LOOKING FOR LAURA NELSON
A Bruce Nelson Film
Learning her name was just the beginning
The Laura & LD Nelson Foundation is a 501(c)(3) Non-profit organization.Thank you for your support!
the trailer
Bruce’s Story
After receiving an email from someone claiming to be my 3rd or 4th cousin through Ancestry DNA testing; I decided to answer the email. After about an hour of conversation I discovered that we are in fact… cousins. Our family is from Oklahoma the two of us exchange names of grandfathers, uncles, aunts and our formerly enslaved great grandfather David Nelson. Our conversation was filled with laughter, surprise and wonderment, as the conversation is coming to a close Shirley asks, “Do you know the story of Okemah?” “I know of Okemah,Arizona, but what is the story you know?” I asked. Shirley told me to Google “Laura Nelson” and left it at that.
I found her on Wikipedia. It tells story of an African-American mother and son who were lynched on May 25, 1911, near Okemah, Okfuskee County, Oklahoma. They had been seized from their cells in the Okemah county jail the night before by a group of up to 40 white men, reportedly including Charley Guthrie, father of the folk singer Woody Guthrie. Laura was raped, here infant Carrie was stripped from her. Laura and Lawrence D. Nelson were then hanged from a bridge over the North Canadian River.” Austin Nelson was imprisoned in the McAllister State Prison. “They are our relatives,” stated Shirley. Now connecting with new relatives through DNA testing I am on a journey to find Aunt Laura Nelson, Uncle Austin Nelson,L.D.Nelson and the infant, Carrie.
The Locations
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Boley, OK
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McAllister State Prison
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Okemah Court House, OK
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Greenleaf Cemetery
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Museum Of Social Justice
The Lynching Museum, Nkyinkyim Installation by Kwame Akoto-Bamfo
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Sandstone Grave Marker
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WGC Center
The Impact Mission
Focusing on the lynching of Laura Nelson, this documentary strives to expose the persistent violence against Black women and girls and their overlooked suffering in the narrative of police brutality and social justice in America.
“Police violence against black women is marginalized in the public’s understanding of American policing. There is a perception among many Americans that black women are somehow shielded from the threat of police violence. This could not be further from the truth.”
-Keisha N. Blain, Professor of History and Africana Studies, Brown University.
“Her Name Was Laura Nelson.”
-From The Lynch Quilt’s Project- LaShawnda Crowe Storm
The Laura & LD Nelson Foundation is a 501(c)(3) Non-profit organization.
Thank you for your support!
The Film
LOOKING FOR LAURA NELSON is a gripping historical documentary that confronts one of the most haunting—and overlooked—acts of racial violence in American history: the 1911 lynching of Laura Nelson and her 12-year-old son, L.D., in Okemah, Oklahoma.
Through a careful weaving of archival records, expert testimony, and present-day investigation, the film reconstructs the story of Laura Nelson—a Black mother whose name has largely been lost to history despite the existence of one of the most widely circulated lynching photographs in the United States. Moving across locations from Oklahoma to Texas and Alabama, the film traces the social, legal, and cultural forces that made such violence possible, while uncovering the fragments of a family story left behind: a missing infant, surviving relatives, and generations of silence.
At its core, LOOKING FOR LAURA NELSON is not only about recovering a single life—it is about examining how and why certain stories disappear. The film interrogates the historical erasure of Black women and girls as victims of racial terror, challenging dominant narratives that have often excluded them from public memory and justice movements.
By connecting past to present, the documentary draws a direct line from early 20th-century mob violence to contemporary conversations about systemic racism, policing, and whose stories are amplified—or ignored. In doing so, it asks an urgent question: what does it mean to reckon with a history that was never fully acknowledged?
Haunting, investigative, and deeply resonant, LOOKING FOR LAURA NELSON brings Laura Nelson’s story out of the shadows—and insists on its place in the American narrative today.
Join us in bringing this film to the world
The Laura & LD Nelson Foundation is a 501(c) (3) Non-profit organization.
Thank you for your support!
Producer/Director Bruce Nelson
Bruce Nelson is an award-winning documentary filmmaker whose work has consistently explored overlooked stories with depth and care. His previous films include Gospel Radio Man, which is optioned nationally for PBS, and Tales of Tobacco, which earned a Telly Award. His short film Raglin Tales screened at multiple festivals including the Phoenix Film Festival and the San Francisco Black Film Festival, receiving a Special Mention at the I-Filmmaker International Film Festival in Marbella, Spain. His earlier feature-length documentary North Town was recognized at several festivals, including Docs Without Borders, where it received an Exceptional Merit award, and is currently streaming on Amazon.
Looking for Laura Nelson marks Nelson’s first feature documentary of this scale and ambition—a deeply personal project that draws on his experience as a storyteller to confront a largely unexamined chapter of American history.
Email: nebproductions1@gmail.com
