Fred Lookout

Who was Fred Lookout?

Fred Lookout was a leader of the Osage Nation of Native Americans.

Lookout was born near what's now Independence, Kansas, and raised by his paternal grandmother, as his mother died when he was still an infant. He was selected by the Osage's government agent to attend the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, which he did from 1879 to 1884; in 1884 he returned to the reservation upon the death of his father, and refused to return to the school. He married Julia Pryor and settled as a farmer near Pawhuska.

Lookout entered tribal politics in 1908, winning election as assistant principal chief; he didn't run for reelection in 1910. In 1914 he was appointed principal chief by U.S. Secretary of the Interior Walter L. Fisher, replacing Bacon Rind, who was removed amidst a scandal involving oil leases. He lost his reelection attempt later that year, but won a two-year term as principal chief in 1916. Thereafter, he served on the tribal council from 1920 to 1922, and then served a remarkably long third stint as principal chief, from 1926 to his death in 1949.