This is an accepted version of this page Stilwell / ᏍᏗᎳᏪᎵ is a city located in the sovereign territory of the Cherokee Nation.

The trail was called nu na da ul tsun yi in Cherokee language, or "the place where they cried".

The U.S. federal government set up a “disbandment depot” outside what is present-day Stilwell in the early months of 1839 to distribute food and supplies to the newly arrived Indigenous people.

[10] Those with resources quickly left to settle across the rest of Indian Territory, but the sickest and poorest stayed in the Stilwell area, close to the safety of the depot.

[14] After three intensely contested elections, however, Oklahoma governor Charles Haskell proclaimed Stilwell as the county seat on May 6, 1910.

Earthquakes are often felt in Stilwell due to oil and gas production activities in central Oklahoma.

Below the ground in Stilwell lays chert rock, which breaks down into the soil and purportedly gives strawberries a unique taste.

[31] Rainfall samples collected over a 13-year span at an air quality station near Stilwell found abnormally high levels of mercury.

[31] The Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality warned residents against eating certain fish from Stilwell's city lake in 2019, furthering suspicion that the town's aquifer could be contaminated.

[32] Stilwell was labelled "the early death capital of the world" after a detailed report by the National Center for Health Statistics surfaced in 2018 indicating the life expectancy of the town's residents was just 56.3 years.

The agency stated the report was their "most detailed local health data ever released"[33] and the life expectancy of Stilwell residents was lower than that in every jurisdiction in North America, Europe or Asia, with a similar life-expectancy to the poorest regions of sub-Saharan Africa.

box addresses in Stilwell that lived outside city limits were included in the report, producing inaccurate data.

[38] 16% of adults in Stilwell have diabetes, 27% smoke, and 42% are obese, according to the Oklahoma State University Center for Health Sciences.

[6] Stilwell city council passed a mask mandate in response to the COVID-19 pandemic on July 8, 2020, taking advice from a local infectious disease specialist.

[40] Just 10 days later, city council struck down the mandate advising face masks would no longer required after receiving "extremely hostile" responses and threats against officials.

Technical and vocational studies beyond high school level are offered by the Indian Capital Technology Center campus in Stilwell.

[43] According to its founder, David Hilligoss, the school was created to "Provide an education to Isolated Indians and rural whites in this beautifully treed and poverty stricken section of the state".

[50] Violent crime has increased every year since 2009[51] and Stilwell has an incarceration rate higher than what's found in every other country in the world.

[39] In response to the town's high crime rate, Stilwell has a year-round curfew in place that prohibits people under the age of 18 from being in public past midnight.

The enclave has ties to myriad criminal, terror and racist organizations, including the Aryan Resistance Movement.

[55][56][57] An Associated Press investigation from 2003 concluded that white supremacists from Elohim City played a “major role” in the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building that killed 168 people.

[58] The Southern Poverty Law Center calls the compound “the meeting ground for America’s most sinister extremists”.

Though the service is open to the public, it is not widely used and its primary purpose is to provide low-cost rides to disadvantaged, elderly and impoverished Stilwell residents.

Stilwell is situated on the Kansas City Southern (KCS) main line, it runs north and south through the east end of the town.