locomotive were rushing by. From the hole in the ground came a
rumbling, gurgling sound, and the workers began to run, their
screams smothered by what had become a roar. A driller grabbed
Phillips and pulled him off the platform just as the earth burst
open and a black column of oil spewed into the air.
Each new find seemed more breathtaking than the last. In 1920,
E. W. Marland, who was once so poor that he couldn’t afford train
fare, discovered Burbank, one of the highest-producing oil fields in
the United States: a new well generated 680 barrels in its first
twenty-four hours.
Many of the Osage would rush to see a gusher when it erupted,
scrambling for the best view, making sure not to cause a spark,
their eyes following the oil as it shot fifty, sixty, sometimes a
hundred feet in the air. With its great black wings of spray, arcing
above the rigging, it rose before them like an angel of death. The
spray coated the fields and the flowers and smeared the faces of
the workers and the spectators. Still, people hugged and tossed
their hats in celebration. Bigheart, who had died not long after the
imposition of allotment, was hailed as the “Osage Moses.” And the
dark, slimy, smelly mineral substance seemed like the most
beautiful thing in the world.