This is in conversation from Apple News. I'm Shemeethavasu. Today, the true story of money, murder and betrayal behind the movie Killers of the Flower Moon.

The 19th century was a grim period for the Native American tribe, the Osage Nation.

Between disease brought by European colonizers and forced displacement by the U government, roughly 90% of the Osage people

were wiped out.

The survivors settled in Oklahoma.

Then at the turn of the century something incredible happened.

We struck oil.

Striking oil was as good as striking gold, and the Osage wanted to be sure that this valuable

resource wasn't taken away from them by white Americans.

So they claimed their rights.

We held our minerals in reserve for all of us and that was divided to the surviving 2,229 Osages in 1906.

That's Chief Jeffrey Standing Bear, the principal chief of the Osage Nation today.

He says the Osage decided each member of the tribe should get an equal share of the oil

royalties.

That share was called a head right. Here's David

Graham who wrote the 2017 book about this history called Killers of the Flower

Moon. These head rights were worth you know know, a fortune because it ensured you received a quarterly check, and

a head right could not be bought or sold.

A head right could only be inherited.

Back then, the head right payments could amount to as much as $13,000 a year per person. In today's

money, that's around $232,000. This made the Osage the richest people per capita in the world.

And it also made them targets of a sinister and elaborate plot by white Americans. At least 60 Osage people were murdered or went

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