Historical Marker Program

Million Dollar Elm

Osage County
Location: on grounds of Osage Nation campus in Pawhuska
Coordinates: 36.666224, -96.340294
Material: Other (Stone with bronze plaque)
Sponsor(s): Harry G. Benson and Family
Topics: American Indians; Early Statehood, 1907–1941; Folklife; Natural Resources; Petroleum; Social/Cultural; Territorial Period, 1861–1907

The Osage Nation held the first public auction sale for oil leases on reservation tracts on November 11, 1912. Early sales were held under this elm tree. Bidders sat on bleachers around the tree and the auctioneer, Colonel E. Walters, ‘cried’ the sales. A total of 16 160-acre tracts leased for a bonus of over $1 million. Thus, this tree under which these high bids were made became known as the “Million Dollar Elm.”

Oil in the Osage Indian Nation and the “Million Dollar Elm”

Osage County
Location: on grounds of the Osage Nation Museum in Pawhuska
Coordinates: 36.667616, -96.339443
Material: Granite
Sponsor(s): Oklahoma Historical Society and Oklahoma Petroleum Council
Topics: American Indians; Early Statehood, 1907–1941; Folklife; Industrial Period, 1941–1982; Natural Resources; Petroleum; Social/Cultural; Territorial Period, 1861–1907

Symbolic of the impact oil had on the people of the Osage Indian Nation is the so-called “Million Dollar Elm.” It was given this name because in its shade millions of dollars worth of Osage oil leases were auctioned. It was planted at this site sometime during the latter part of the 19th century as an ornament and for shade. The name was not given by tribal leaders but by reporters and magazine writers who were dramatizing the events when important heads and founders of the world's greatest oil companies came in person to bid. The auctioneer himself, the histrionic Colonel Walters, became famous because of his success in getting top bids. The drilling of the first well in the Osage Nation occurred in 1897. The first tract to bring one million dollars or more was acquired in March 1922. On March 29, 1924, Midland Oil Company bid almost two million dollars for a tract. By November 1969, Osage lands had produced one billion barrels of oil.