Pod Insights Infamous America ENCORE: OSAGE MURDERS Ep. 2 | “Reign of Terror” About this episode The Osage and local lawmen began to investigate the first two murders, but their efforts produced few results. The Osage were scared and frustrated, and the body count started to rise at an appalling rate. The second half of 1922 was the deadliest period to date, but it would be surpassed in 1923.
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1:08 Speaker 01 Oklahoma has a long and colorful history of crime. It was created as a territory for the five Native American tribes who suffered through the Trail of Tears in the 1830s. The Creek, Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, and Seminole tribes marched at gunpoint from their homes in the southeastern United States to a new territory north of Texas. The land featured rocky, rolling hills in some places, and flat, desolate prairie in others. Alcohol was outlawed in the territory, which meant illegal whiskey operations immediately sprang to life. Bootleggers made good livings by taking illegal alcohol into the territory in the Old West era, and they continued to do so well into the 20th century,
1:52 Speaker 01 especially in the 1920s during prohibition. Indian Territory, as it was originally called, was the perfect hideout for outlaws of the Old West, like the infamous Dalton Gang. There were bank robberies, stagecoach robberies, train robberies, and shootouts on a regular basis. To try to stop these activities, a new breed of lawman emerged. He was part tracker, part investigator, and part gunfighter. The men who became legends for their work in the Territory were usually US Marshals, like Bass Reeves or Bill Tillman. Many began their careers as sheriffs or rangers down in Texas before moving north to bring
2:32 Speaker 01 law and order to the area that was known as Oklahoma Territory by 1890. By the early 1920s, as the Osage started to wonder who would be the next victim, the Al Spencer Gang prowled the hills of Oklahoma and robbed and killed seemingly at will. At the same time, a young man named Charles Floyd was striking out on his own from his family's farm in eastern Oklahoma. Shortly after he began his career as a bank robber, he was gifted the nickname "Pretty Boy Floyd." He became the second public enemy number one after John Dillinger, and he was a Robin Hood figure to many in Oklahoma. But no one in Osage County was concerned about the upstart bank robber with the stocky
3:17 Speaker 01 build and the wide smile. They were trying to solve the murders of Charles Whitehorn and Anna Brown, and they feared for their own loved ones. Eventually, the Osage and the US government would turn to one of those old-school frontier lawmen to try to find some justice in the murder cases. But before then, there would be more terror, and more corruption, and more false starts. New investigators joined the hunt for the killer or killers in Osage County in the fall of 1921. There were promising leads in the beginning, but in the first half of 1922, people started to die at a rate that was beyond alarming. Newspapers needed a new sensational name for what was happening in Osage County, and
4:00 Speaker 01 they eventually settled on one that has lasted for more than a hundred years. It was definitely sensational and eye-catching, but it was also accurate.
4:19 Speaker 01 From Black Barrel Media, this is Infamous America. I’m your host, Chris Wimmer. In this season, we’re telling a tragic story of conspiracy, greed, and betrayal that became known as the Osage Murders. This is episode 2, Reign of Terror. By July of 1921, the investigations into the murders of Charles Whitehorn and Anna Brown had fizzled out. They’d both been killed in mid-May, and their bodies were discovered on the same day, May 28th. The discovery of both bodies on the same day was big news for a couple days, but then, three days later, one of the darkest chapters in American history happened.
5:01 Speaker 01 Just 40 miles from the heartland of the Osage, the city of Tulsa exploded into two days of unprecedented racial violence. A mob of white citizens attacked black citizens and burned an entire neighborhood to the ground. The most common estimate says 39 people died in the two days of mayhem, 26 black and 13 white. The Tulsa Race Riot, or Tulsa Massacre as it was also called, dominated the news across the country. But in Osage County, the work continued to solve their own murders. Charles and Anna had both been shot by small-caliber pistols. Charles, twice in the forehead; Anna, once in the back of the head.
5:46 Speaker 01 The local doctors, a pair of brothers, had recovered the bullets from Charles’s body, but they couldn’t find the bullet that killed Anna. This gets a little gruesome, but there was no exit wound, which meant the bullet still had to be inside her skull. Yet the doctors claimed they couldn’t find it. After Anna was buried, there was still pressure to locate the bullet, so the doctors exhumed Anna’s body and re-examined her head. Once again, the brothers claimed the bullet wasn’t there. Not only was that critical piece of evidence missing from Anna’s case, but it could have helped in Charles Whitehorn’s case. It was possible that the same gun was used in both murders, and the same killer had fired it.
6:28 Speaker 01 But without the bullet from Anna’s body, there was no way to make a comparison. And as local law enforcement gave up on the investigation, Anna’s friends and family hired outside help. Anna had two surviving sisters, Molly and Rita. There had been a fourth sister, Minnie, but she had died of a strange illness three years earlier. The same type of illness that had just killed their mother. It was called wasting sickness, simply because the doctors didn't know what else to call it. No one knew exactly what it was, no one knew what caused it, and no one, at least publicly, knew how to treat it. Victims just grew sicker and sicker until they passed away.
7:08 Speaker 01 When Lizzie, the mother of Anna, Molly, Rita, and Minnie, died of wasting sickness shortly after Anna was buried, people started to seriously suspect that wasting sickness was caused by poison. It was certainly a more subtle approach to murder than bullets to the head. Each member of the Osage tribe had an equal share of the wealth that was available from the oil leases on their land. Whoever inherited those rights would receive a life-changing amount of money. That was powerful motivation for murder.
7:40 Speaker 01 When Charles Whitehorn, Anna Brown, and Anna's mother Lizzie all died within two months of each other, there was uproar within the Osage Nation. Local lawmen ran a poor investigation, either because of laziness or incompetence, or maybe something worse. The sheriff of Osage County was a known friend of the rich and powerful white men in the area, and he was heavily suspected of consorting with local criminals. It was very possible that he intentionally closed the cases early.
8:11 Speaker 01 So, in August of 1921, Molly Burkhardt's family hired the Burns Detective Agency to work on the case of Anna's murder. The Burns Detective Agency was similar to- The weather's getting colder, and maybe some thoughts are starting to drift in the direction of holiday gifts. Even if you're not there yet, it's still time for sweatshirts and hoodies, in most places, which I wear almost every day while I'm working. My newest purchase from Quince is the Flow Knit Performance Hybrid Pullover Hoodie. It's a long name, but it's ultra-soft, lightweight, and amazingly affordable. Three big retailers are charging $118 to $158 for the hoodie. At Quince, it's $45.
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9:25 Speaker 01 The famous and infamous Pinkerton Detective Agency. It was an organization of private detectives that was founded by the flamboyant William Burns. The New York Times newspaper once called Burns "the American Sherlock Holmes." He and his agents solved some big cases, for sure, but they were also perfectly fine with using shady or illegal methods to solve them. In late August 1921, Burns sent some undercover operatives to Osage County. And there's an important distinction to make here: these were agents from his own company. At the same time this was happening, William Burns was sworn in as the new director of the Bureau of Investigation, the forerunner to the FBI.
10:08 Speaker 01 But he didn't send federal agents, he sent his private detectives. And against the odds, they actually made some progress.
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11:03 Speaker 01 Download the Quince app for app exclusive offers. Or go to quince.com/infamousamerica. Get free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada and the UK. That's Q U I N C E dot com slash infamous America. Throughout the month of July 1921, while the murder investigations faltered and Molly Burkhart was forced to bury her mother, a trial was happening in Chicago. Eight members of the Chicago White Sox baseball team were accused of accepting bribes to lose the 1919 World Series. At the end of July, they were found not guilty and they celebrated.
11:48 Speaker 01 A few days after their acquittals, the Major League Commissioner banned them from professional baseball for life. That was historic headline news from coast to coast. But in the northeast corner of Oklahoma, people were more concerned with solving mysteries and bringing killers to justice. New undercover operatives brought new hope, and then they quickly started to build a list of suspects. Back at the top of the list was Anna's ex-husband, Oda Brown. A detective uncovered a new piece of information that seemed like it could be a break in the case. The detectives from the Burns Agency filed daily reports on their progress.
12:33 Speaker 01 And in the reports, they identified themselves by numbers rather than names. The coded entries would keep their identities secret if the reports fell into the wrong hands. Operative number 10 produced immediate results. He met with Anna's main servant and searched Anna's home. To illustrate the sloppy work of the local sheriff, operative number 10 was the first investigator to set foot in Anna's house. None of the local lawmen had bothered to check it out. The servant verified that everything was as it had been on the day Anna disappeared. Nothing had been stolen. And Anna's purse was on the floor, which seemed to verify Brian Burkhart's story of that day. Anna's sister Molly was married to Ernest Burkhart.
13:18 Speaker 01 Brian was Ernest's younger brother, and Brian had occasionally dated Anna after Anna's divorce. On the afternoon of May 21st, Molly and Ernest hosted a party. Brian left the party with Anna, and he said he dropped her at home between 4:30 and 5 o'clock that afternoon. If her purse was in the house, it seemed to verify Brian's statement. Anna had been home for some length of time after the party. Operative Number 10 then took another step that local lawmen hadn't. He checked Anna's phone records. Phone records in 1921 were just handwritten notes by the operators who manually connected each call. When the operator attempted a connection, he or she wrote it in a log.
14:03 Speaker 01 In one of the logs, there was an entry for a call to Anna's house at around 8:30 PM. Someone answered the call, and it was presumably Anna. If so, it further verified that Brian dropped her safely at home. But the call led to a mysterious dead end. The operator tracked the source of the call to a business in a nearby town, but the operators in the area had no record of the call. Half the information about the call had vanished, as if someone was trying to cover his or her tracks. The operative decided that the most likely person to have called Anna that late in the evening was her ex-husband, Oda Brown. A week later, a different operative found Oda and tried to subtly work information from him.
14:49 Speaker 01 But Oda showed no signs of guilt. He admitted to nothing, and didn't seem nervous or jittery. For the second time, investigators moved him back down the list of suspects. He didn't seem to be a killer, but his days of answering questions were still not over. At the same time, Operative Number 28 met with a young woman who had heard a tantalizing story. She had heard that a woman named Rose and her boyfriend had killed Anna. According to the story, Rose was mad at Anna because she thought Anna was trying to steal her boyfriend. So Rose and her boyfriend lured Anna into their car, shot her, and dumped her body in the ravine.
15:31 Speaker 01 Rose got blood on her clothes during the ordeal and threw them in the creek near the body. Operatives quickly followed up on the story, but they found nothing to support it. No witnesses or bloody clothing near the creek or anything else. They went so far as to install a primitive listening device in Rose's home, but all they heard was the mundane chatter of Rose and her boyfriend. After hours of listening to mind-numbing conversations, the detectives removed the device. Rose and her boyfriend hadn't said anything incriminating, and there was no evidence against them. Like Oda Brown, the heat of suspicion around them cooled, but did not die out completely.
16:14 Speaker 01 That left one more suspicious character with a checkered past: Bill Smith, Rita's husband. Molly and Rita were the two middle sisters of the four in the family. By the end of July 1921, they only had each other left. Their father had died several years ago, and their younger sister Minnie had died three years ago, in 1918. Their older sister Anna had been murdered two months ago, and their mother had just died of the mysterious wasting sickness. Bill Smith was originally married to Minnie. When she died, he married Rita. For those who wanted to be cynical and now suspicious, it looked like Bill was trying
16:59 Speaker 01 to keep himself in the family so that he could live the good life with lots of money. Molly and Rita had inherited the fortunes of their deceased parents and sisters, and now they were wealthier than ever. More than once, Bill got drunk and hit Rita. She'd threatened to leave him, but never followed through with it. And like the other suspects, there was no evidence against Bill. There weren't even any rumors to link him to the crimes. There was just his past and his proximity to the family. But since Anna's murder and Lizzie's death, Bill had worked tirelessly to help find the killer or killers. And soon enough, he would no longer be a suspect.
17:44 Speaker 01 Despite new information in the late summer and early fall of 1921, there were no major developments. The investigations once again fizzled out. Autumn came and went. The weather turned colder and winter settled onto Osage County. The calendar flipped from 1921 to 1922, and there were no breakthroughs. But on the upside, there were no new murders either, though that was about to change in a big way. On February 28, 1922, William's stepson received a phone call at his home in the town of Fairfax. William was 29 years old and a champion steer-ropers. He left home after the phone call and returned a short while later.
18:29 Speaker 01 When he did, he was visibly sick. His wife and two children were unable to help. He was in top physical condition, and yet he was dead within hours. The Osage immediately suspected poison. William had probably met someone who ever made the phone call, and the person probably fed him some poisoned whiskey. But as always, the doctors couldn't determine the cause of death. Poison was the most likely culprit, but it was technically possible that he had just consumed a really bad batch of alcohol. In the 1920s, moonshine liquor could be so toxic that it could act like poison, even if it didn't contain something extra like strychnine or arsenic. Less than a month later, it happened again.
19:15 Speaker 01 A woman died of a mysterious illness, and poison was suspected. And then another woman died, and again poison was suspected. In July of 1922, the same thing happened to Joe Bates, who was also called Joe Greyhorse. Joe reportedly drank some whiskey that he bought from a stranger, or the stranger simply gave it to him. Either way, he began frothing at the mouth and collapsed and died.
19:43 Speaker 01 By August, as more victims piled up, the Osage needed to try something new. Local lawmen had done nothing. Private detectives had started with some promising leads, but they had produced no results. Even though the man who ran the private detective agency, William Burns, was also the head of a federal law enforcement agency, the Bureau of Investigation, he sent no agents to help the Osage. So, if Washington wasn't going to go to the Osage, the Osage were going to go to Washington. They found a sympathetic ear in Barney McBride. He was a kind-hearted 55-year-old white man who had married a woman from the Creek Tribe.
20:23 Speaker 01 He was a rare commodity, an oil man who genuinely wanted to help the Osage. Barney agreed to go to Washington and to talk to some of his influential friends. He left immediately and checked into a rooming house in the capital city. That evening, or shortly thereafter, he went to a local Elks Club and played a few games of billiards. And that was the last time he was seen alive. Sometime later, when Barney left the Elks Club, he was kidnapped and driven into Maryland. He was beaten and stabbed more than 20 times and stripped naked except for his shoes and socks.
21:05 Speaker 01 His body was found in a wooded thicket near Meadows Post Office in Prince George's County. The first newspaper articles in Washington appeared on Wednesday, August 10th, and they reported that the police believed Barney had been killed sometime on Tuesday, August 9th. As the newspapers blared headlines in big, bold letters about a mutilated body, Barney had not yet been identified. Police found a label in one of his shoes that listed his last name, McBride, and a New York address. And they found a tag that displayed the initials, MCB. But that was all they knew: he was a mystery man who was referred to as McBride or MCB. The Washington Times implored its readers to solve the case.
21:50 Speaker 01 It asked for theories, and some of those theories appeared on the front page, next to one of the strangest headlines of all time. That story had no bearing on the Osage murder cases, it's just simply a crazy piece of history. The headline claimed that the Ku Klux Klan, which experienced a major resurgence in the 1920s, was thinking about a policy change. The headline read, "Ku Klux May Admit Negroes."
22:21 Speaker 01 Eventually Barney's identity and mission were uncovered, and his name was added to the growing list of fatalities connected to Osage County. Seven months later, that list grew yet again with the tragic story of Henry Roan. Henry was 40 years old, stood six feet tall, and when he was younger, he wore his hair in two long braids. There are good photos online for anyone who wants to do a quick search. Back in 1902, Molly Burkhardt and Henry Roan were married for a brief time. It was an arranged marriage. She was 15 and he was 20, and the relationship didn't last long, but apparently it was pleasant enough. They remained friends after they broke up,
23:04 Speaker 01 and a few years later, Henry married again and had children. His life began a downward spiral when he discovered that his wife was having an affair with a white man named Roy Bunch. Henry started drinking heavily, and one source reported that he and Roy Bunch were often heard threatening each other, which was no surprise. On either January 24th or 25th, Henry drove his car away from his home in Fairfax. It was reported later that he told someone, probably his wife, that he was going to the ranch of a known bootlegger named Henry Grammer to buy whiskey. When Henry Roan didn't return for dinner that night, his wife grew worried. She made phone calls to try to find him, but no one had seen him.
23:49 Speaker 01 Days passed with no sightings or communication from Henry. Then on February 6th, two men were hunting a few miles north of Fairfax, and they spotted a black Buick sitting at the end of a muddy road near the mouth of a ravine. The prairie grass was dead and brown, and two bare and scraggly trees rose up from the ravine near the car. The hunters hurried back to Fairfax and alerted the town marshal and a deputy sheriff. The marshal and the deputy drove back out to the scene and examined the car. There was a man slumped over behind the steering wheel, and they initially thought he was drunk. But when they opened the car door, they saw blood, and quickly noticed that the man had been shot in the back of the head.
24:34 Speaker 01 The gun was nowhere to be found, which further solidified the fact that the man had been murdered. The freezing cold weather had preserved the body, and they clearly recognized the dead man as Henry Roan. The lawman went back to Fairfax and notified the justice of the peace, who would organize some men to go back out to the scene and assess the situation for the coroner's inquest. The lawman also told William Hale about the death of Henry Roan. Hale was arguably the most influential man in Osage County, and he was probably Henry's closest friend. Henry had confided in Hale when he learned about his wife's affair. As a full-blood Osage, who recently had his share of problems, Henry was not allowed
25:19 Speaker 01 to manage his own money. William Hale repeatedly loaned money to Henry when Henry was in need. Now, Hale rode out to the scene of his friend's murder, and watched from a hill as the lawman, a doctor, and a few others began the investigation. William Hale was a Texas cowboy who had drifted north to Oklahoma in the late 1800s. He didn't have a penny to his name when he landed in Osage County and found work as a cowhand. He worked tirelessly through grueling conditions, and he slowly built up his bank account. Eventually, he bought his own small ranch and began his own cattle operation, but then
26:04 Speaker 01 he lost it all. He went bankrupt and had to start all over again. But the second time around, he made it work. He drove himself even harder than before, and had a zealous determination to be successful at all costs, and he was. His profits rose, and he bought land from the Osage and white settlers in the area. And by the 1920s, he was lord over forty-five thousand acres and had amassed a small fortune.
26:32 Speaker 01 He transformed himself from a dusty, sweat-soaked cowboy into a businessman. He shed the cowboy's clothes and replaced them with suits, a bow tie, a pair of glasses, and a felt hat. He became one of the most powerful men in the area, and the Osage began to call him "the king of the Osage Hills." William Hale gave generously to the Osage. He helped with medical care, which was sorely lacking on the reservation. He helped with food, and he loaned money to people like Henry Roan. Politicians courted his support. The county sheriff made him a reserve deputy. The position was mostly honorary, but it allowed him to own a badge and lead a posse
27:17 Speaker 01 if necessary. In 1912, one of Hale's nephews moved from Texas to Osage County and lived on his ranch. That nephew was Ernest Burkhardt. Ernest met Molly and became her driver. He learned the Osage language so he could talk to her, and they got married in 1917. By 1921, they had two kids, and now they had a third, a girl whom Molly named Anna after her sister. Times may have seemed good for a while, but then tragedy struck in 1918, the year after Molly and Ernest were married, when Molly's sister Minnie died. Three years later, Molly's sister Anna was murdered.
27:59 Speaker 01 William Hale was closely connected to the family, and he was a pallbearer at Anna's funeral. He pushed local lawmen and prosecutors to find Anna's killer. He hired his own private detective to work on the case, but the man failed to produce any tangible results. At the time, that wasn't unusual because no one else had produced results either. And now, two years after Anna had been murdered, and after numerous others had been killed, Hale's friend Henry Roan was dead. Hale was a pallbearer at Henry's funeral, just like he had been at Anna's. There was a big turnout for the ceremony, and everyone grieved and focused on the loss of Henry Roan for a brief moment in time.
28:42 Speaker 01 But then the fear returned. The reign of terror wasn't even close to finished. After Henry's funeral, the Osage began leaving lights on outside their homes. Electricity was still a novelty for many people in America, and now the Osage used their electric lights to drive away a darkness that was deeper than nighttime. Friends suspected friends. Neighbors suspected neighbors. Old grudges and rivalries and enemies suddenly took on new meaning. William Hale strongly believed that Roy Bunch was the primary suspect in Henry Roan's murder. There was certainly logic in that opinion. Roy was having an affair with Henry's wife, and they were openly hostile toward each other.
29:25 Speaker 01 But even if Roy Bunch had killed Henry Roan, that didn't help the other murder cases. The mysterious killers of the Osage were still out there, and they could be anyone: friends, family members, neighbors, hired gangsters, who knew? And worse than that, no one knew who the next victim might be. Sadly, it took just two months to find out, and it ended up being the most horrifying moment of the entire ordeal. And once again, it happened to Molly Burkhardt's family.
30:02 Speaker 01 Next time on Infamous America, Molly's sister Rita becomes the next target of the elusive killers. In the aftermath, the story takes a turn. Suddenly, the victims are not just members of the Osage tribe or sympathizers. It looks like the masterminds might be trying to eliminate their henchmen. There can be no loose ends, and no one can be allowed to talk. That's next week on Infamous America.
30:32 Speaker 01 Members of our Black Barrel Plus program don't have to wait week to week for new episodes. They receive the entire season to binge all at once with no commercials. And they also receive exclusive bonus episodes. Sign up now through the link in the show notes or on our website, blackbarrelmedia.com. Memberships begin at just $5 per month. Original music by Rob Valier. I'm your writer, host, and producer, Chris Wimmer. Find us at our website, blackbarrelmedia.com, or on our social media channels. We're Black Barrel Media on Facebook and Instagram, and B Barrel Media on Twitter. And you can stream all our episodes on YouTube. Just search for Infamous America Podcast. Thanks for listening.
Previous ENCORE: OSAGE MURDERS Ep. 1 | “A Body In The Dirt” Next ENCORE: OSAGE MURDERS Ep. 3 | “No Rest For The Wicked” Page updated November 5, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated