Holmes Peak: The Master, The Hill and The Osage
Holmes Peak, as seen from the Post Oak Lodge in northwest Tulsa.
Dick Warner atop Holmes Peak.
Shan Grey's The American, seen as a model here in 2004, was planned to stand atop Holmes Peak, but it has never been erected.
|
By Brian Wilson Afghanistan Perceivers Privy Council member The syllogism is easy. If Irene Adler is known in the Sherlockian world as (using Holmes’s own words) The Woman … and if the followers of the world’s greatest consulting detective often call him The Master, then it stands to reason that a certain piece of high ground in southeastern Osage County, Oklahoma, could be called The Hill. The topography is non-descript, even by Oklahoma standards. It’s just one of many undulating, treeless elements of the Osage Hills, just 2 kilometers from Tulsa’s northwestern outskirts. The hill, sitting at an elevation of 314 meters (1,030 feet) above sea level, has a modest rise of about 80 meters (262 feet); nothing sets it apart from the other brush-covered, largely barren hills and dales in the area – except for one anomaly. This is the only geographic formation on Earth named for Sherlock Holmes. The moon has Sherlock Crater, about a kilometer from the 1972 landing site of Apollo 17. In our galaxy, just two designations honor the man chronicled by John H. Watson in scores of short stories. Tulsan Dick Warner, a prominent figure in the first 20 years of the Afghanistan Perceivers, spent many months in the early 1980s researching the hill, privately owned (not Osage-owned) for decades and with unofficial nicknames such as Old Baldy. With ceaseless prodding and cajoling of various officials, he successfully petitioned the U.S. Geological Survey to name it Holmes Peak on 5th Oct. 1984. While Warner is often tongue-in-cheek with his 1985 Guidebook and Instructions for the Ascent of Holmes Peak, he does present the bare facts to start: “Holmes Peak, located at 36° 12’ 26” N, 96° 02’ 56” W, can be found in the northeast quarter of the southwest quarter of Section 17, Township 20 N, Range 12 E of the Indian Meridian in Osage County, Oklahoma. Holmes Peak appears on the 1:24,000 U.S. Topographical Map labeled Sand Springs, Oklahoma.” (One can find Warner’s entire guidebook via the button to the top-left.) Warner spells out how the hill became dispossessed from the Osage people. “The immediate area around Holmes Peak was alloted to a member of the Osage Tribe, but, as the result of a marriage to a non-Indian [early in the 20th century], the land came into the hands of a part-Indian family who ultimately owned thousands of acres of land in the area,” he writes. “Holmes Peak remained in the [private] hands of this family until 1982, when it was bequeathed [upon the death of the land owner] to the University of Tulsa, Oral Roberts University and the Catholic Diocese of Tulsa.” Michael Hardwick wrote the forward to Warner’s humorous, informative guidebook. In January 1986, his article “Footnote Holmes on the Range” appeared in the Washington Post, in which he describes Warner’s two-year trudge toward Holmes Peak becoming official. The University of Tulsa and ORU had no trouble with naming the hill after The Master. The hang-up was with the Catholic Church. “The bishop of Tulsa [Eusebius Joseph Beltran] found the idea frivolous and vetoed it,” Hardwick writes. “Warner wrote to the pope [John Paul II]. In case His Holiness might have gone a trifle rusty on a particular aspect of hagiology, he was reminded that in 1890 [in The Hound of the Baskervilles] Sherlock Holmes had obliged a predecessor of his in a matter of some missing cameos. “If he did not do so, Warner might well have pointed also to the common ground of papal infallibility and Holmes's conceit of himself as ‘the last and highest court of appeal in detection.’ “Instead of a note of thanks and benediction, the Vatican's reply came in the form of a bull to the bishop of Tulsa, who, not unnaturally, protested at the matter having been carried above his head. At the same time, he conceded that the diocese's one-third interest in the land had recently been made over to the two other owners [the University of Tulsa and ORU].” Possession of Holmes Peak can be a sore point, especially given the Reign of Terror inflicted on the Osage people during the 1920s and 1930s by greedy, insidious whites; those murders for money are recounted in David Grann’s book Killers of the Flower Moon and depicted in Martin Scosese’s film of the same name. Julita Fenneuff of the Sherlockian.net website, in “Why Holmes Peak in Tulsa, OK, Isn’t So Okay,” writes of Warner’s and the Afghanistan Perceivers’ links to the hill, which she describes as “boring to anyone without mild interest in the famous fictional detective.” Her essay concludes: “Holmes lovers should acknowledge that the slope dedicated to their favorite detective does, in fact, reside on tribal land. The blatant disrespect of minority groups is nothing new to either the Sherlock canon or the fandom….” Dean Clark, a founding member of the Perceivers in 1974 with his longtime friend Warner, notes that the Tulsa group has had solid relations with tribal citizens through the decades. “The American Indian Theatre Company of Oklahoma once did a Sherlock Holmes play and the actor playing Holmes in that play participated in the Perceivers’ Christmas float circa 1990,” Clark says. Warner’s dry wit is evident from the start of the guidebook about the Osage County hill. Declaring himself to be Head Sherpa, he states the Holmes Peak Preservation Society, “formed by members of the Afghanistan Perceivers and The John H. Watson’s Elder Brother Society [now defunct], defends and protects Holmes Peak and provides aid and assistance to those who visit this historic site.” The Afghanistan Perceivers today, along with the small, re-formed group called the Elder Brothers of John H. Watson Society, fully acknowledge and denounce the exploitation and killings of Osage people during that dark time in Oklahoma’s history. No one in either group seeks to defend and protect Holmes Peak. Plus, the current owner of the hill does not allow public access to it. Fenneuff and several media outlets have reported on the desire of Osage sculptor Shan Grey to erect a 21-story monument on Holmes Peak to honor his tribe and other indigenous peoples. Grey announced his plans in 2004. “[The] 217-foot-tall bronze statue of a Native American with an eagle taking flight from his right arm [would be] accompanied by an observation deck for visitors,” Fenneuff writes. “[It was] expected to stand about 60 feet taller than the Statue of Liberty, [making it the] tallest free-standing bronze statue in the world. It was estimated to cost around $26 million.” However, full funding has never happened, so The American, as Grey’s sculpture would be called, remains a dream. |