Unattended Death and Biohazard Cleanup in Skiatook, OK

Skiatook is a city straddling the line between Tulsa County and Osage County, about 20 miles northwest of Tulsa at the junction of State Highways 20 and 11.

Skiatook was founded by William C. Rogers, who later became principal chief of the Cherokee Nation - he established a trading post on the south bank of Bird Creek, and the settlement took the name Ski-a-took when a post office opened there in 1872.

The Civil War Battle of Chustenahlah was fought just west of present-day Skiatook on December 26, 1861, when Confederate forces routed Creek chief Opothleyahola's Union-aligned followers, who fled toward Kansas.

Skiatook was incorporated on May 28, 1905, just after the Midland Valley Railroad arrived in March 1905; its first newspaper, the Skiatook Sentinel, and its first school both date to 1905.

The abandoned Midland Valley rail line south of town has been converted into the Osage Prairie Trail, a 14.5-mile rail trail linking Skiatook with Tulsa.

Known as "the Gateway to the Osage," Skiatook is tied to oil and natural gas production, ranch land, tallgrass prairie and the wooded hills where the Cherokee and Osage nations meet.

Skiatook Lake, a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reservoir impounded on Hominy Creek in 1984 at a cost of roughly $120 million, gave the town its own water supply and a major recreation draw about five miles west of town.

Near Skiatook Lake stands Healing Rock, also called Tepee Rock - a stone slab twelve feet high and seventeen feet across at its base that, by legend, was leaned against by sick people seeking its healing power.

The Skiatook Museum, organized in 1976, preserves the town's history, and the town celebrated its centennial on September 17, 2005.

Skiatook had 8,450 residents in the 2020 census, up 14.2% from 7,397 in 2010, continuing a growth run that began after decades of mid-century decline.