One of the most notorious incidents in the history of Oklahoma City and Heritage Hills was Machine Gun Kelley’s kidnapping of oil millionaire Charles Urschel in 1933. Twelve years before that fateful day, Urschel and his wife Flored purchased this modest Colonial Revival home from G.A. Nichols.

Little is known about Urschel’s early years, other than he was from Pennsylvania, where he married the sister of the famous oilfield wildcatter Tom Slick. The Urschels came to Oklahoma to manage the oil properties of Slick, who had a nervous breakdown after opening the Glenn Pool Oil Field. When they moved to Oklahoma City in 1921, Urschel was listed in the city directory as secretary of the Oklahoma Southwest Railway Company.

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