As I'm sure you've noticed by now, Sterlin Harjo's The Lowdown is in full swing.
In it, we watch Lee Raybon, Tulsa's "Truthstorian," barrel through town, discovering secrets and upsetting decades-old balances of power. The character Lee is inspired by the real Lee Roy Chapman, a journalist, archivist and former colleague of Harjo's at This Land Press, who lived and worked in Tulsa in the early 2000s.
Lee dedicated his life to uncovering Tulsa's "public secrets," which was a term he coined to describe the historical truths that many Tulsans would prefer to have kept hidden. He started the Center for Public Secrets, which carries this legacy on today.
And while Lee was well-known for the stories he reported in print for This Land, he was also an onscreen talent, driving around Tulsa in his white van as he investigated "the hidden and neglected histories of Tulsa, Oklahoma." Here's a selection of eight of the videos in his Public Secrets series that he produced for This Land.
Let's go back to 1978, when Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols punched a hole through the Cain's Ballroom wall, leaving an indelible impression:
In this three-part series, Chapman dives into Gaylord Herron's Vagabond, the 1975 book considered a "forgotten masterwork."
Chapman went to Okemah, Oklahoma, the birthplace of Woody Guthrie, to explore Guthrie's life story and reflect on some of his formative experiences:
Here's the story that made Chapman's career. Tate Brady, a Tulsa founder whose name dotted the city's street and businesses, was found to be a Ku Klux Klan member who took part in the Tulsa Outrage and the Tulsa Race Massacre.
"That's a Joe Brainard; it should be in a museum!" Lee Raybon's love of Brainard didn't come from nowhere. Here, Lee Roy Chapman takes us into the story of Tulsa's painter-poet.
Lee Roy gives Cuban-American artist Jose Antonio Pantoja Hernandez a driving lesson in his van, learning his story along the way.
