John Joseph Mathews John Joseph Mathews ( c . 1894 – 1979 ) became one of the Osage Nation ' s most important spokespeople and writers , and served on the Osage Tribal Council during the 1930s . He studied at the University of Oklahoma , Oxford University and the University of Geneva after serving as a flight instructor during World War I . Matthews ' first book was " Wah ' kon - tah : The Osage and The White Man ' s Road " ( 1929 ) , which was selected by the Book - of - the - Month Club as their first by an academic press ; it became a bestseller . His book " The Osages : Children of the Middle Waters " ( 1961 ) was a life work , preserving many collected stories and the oral history of the Osage . Early life and education . Mathews was born at Pawhuska , Oklahoma as the only son among five children of William Shirley and Eugenia ( Girard ) Mathews . His banker father was the son of John Allan Mathews , a noted trader , and Sarah Williams , the mixed - race daughter of " A - Ci ' n - Ga , " a full - blood Osage , and " Old Bill " Williams , a noted missionary and later Mountain Man who lived with the Osage . Mathews grandparents had met in Kentucky where " Old Bill " Williams had sent his daguthers for school after A - Ci ' n - Ga had died . John Joseph Mathews ' mother was Pauline Eugenia Girard , whose family had emigrated from France . One - eighth Osage by ancestry , as well as Anglo - Scots - Irish and French , the Mathews children all attended local schools in Pawhuska . Service in World War I came before college , and John Mathews became a flight instructor and second lieutenant after time in the cavalry . Afterward , he went on to the University of Oklahoma , then studied at his own expense at Oxford University in England , graduating in 1923 . He studied international relations at the University of Geneva and traveled in Africa before returning to the United States , determined to study the culture and traditions of the Osage . Marriage and family . In 1924 in Geneva , Mathews married Virginia Winslow Hopper . They first settled in California , where they had two children , John and Virginia . The couple divorced . After returning to Oklahoma , where he stayed the rest of his life , Mathews married Elizabeth Hunt in 1945 . She worked with him on much of his research related to the Osage and their forced migration from Missouri to Oklahoma . He considered her son John Hunt a stepson . Career . After his return to Oklahoma , Mathews began writing in the late 1920s and published his first book , a work of literary non - fiction , " Wah ' kon - tah : The Osage and The White Man ' s Road " ( 1932 ) , with the University of Oklahoma Press . The first work by an academic press to be selected by the new Book - of - the - Month Club , the book became a bestseller through that secondary publication . His most famous work is " Sundown " ( 1934 ) , his only novel . The semi - autobiographical work is about Challenge " Chal " Windzer , a young Osage . After leaving home to study at the University of Oklahoma and serve in the military , Chal feels estranged when he returns to his tribal community . He suffers from alienation and hopelessness as his life takes a downward swerve . The novel is set during the turbulence of the oil boom that took place on Osage land in Oklahoma beginning in the first two decades of the 20th century , bringing great wealth to the people who had headrights . It depicts the frictions within the tribal community resulting from the bonanza , as well as the swindles and numerous murders of Osage during the 1920s as white opportunists tried to get control of the Osage headrights . During the 1930s and the Great Depression , Mathews was politically active within the Osage Nation . As the people took advantage of the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934 and the Oklahoma Indian Welfare Act , Mathews helped the Osage Nation restore its self - government . He was elected to the Tribal Council , serving from 1934 - 1942 . He helped found the Osage Tribal Museum , which opened in 1938 in Pawhuska . In 1940 , Mathews served as the United States representative to the " Indians of the Americas Conference " at Michoacan , Mexico . From 1939 - 1940 he lived and studied in Mexico on a Guggenheim Fellowship . Later , he concentrated again on his writing . His work " Talking to the Moon " ( 1945 ) is a narrative of the ten years he spent in the " blackjacks " of his homeland , observing nature and reflecting on the influence of the environment on Osage culture . It is a combination of autobiography , philosophical treatise and the work of an amateur naturalist . Some critics compared it to Henry David Thoreau ' s " Walden " among that author ' s works . In " The Osages : Children of the Middle Waters " ( 1961 ) , Mathews combined his research with many oral histories collected from his people , as a way of preserving and interpreting their common culture . His " Life and Death of an Oilman : The Career of E . W . Marland " ( 1951 ) was his only biography ; it recounts a notable figure of the oil boom who also served as governor of the state .