<![CDATA[Intersections Tulsa - musings from the territory \'25]]>

<![CDATA[Intersections Tulsa - musings from the territory \'25]]>Tue, 14 Apr 2026 16:29:45 -0500Weebly<![CDATA[Tulsa Outrage 1917 - Whipped, Tarred and Feathered • Outrage 2025?]]>Tue, 27 May 2025 16:01:31 GMThttps://www.intersectionstulsa.com/musings-from-the-territory-25/tulsa-outrage-1917-whipped-tarred-and-feathered-o-outrage-2025On Memorial Day 2025, via a social media post, Russell Cobb added to the brew that is part of Tulsa's sordid past. You can read a few of Dr. Cobb's stories on Medium and find details of his latest book "Ghosts of Crook County: An Oil Fortune, a Phantom Child, and the Fight for Indigenous Land". His instagram post, like much of his his storytelling puts him squarely in the middle of the story, a technique that serves his provocative writing style.

I wanted to share a bit of the research I had conducted in 2019 on the Tulsa Outrage. At Tulsa Morning Times newspaper clipping from November 18th, 1917 provides pertinent details but the National Civil Liberties Bureau (NCLB) pamphlet is a worthy document to explore. Both are at the bottom of the post.

The NCLB was founded in 1917 as an offshoot of the American Union Against Militarism (AUAM) with Roger Nash Baldwin it's first director. In 1920 the organization became the American Civili Liberties Union. AUAM was at the forefront of the effort to push back in defense of the First Amendment liberties of freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and the right of peaceable assembly to address grievances; rights which were coming under fire from the increasingly reactionary and authoritarian administration of Woodrow Wilson, fronted by his Attorney General, A. Mitchell Palmer. The (A. Mitchell) Palmer Raids, occurred between November 1919 and January 2020, his agents deported nearly 250 people, including notable anarchist Emma Goldman, and arrested nearly 10,000 people in seventy cities. As described in the 2019 New Yorker article, "When America Tried to Deport Its Radicals", the Palmer raids were the first mass deportation of political dissidents in the twentieth century'.

Think about that in context with 287G, a federal program that creates a partnership between ICE and state and local law agencies to enforce certain aspects of U. S. immigration law, a partnership that essentially aids in the process of deportations happening in the United States today; fast tracked deportations that are not giving these deportees due process. as provided under the Constitution.

Maybe it's a stretch to compare the Palmer Raids of 1919-1920 with Tom Holman's Immigration Raids of 2025, but I'm have to agree with the "Boss", Bruce Springsteen who said, in the 4th track of his EP “Land of Hopes and Dreams”, 'they’re rolling back historic civil rights legislation'. I think we could all ask 'what outrage is next?'.

Tulsa Morning Times • November 18th, 1917

NCLB Pamphlet • February 1918

Below is the complete pamphlet created by the National Civil Liberties Bureau in 1918.

tulsa_outrage.pdf
File Size:	778 kb
File Type:	pdf

Download File

]]><![CDATA[Tulsa Tribune Photographer, Lee Gillette]]>Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:40:45 GMThttps://www.intersectionstulsa.com/musings-from-the-territory-25/tulsa-tribune-photographer-lee-gillett

Photo Title: Fantasy of Fog

It was first published by the Tulsa Tribune in 1943 with the caption/description: Smoke in the distance from the Mid-Continent Petroleum Corp. Refinery, completely obscured by fog. Shot from atop KVOO studios only the smoke and the spires of the Boston Ave. Methodist Church and the Holy Family Cathedral to the south were visible.

The photograph was selected as one of Pictures of the Year International top photos in 1944. It is a program of the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute at the Missouri School of Journalism.

]]><![CDATA[maps of osage county with bia oil wells & townships]]>Mon, 06 Jan 2025 21:41:21 GMThttps://www.intersectionstulsa.com/musings-from-the-territory-25/maps-of-osage-county-with-bia-oil-wells-townships1920 Osage Indian Reservation • Showing Lands to be Leased for Oil Mining

2025 Osage County Map • BIA Oil and Townships
created with ArcGIS by worker33

Scroll in to look at oil well data, townships popup by selecting the map (linked it the title above)

osage county via good old gee earth image

]]><![CDATA[indian territory, story map]]>Sat, 22 Apr 2023 13:44:39 GMThttps://www.intersectionstulsa.com/musings-from-the-territory-25/indian-territory-story-mapI created a story map for the map(un)mapped on Earth Day, 2023. The map carried the workshops attendees through various concepts and creative modes to reconsider where we are and how to use these tools to reflect our lives in the places we inhabit.

February 2025 update:
In September 2023 Knight Labs was no longer able to provide the Stamen base map I used to create the original map(un)mapped) story map. The link below is active again and I am working to replace that map with a stable basemap through Stadia.

Story Map

]]><![CDATA[Mapping in Community]]>Fri, 21 Apr 2023 16:14:59 GMThttps://www.intersectionstulsa.com/musings-from-the-territory-25/mapping-in-communityalas he ArcGIS Story map no longer exists, like so much else...
but that perhaps is but the lament of an old one who as Paul Simon said,
"I cannot run, but I can walk much faster than this"]]><![CDATA[good friday moon, owen park, indian territory]]>Fri, 07 Apr 2023 12:10:36 GMThttps://www.intersectionstulsa.com/musings-from-the-territory-25/good-friday-moon-owen-park-indian-territory

Today's Good Friday moon comes to you from Owen Park IT, yes kids which is still located in Indian Territory as it was called before the land was parceled, packaged, sold, and stolen.

Only 119 years ago poor old McDonald, who had some nitroglycerin, was vaporized when a tragic accident occurred and created a crater much like a moon crater, but folks 'round here use it as a pond.

]]><![CDATA[Earl Biss Jr.]]>Thu, 06 Apr 2023 12:41:21 GMThttps://www.intersectionstulsa.com/musings-from-the-territory-25/earl-biss-jr

This is from the Gilcrease Collection in Tulsa IT, it's called "A Disposable Death Sketch and was created in 1993. Earl was born in 1947, was a member of the Absaroke (Crow) tribe, and was raised by his grandmother at Crow Agency, Montana, and at Yakima, Washington. I was touched by the intensity of feeling that the work conveys and drawn into a path of discovery, I found more at Toh-Atin Gallery

]]><![CDATA[remembering part 1]]>Thu, 16 Mar 2023 05:00:00 GMThttps://www.intersectionstulsa.com/musings-from-the-territory-25/remembering-part-1

My artwork continues to be informed by my research and immersion into the history of this deep red and deeply divided state of what was once labeled Indian Territory.

In some respects, I am haunted by the imagery I discover, and the use of photo layering is an attempt to create a composite narrative for a past that was and never was.

On my father's side, my family came to Oklahoma in the early part of the 20th century from Poland. My grandfather worked in the smelters, my grandmother was a house cleaner and they lived with five children on the western edge of Bartlesville in a Polish neighborhood on the poor side of town.

My mother claimed a mixed bag of ethnicity: English, Dutch, Irish, and a smattering of Cherokee blood that was buried in the ground so deeply that it was rarely spoken of and mostly forgotten; a topic that was off-limits. In truth, our family heritage was frayed by sagas of death, separation, and divorce; elements that fracture one's connection to place and to one another. Now anyone who could speak to it has passed; what remains is my desire for a connection to place.

I feel indigenous to this territory; I've lived here for most of my 67+ years but my longing for a deeper connection goes unrequited except through my efforts to lay claim to a homeland through my creativity. The world changes so rapidly, it seems we spend most of our time either looking ahead, trying to remember what was, or trying to forget; it's a race to keep up that no one can win.

This piece called "mother was a dear" will be on display at Price Gallery in Tulsa in April 2023.

There are four individual layers embedded in this image. It is a personal and meditative study of loss; a lament for a connection to a world that I am a part of and yet am also removed from.

Layer 1: Nellie Johnstone, Bartlesville Oklahoma.

Layer 2: Mrs Ryals

Layer 3: Eudotia Teenor

Layer 4: Found Poem of the Creeks

More on these layers to follow.

]]><![CDATA[a sunday in winter • a shumard oak • a witness bird]]>Sun, 12 Mar 2023 06:00:00 GMThttps://www.intersectionstulsa.com/musings-from-the-territory-25/march-12th-2023

One of the series of Shumard oaks that border the Senator's Walk at the museum.

a chilly morning at Gilcrease, walking the grounds, down the Senator's Walk, and visiting Crisita. the new building is rising slowly from the old earth...

but even the daffodils can't escape the march of progress.

]]><![CDATA[when you begin to notice]]>Sat, 11 Mar 2023 15:43:45 GMThttps://www.intersectionstulsa.com/musings-from-the-territory-25/when-you-begin-to-notice

this is a found map that lends itself to a simple interpretation of place. its rawness speaks to me as i incorporate tape in my hand-drawn maps as well. below is a simple study of 'tree', not a literal rendering but a drawing imbued with my interpretation of the natural energy that is imbued within.

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