Pre-Release Screening for "Sarah's Oil" Being Held Tonight In Birmingham

The pre-release screening for "Sarah's Oil" is being held tonight at the AMC Summit 16 movie theatres in Birmingham, Alabama. Based on a true story, "Sarah's Oil" is an upcoming motion picture based on the book, "Searching for Sarah Rector: The Richest Black Girl In America" by Tonya Bolden. Which focuses on the story of how Sarah Rector, whose parents were the grandchildren of Creek Indians before the War Between The States, allowed her to inherit land under the Treaty of 1866. A treaty that required the Creek Native Americans to abolish slavery within their territory and grant tribal citizenship to the Creek Freedmen who chose to stay in their territory, with said citizenship including voting rights and shares of annuities and land allotments.

Specifically, in Sarah Rector's case, she inherited 159.14 acres in Glenpool, in Tulsa County, Oklahoma. The land she inherited was considered infertile and unsuitable for farming. With her father even wanting to sell the land at one point to avoid paying the taxes on it. Nevertheless, as chronicled in the motion picture, "Sarah's Oil", Sarah's land had a hidden treasure underneath its barren landscape – oil. And the movie focuses heavily on how her strong faith and belief in God led her to discover that her parcel of land contained such a plethora of the sought after natural resource. Only to then have to fight to keep her land.

The result is that by the age of eleven, Sarah Rector was receiving royalties from the oil drillers on her land in the equivalent of $368,000 in today's dollars. Which made her somewhat of a celebrity in her day. With Booker T. Washington even inviting her to attend the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama , which she did. And after her graduation from Tuskegee, Sarah Rector, bought a house in Kansas City, Missouri for herself and her entire family. Where she enjoyed entertaining celebrities of the jazz era such as Count Basie and Duke Ellington.

"Sarah's Oil" is set for a nationwide release on November 07th, 2025. And is produced by the Kingdom Story Company. It is rated PG and features the Haitian-American actress, Naya Desir-Johnson, in the role of Sarah Hector. The motion picture was filmed primarily in Oklahoma.

Luisa Reyes is a Tuscaloosa Attorney, piano instructor, and vocalist