𝗢𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗱𝗮𝘁𝗲, 𝟭𝟬𝟮 𝘆𝗲𝗮𝗿𝘀 𝗮𝗴𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗸𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗼𝗳 𝗕𝗲𝗻 𝗔𝘃𝗮𝗻𝘁: 𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗙𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿 𝗼𝗳 𝗮 𝗧𝗼𝘄𝗻 𝗙𝗲𝗹𝗹 𝗼𝗻 𝗶𝘁𝘀 𝗦𝗾𝘂𝗮𝗿𝗲

On August 28, 1923, tragedy struck the town of Avant, Oklahoma, when its namesake and founder, Ben Franklin Avant, was shot down on the very square that had once been part of his homestead. The man who pulled the trigger was City Marshal Homer Penequine, a controversial lawman with a checkered past.

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗠𝗮𝗻 𝗕𝗲𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗧𝗼𝘄𝗻

Ben Avant was no ordinary settler. Born in Gonzales, Texas, he first visited Osage County in 1892 and returned three years later to make it his home. In 1895, he married Rosalie Rogers, an Osage-Cherokee woman, and together they began ranching on her Osage allotment lands. Avant quickly became a respected figure in the community, not only for his ranching but also for his service as a deputy sheriff.

When the Midland Valley Railroad pushed through the region, Avant’s ranch became the nucleus of a new settlement. In 1904, the post office was established, and in 1905, the town was officially incorporated as Avant, in his honor. What began as open pastureland grew into a bustling oil boomtown, with banks, stores, and automobiles crowding streets that had once seen only horses and wagons.

But for Avant, some habits remained unchanged. He still preferred his horse, and when he rode into town on that late August day in 1923, he expected to hitch his reins to the corner post—just as he had done a quarter-century earlier.

𝗖𝗹𝗮𝘀𝗵 𝗼𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝗾𝘂𝗮𝗿𝗲

Times had changed, however, and automobiles now dominated the public square. Marshal Homer Penequine ordered Avant not to tie his horse there, threatening him with arrest. The two men exchanged heated words. According to witnesses, Penequine even searched Avant for weapons before the argument seemed to cool. The two shook hands, and Avant rode back toward his home.

But the dispute was not over. Within the hour, Avant returned to town, riding south along Main Street before turning west onto Broadway. He looped back east on Broadway, then turned north again onto Main, as if deliberately circling the square to make his point. At the northwest corner of Main and Broadway, he dismounted and led his horse to the curb. Bending over, he began hitching his reins by pinning them beneath a sandstone rock.

As he straightened up, Penequine stepped forward from a few feet away. The marshal spoke only two words—“Mr. Avant—”—before drawing his revolver and firing. Three bullets struck the 55-year-old rancher, killing him almost instantly in the street of the town that bore his name.

𝗖𝗶𝘁𝗶𝘇𝗲𝗻𝘀 𝗧𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝗔𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻

The shooting stunned the town. Avant was not just another resident—he was its founder, a pioneer whose name the place carried. Outrage spread quickly through the crowd that gathered in the square. Feeling ran high, and most of the citizens sided with Avant.

Rather than let the marshal slip away, angry townspeople seized Penequine on the spot. They placed him under guard and escorted him to Pawhuska, where they delivered him to Sheriff Charles Musselwhite at the Osage County Jail. A charge of murder was formally lodged against him, ensuring the matter would be tried in court.

𝗣𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗾𝘂𝗶𝗻𝗲’𝘀 𝗗𝗮𝗿𝗸 𝗣𝗮𝘀𝘁

If Ben Avant’s legacy was that of a respected pioneer and lawman, Homer Penequine’s reputation leaned toward suspicion and notoriety. The 32-year-old marshal had only recently arrived in Avant from Okmulgee County, where his law enforcement career had already unraveled. His deputy sheriff’s commission there was revoked by order of Governor Jack C. Walton following a state military investigation into mob violence and masked night-riding—an echo of the Ku Klux Klan’s influence that unsettled Oklahoma in the early 1920s.

Even before that, Penequine’s name had surfaced in connection with bloodshed. In 1922, he was arrested for murder in the shooting death of Tom Boggus at Spelter City, Okmulgee County. Boggus had been gunned down by a band of masked men, and several witnesses placed Penequine among them. Though he was released after a preliminary hearing, the stain of the accusation clung to him. Newspapers piled on, remarking that “Penequine previously worked at Sperry, where it is understood he put a couple of notches in his gun.” Whether fact or bravado, such accounts cast him as a man already too familiar with violence.

𝗧𝗿𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗖𝗼𝗻𝘃𝗶𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻

The killing of Ben Avant sent shockwaves through Osage County, and when the case reached the courtroom, it became one of the county’s most closely watched trials. Prosecutors painted Homer Penequine as a reckless lawman who had gunned down an unarmed community leader in cold blood. Avant, they argued, posed no immediate danger; his only offense was insisting on tying his horse where automobiles now ruled.

The defense countered that Avant had returned armed and had attempted to draw his weapon, leaving the marshal no choice but to fire first. Witnesses were divided, some insisting Avant carried a revolver that day, others swearing he had none.

In the end, the jury refused to convict Penequine of murder but found him guilty of first-degree manslaughter in December 1924. He was sentenced to five years in the state penitentiary. A juror later admitted that what swayed the panel was not just testimony, but the unsettling detail that Penequine’s revolver grip bore two carved notches, which the jury interpreted as grim reminders of past killings.

Penequine appealed, but the Oklahoma Criminal Court of Appeals upheld the conviction, ruling that he had overstepped his authority when he fired the fatal shots that ended Avant’s life.

Yet prison would not hold him for long. On April 9, 1928, Governor Henry S. Johnston granted Penequine parole after he had served only a portion of his sentence. The parole order stretching more than fifteen pages, the longest of its kind filed during Johnston’s administration, was backed by influential voices, including Miller D. Hay, Chief Inspector, and R. L. Seaman, Secretary of the State Highway Commission. Their recommendations, combined with Penequine’s political connections, won him early release.

By the time he walked free, Homer Penequine’s reputation was cemented. To many, he was not remembered as a marshal, but as a man whose badge had become a shield for violence—a gunman who killed the founder of the very town he was sworn to protect.

𝗟𝗲𝗴𝗮𝗰𝘆 𝗼𝗳 𝗮 𝗙𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿’𝘀 𝗗𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗵

The killing of Ben Avant marked a bitter turning point in the history of the community he helped establish. The man who had brought his family to the Osage Hills, who had married into the Osage people, and whose ranch became the foundation of a town, was struck down in its streets—ironically by the very forces of law and order he once represented.

For the people of Avant, the memory of their founder’s death is inseparable from the town’s origins. What began as a pioneer’s dream ended in a violent clash over something as simple as hitching a horse, a conflict between old ways and new.

Even today, Avant, Oklahoma, carries the name of the man whose life—and whose death—shaped its story. … See MoreSee Less