By RayJaun Stelly, The Seattle Medium
In the early 20th century, Sarah Rector was a young African American girl who became known as the “richest colored girl in the world.” Her story of sudden wealth and success is both inspiring and complex, highlighting the challenges faced by people of color and Native Americans during this time period.
Rector was born on March 3, 1902, to Joseph and Rose Rector in a two-room cabin near Twine, Oklahoma, on Muscogee Creek Indian allotment land. Thanks to the Dawes Allotment Act in 1907, which divided Creek lands among the Creeks and their former slaves, Rector’s family received land, and Rector’s portion was 160 acres valued at $556.50.
Having land was the easy part for Rector, but she had to maintain enough revenue to pay the $30 annual tax bill that came around every year. Her father, Joseph, leased Rector’s allotment to the Devonian Oil Company from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, beginning Rector’s journey to millionaire status.
In 1913, Rector became financially stable, receiving an income of $300 a day, when a wildcat oil driller named B.B Jones produced a gusher on her land that brought in 2,500 barrels a day. Rector’s allotment was part of the Cushing-Drumright Field in Oklahoma, and in October of that year, she made a staggering $11,567 in income.
From that first gusher, she stood to make more than $114,000 per year, which is nearly $3 million in today’s dollars. Based on her allotment bringing in a substantial amount of money, Rector’s identity was made public, and numerous offers started to pour in. She received numerous requests for loans, money gifts, and marriage proposals despite just being 12 years old at the time.
Despite her wealth, Rector faced many challenges. She was still a young girl and had to navigate the complexities of being a member of a Native American tribe during a time when the government was trying to assimilate Indigenous people into mainstream American culture. She also faced discrimination because of her race, even though she was one of the wealthiest people in the country.
To protect Rector’s interests, her parents decided to move the family to Kansas City, Missouri, where they could live a more private life while investing her money in real estate. By the time she was 18 and finished school at the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, Rector owned stocks and bonds, a boarding house and bakery, the Busy Bee Café in Oklahoma, and 2,000 acres of prime river bottomland.
Later on, Rector moved into a home that would be deemed the “Rector Mansion,” where she started her own family, having three children. Despite being publicized and criticized for her “extravagant” spending, her investments and wealth continued to accrue throughout the 1920s.
Deborah Jean Brown, a niece of Rector’s, expressed, “She lived a life of luxury. She had money coming in, and she did whatever she pleased with it.”
Donna Brown Thompkins, another of Rector’s nieces, stated, “I remember the fancy cars she had, big fancy Cadillacs. I remember her coming to the house, and they’d play cards and sit around and have fun. They would close Emery, Bird and Thayer down, downtown, because we (African Americans) couldn’t go in there and try on clothes. But they closed it down for her to shop.”
Despite what people may have thought about her personal spending, Rector also used her wealth to support various causes, including the NAACP and the Tuskegee Institute. She also helped fund a local hospital and a church in her hometown of Taft, Oklahoma.
Despite her wealth, Rector’s life was not without hardship. She faced several lawsuits and legal challenges, including a case brought by the state of Oklahoma that claimed she was incompetent and needed a guardian to manage her money. She fought back against these challenges and eventually won the case, demonstrating her intelligence and business savvy.
Rector’s story is a remarkable one, not only because of her wealth but also because of the obstacles she faced as a young Black and Indigenous woman during a time of great racial tension in the United States. She was able to use her wealth to support causes she believed in and make a difference in the lives of those around her.
Although over time her wealth would diminish due to The Great Depression, she still had working oil wells and real estate holdings up until her death in July of 1967 at the age of 65.
