's head of podcasts is Sage Bowman. Additional thanks to
Davis Land, Jackie Kestler, Ariel Brown, and Shane Brown.