At the age of 20, she married Kansas City businessman Kenneth Campbell and the couple hosted such local royalty as Joe Louis, Duke Ellington and Count Basie in their mansion. They divorced in 1930 and Rector remarried in 1934. Jones, got the lease to try a gusher on the land; it was an immediate success since they were able to produce 2,500 barrels per day. In late August 1913, B.B. Mansa Musa I: The Richest Man In History Was An African King, Not Jeff Bezos. This is Sarah Rector, she said. According to historian Tonya Bolden in her biography Searching for Sarah Rector: The Richest Black Girl in America, Jefferson had been the familys benefactor for years and long before there was any probability of them every having money.. Each member of the Rector family received a 160-acre allotment of rocky, unproductive land deemed unsuitable for farming. Had the U.S. government known at the time what flowed beneath Sarahs rocky acres, they likely would have reconsidered. At age 20, Rector married Kansas City businessman Kenneth Campbell and had three sons. The Hall & Oates tour begins on August 5 in Mansfield, Mass. Sarah Rector moved to Kansas City in 1917, where she finished high school and stayed for the rest of her life. Sarah Ferguson says the late Queen was her 'total idol' and 'put you at ease straightaway' - and admits when her corgis 'bark at nothing' she 'believes it's the monarch Of course, Brown has no memory of Rector spending anything. The retired phys ed teacher had traveled from Kansas City to Maryland with her partner to coach a womens softball tournament. When Sarah reached legal age, a judge found her mentally sound and capable of managing her own affairs. Who is the first richest woman in the world? [14], Soon after moving to Kansas City, when she was 17 or 18, she married local businessman Kenneth Campbell in 1920. They divorced in 1930 and Rector remarried in 1934. Sara Recor is an American personality. She is Mick Fleetwood's ex-wife. They got married in 1988 in Malibu, California and separated after 4 years in 1992. When Mick Fleetwood married Sara Recor on April 24, 1988 in a lavish ceremony at their Malibu home, it was an affair to remember. By the time she was 11, her portion of the familys land was earning more than 300,000 a year, drawing both suitors and global attention despite her age. An earlier version of this article incorrectly spelled the name of Muskogee County. Connecting oklahoma's electric cooperative communities. By October 1913, 11-year-old Sarah received $11,567 in royalties from the gusher. For a hundred years, these photos have depicted Sarah Rector, the Richest Black Girl in America. Meanwhile, Chinas state-run media portrays China as acting as a good faith peacemaker. With an estimated net worth of $177 billion, he is the richest person in the world. This caused National African American leaders Booker T. Washington and W. E. B. When his people were forced west of the Mississippi by the U.S. government, the chief took his enslaved workers with him. She never managed to recover all that wealth, though she lived comfortably for the rest of her life until the age of 65. The parcel allotted to Sarah Rector was located in Glenpool, 60 miles (97km) from where she and her family lived. The White-owned newspapers, seemingly unconstrained by facts and at times human decency, were openly racist in their coverage. Who is the richest black actor in the world? Many stores, including Emery, Bird, Thayer & Co., would close down and allow the Rector women to shop freely. Cover photo: These photos are commonly used when telling the story of Sarah Rector, however her descendants claim these are not her. The couple had three sons before divorcing in 1930. But will go back to this in a moment. 1886), and by 1907, they were living in a two-room cabin outside of Taft, population 250, on Roses land allotment. Meet Sarah Rector, the 11-Year-Old Who Became The Richest Black Girl in America in 1913. A horse and buggy were purchased to spare the children the two-mile trek to school. It was considered inferior infertile soil, not suitable for farming, with better land being reserved for white settlers and members of the tribe. Jones produced a gusher on the land. Her issues with disputed guardianship continued in Kansas City, In response to DuBoiss inquiry, Judge Leahy wrote a letter to the famous Black intellectual with a frank accounting of spending on Rectors behalf: $54,490 in eight months. Both of Sarahs grandfathers had fought with the Union Army during the Civil War, and when Indian Territory became Oklahoma in 1907 the Dawes Allotment Act divided Creek lands among tribal members and their former slaves. BLACK ENTERPRISE is the premier business, investing, and wealth-building resource for African Americans. By then, Rector owned stocks and bonds, a boarding house, a bakery and the Busy Bee Caf in Muskogee, Okla. Rector, with the familys signature round face, looked nothing like the girl with the more angular chin in the picture, said Brown, who first caught sight of the photo online in 2010. She owned stocks, bonds, a boarding house, businesses, and a 2,000-acre piece of prime river bottomland. Certainly, the spending coupled with what Brown believes was little understanding of managing money didnt help. Very interesting thank you. 1878) met and married Rose Jackson (b. But she had also intentionally chosen to omit Pope-Turnbos role.. At that time, it was required by law that all Native Americans and Black citizens from Indian Territories with relatively significant property and wealth had to be assigned a well-respected white guardian to be able to keep making business. It included five tribes who were relocated by the U.S. government using a combination of bribery and force from their former homelands in the Southeast to what would become Oklahoma so that new white settlers could take over their rich land. At 18, Rector came fully into her wealth, free now of guardians. In October 1914, Rector enrolled at the Childrens House, a boarding school for teens at Tuskegee Institute. It wasnt until Brown was in her late teens after Rector died in 1967 at the age of 65 that Brown realized Aunt Sister had indeed been rich. Rectors father leased Sarahs portion of the land to a Pittsburgh oil company in 1911, primarily to pay a yearly $30 tax bill. The Rector children attended school in Taft, an all-Black town. Her last stop in Kansas City was none other than the old Rector Mansion, now a funeral home. Mollie McQueen, Sarahs paternal great-great-grandmother, was enslaved by Creek Chief Opothleyahola in Alabama. Who is the youngest richest woman in the world? Sarah Rector was born in 1902 near the all-black town of Taft, located in the eastern portion of Oklahoma, in what was then Indian Territory. Her mother insisted that older sister Becky go along to ensure her younger sister was tended to. The two photos side-by-side, one of a child in a plaid dress and the other of a woman with her hair pulled simply back, have been timelessly interpreted to be the richest black girl in America, Sarah Rector the very same Sarah Rector who lived out the majority of her life in Kansas City. Browns mother insisted, too. In fact, Sarahs parents had selected Porter as guardian of their daughters wealth, and he received only 2% of her total income. His petition was denied because of certain restrictions placed on the land, so he was required to continue paying the taxes. They had a lavish life and were part of the elite of the time. Newspaper articles about Sarah Rector spread throughout America and were filled with the casual racism of the era. He focused on real estate development and his car dealership at 18th and Vine. BE 100s Her grandparents had been enslaved by Creek Indians and freed after the Civil War. Sarahs experiences encouraged officials in Oklahoma to provide badly needed protection for children caught up in the oil boom, especially Black and indigenous children who became targets of unscrupulous men attempting to snatch their money. By the time she turned 18, Rector was worth an estimated $1 million, or about $11 million today. At the height of her wealth, Sarah owned Rector Mansion, a large stone house on East 12th Street in Kansas City, and the entire block surrounding it. Now, as mentioned, as Sarahs wealth kept growing, so did her fame. Please be sure to open and click your first newsletter so we can confirm your subscription. While living on Creek Indian land, Rectors parents Joseph and Rose were given hundreds of acres thought to be useless in 1907. With all the attention surrounding her wealth, eventually Sarah Rector attracted the attention of another type of man: one who did not see black or white so much as green. Newspaper articles reporting Sarahs rags to riches story and the NAACP investigation sparked a number of international marriage proposals when Sarah was just 13, some from white men seeking to control her growing oil empire. She had three boys. 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In 1913, an oil driller discovered a gusher that produced a reported 2,500 barrels per day. Her parents, Joseph Rector and his wife, Rose McQueen (both born 1881) were African descendants of the Creek Nation Creek Indians before the Civil war. Sarah Rector was 11 when oil was discovered on her land in Oklahoma in 1913. 1901), Sarah (b. And, perhaps most remarkably for the time, Sarah Rector was able to keep just about all her money. We cant prove with absolute certainty to everybody that its not her, Brown said, because there are no childhood photos that exist for comparison. Im not going to leave them so they can sit on someones desk, Brown said. Du Bois to become concerned about her welfare. Jeff Bezos is the founder of both Amazon, the worlds largest retailer, and Blue Origin. Nicks herself had an affair with Mick Fleetwood in early 1978 while he was married to Jenny Boyd. She and Kenneth Campbell had three sons, Kenneth Jr., Leonard, and Clarence. For their part, Black-owned newspapers, including the influential Chicago Defender, speculated anxiously that Rectors White guardian was taking advantage of her and shortchanging her education. It is important to hear from those directly concerned, rather than base research solely on archival material like newspaper clippings. [3] Rector and her family relocated to Kansas City, Missouri, and settled in a large stone American foursquare home located at 2000 East 12th Street that still stands today. When the Indian territory where Rector was born became Oklahoma in 1907, the federal government granted each member of the Creek Nation a land allotment, including descendants of people enslaved by the Nation like four-year-old Sarah Rector. Joe wasnt in the best of health, but when a friend from back home named Jim Manuel was serving time in the penitentiary, he contacted Joe and claimed to have property in Mexico that had been found to have oil on it. Kansas City, Missouri The family didnt leave Kansas City as some like to report; five generations of Rector descendants still call this place home. B. Jones produced a gusher that brought in 2500 barrels a day. A typical cabin for Creek Freedmen on Muscogee (Creek) Nation land in Oklahoma, similar to where Sarah Rector would have been born. Jones produced a gusher on her land that brought in 2,500 barrels or 105,000 gallons per day. Oil Made Pickaninny Rich blared a headline in The Washington Post, which described Rector in 1914 as an orphan, crude, Black and uneducated, yet worth more than $4,000,000.. That equates to $7,000 $8,000 today. By the time Sarah was 18, she was worth well over one million dollars. Of course, there was a trick in this Act, and black children were simply granted the worst parts of the land; generally rocky and infertile soil so the good allotments could be granted to white settlers and distinctive members of the Indian tribe as it had been agreed upon. She divorced Campbell and married restaurant owner She eventually left Tuskegee with her family and moved toKansas City, Missouri, where she bought agrand home that still stands today. While lands granted to former slaves were usually rocky and infertile, Rectors allotment from the Creek Indian Nation was located in the middle of the Glenn Pool oil field and was initially valued at $556.50. The newspaper published an article claiming that her estate was being mismanaged by her family and that she was uneducated, and had a poor quality of life. In 1887, the state declared the Dawes Allotment Act, which established that all Creek Freedmen minors had to be granted land. However her descendants claim these are not her im not going to leave them so they can sit on desk. City was none other than the old Rector Mansion, now a home. Mansfield, Mass research solely on archival material like newspaper clippings Sarahs rocky acres, they likely have... 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