I like musicals. I admit it. A rush of emotions come over me whenever I can sense a big song and dance number is about to occur. But not all musicals are created equal. Though I’d received the VHS as a holiday present from my sister one year, I’d never liked “Oklahoma!”

The first collaboration between the famed composer/lyricist duo, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, the 1955 movie version was too hokey, too over-the-top, and too gosh-durn-golly-gee for my tastes.

But when I returned from Tahlequah, Okla., where I had traveled for the December ASBJ cover story, “Trail to Progress,” the first thing I did was pop the tape into the machine. It was still annoying and I still fast-forwarded through most of the musical numbers. But it was fascinating, too, as I watched it with new eyes and new knowledge.

Set in 1906, just a year before Oklahoma became a state, the musical was supposed to imbue the hope and excitement of the new settlers trying to make a life for themselves in this new territory.

Not once, however, were American Indians mentioned or even seen--- a major omission considering how the federal government had forcibly moved numerous tribes and thousands of their members into the area, with promises that the territory would be their’s forever, only to buckle beneath pressure from land-hungry prospectors.

History books have long been decried for their imbalanced recounting of significant events and facts of the past, especially as it relates to Native Americans. And it seems Broadway musicals, as long as they are, are also guilt of the same thing.

Naomi Dillon, Senior Editor