INK'S O.K. IN OKLAHOMA
By Bobby Lynn Shehorn

On November 1, 2006, Oklahoma became the last remaining of the 50 United States to legalize and regulate tattooing, a victory in the war against tattoo taboo. After banning the tattooing of minors in 1957, the Oklahoma state legislature followed the practice of other states and municipalities during this period and, in 1963, banned tattooing completely. Establishing the licensing and regulation for body piercing in 1999, the Oklahoma legislature recently amended this statute to include tattooing, only after more than a decade of debate and countless, statewide undercover stings by the local police. Lobbying for legalization escalated in the past several years, resulting in a loosening of restrictions on tattoo advertising and in two tattoo conventions last year, one in Oklahoma City and a larger one in Tulsa. Along with legislative lobbying by many established artists and new shop owners, the Oklahoma Department of Health, led by Director of Consumer Protection Tressa Madden, supported tattoo regulation, only after Ms. Madden's thorough investigation and comparisons of the health laws in other states. However, concerns heightened, due to a recent rise in local hepatitis infections and four cases of antibiotic-resistant skin infections blamed on unsanitary tattooing practices.

The creation of a new, tattoo-friendly commercial market in the Sooner State resulted in a territorial land rush, somewhat comparable to the one that gave the 46th state its nickname and the University of Oklahoma its mascot. Eighteen years before Oklahoma was admitted to the Union in 1907, the federal government opened for white settlement a two-million acre section of what was then Indian territory. In an attempt at fairness (to the Anglos and not to the indigenous and expatriated Native Americans), the U.S. advertised a land rush to be held on April 22, 1889, and 50,000 settlers lined up on the border, awaiting the signal to rush in and stake their claim. Some more enterprising individuals, who came to be known as Sooners, literally jumped the gun and entered early, in an attempt to take the land illegally.

The 21st-century Oklahoma Tattoo Rush, however, has its pragmatic problems too, and all who are involved are experiencing challenges from the strict, new regulation and licensing statutes. Animosities and rivals have risen between the new immigrant "sooner" operations, many owned by non-tattooers staffing untrained and inexperienced scratchers and the well-established, formerly underground, but happy-to-be legal Oklahoma artist scene.

As in other American cities on the rail circuit, carney tattooers came through Oklahoma with the circuses and sideshows of the first half of the 20th century. These included Prof. J.B. King, who advertised a tattoo shop at 318 South Robinson in Oklahoma City in the '30s. The post-World War II boost in the Oklahoma economy, due to the expansion of Fort Sill in Lawton and the establishment of Tinker Air Force Base near Oklahoma City, attracted tattooers, including San Antonian Edna Sanchez, who is reported to have tattooed in Oklahoma in the early '50s. The legendary Lotteva Wagner Davis, daughter of circus tattooers Gus and Maude Wagner, lived in Lawton in the '50s and '60s with her husband, showman Russell "Tarzan" Davis, and may have tattooed there. Seven years after Davis' death in 1977, Lotteva Wagner Davis married Oklahoma tattooer Stanley Allen. Since the ban in 1963, an underground tattoo scene had steadily developed in the Sooner state. Names like Warlock, Bob Smith, Bishop, Corky and Johnny Dragon are legend in the old-school Oklahoma tattoo community. Countless aspiring Okie artists simply left for legally greener pastures.

Oklahoman Jody Benner worked in Colorado, but kept coming back home for nearly 20 years, and is a respected elder to the local tattooers of Oklahoma City, the capital and, with over half a million people, the largest city in the state. Jody Benner, like many serious OK artists, turned part of his house into a professional-style tattoo studio with hot and cold running water. He opened Mystical Illusions on 23rd Street in Oklahoma City as a licensed piercing studio in 1999, and discreetly tattooed out of the backroom. Benner's Mystical Illusions is the first licensed tattoo shop in Oklahoma City and one of the first in the state.

Around the same time that Benner opened his piercing studio in Oklahoma City, Tulsa tattooer David Bennett opened Bennett's Tattooing and Body Piercing in the Tulsa suburb of Sapulpa, in 1999. Complying with the Oklahoma piercing statutes, but visibly tattooing in public, Bennett's was one of the first Oklahoma shops publicly to question the verbiage of the state's tattoo law. With over 23 years experience, Bennett learned his art while in the Air Force and tattooed in Guam, the Philippines and Korea. Starting in 1990, Bennett worked out of his house in Tulsa for eight years and felt that what he was doing in his new studio was legal. Due to the advent of laser surgery as a successful tattoo removal system, he believed he was not "pricking with a needle or otherwise, so as to produce a permanent indelible mark or figure visible on the skin" as defined in the Oklahoma law. Bennett's revolutionary move kept the ball rolling, as he and others across the state continued a strong lobby to legalize tattooing in Oklahoma. Many attempts were made to initiate a change, including a collection of signatures for a public vote to legalize the craft.

Now tattooing at Eric Poland's Electric Eye Tattoo, one of the first licensed shops in Tulsa, Brandon Mull worked with David Bennett when he opened Bennett's Tattooing and Body Piercing in 1999. Mull recalls the situation:

"Before us, Cliff James opened Eyewitness Tattooing and Body Piercing, but at that time, they weren't tattooing. They were sending people out-of-state [to their shop in Joplin, Missouri]. We had tattooing signs in the window. We were balls-to-the-walls doing it, just trying to get something to happen. There were other shops that were tattooing, but you had to give a secret knock on the door, all this crazy stuff, to get in. We just opened up a tattoo business and ran it as such."

Oklahoma tattooists welcome most of the new statutes, including the individual licensing of tattooists that requires proof of two years of experience, blood-borne pathogens training, CPR and first aid courses and a mandatory apprenticeship educational program. Their biggest hurdle is the requirement of a $100,000 surety bond to license a tattoo shop. Although the total number of bonding companies in Oklahoma may be in the three-digit range, only one, at this time, is bonding tattoo studios. Depending on the shop owners' credit, the initial deposit to the bondsman is a sliding scale, ranging upward from the minimum of 10 percent or $10,000. Many shop owners who opened prior to November 1, 2006 had stretched their cash and credit, just to open the doors. Although all their tattooers may be properly licensed, shops are struggling to make the $100,000 bond requirement for a shop license. Before the end of the 2007 Oklahoma legislature session, however, the governor may sign a final, amended revision of the emergency statute, which might reduce or delete the tattoo shop bond requisite, and add an insurance requirement. There is still debate in the legislature over these amendments, and, since the current tattoo law took some time to evolve, so may its revisions.

Highly acclaimed tattoo artist D.J. Richardson publicly advertised and opened the first modern street-shop in Oklahoma City in 2004, in defiance of the old law. Calling it OKC Tattoo, Richardson agreed with Bennett's and Mull's interpretation of the law and also claimed that what he was doing in his studio was legal. Richardson's bold action in the shadow of the Oklahoma capital hastened the state government's discussion on the regulation and licensing of tattooing and helped start the tattoo land rush.

"After we opened our doors," explains D.J., "about six months later, everyone saw that we were still afloat and that everything was going just fine. More people started jumping on the bandwagon, which is what put pressure on the capital, because they saw that they had better get in and start to regulate it. There were a lot of shops that were doing terrible work, bad work, and they were spreading God knows what. It could make the reputation of Oklahoma a lot worse and the state started to recognize what was going on. We didn't want to be outlaws. I just wanted to draw and make a living for my family."

But tattooers were outlaws to the local Oklahoma police and, for years, they made raids across the state, and especially at OKC Tattoo. "They did it like a prostitution sting." D.J. Richardson recalls, "The undercover cop came in, struck up a deal and the guy was wired. They came running in with guns like a big Western showdown. It was crazy!" Forced to close his first shop, D.J. has since opened Undisputed Tattoo at 2608 North Pennsylvania Avenue in Oklahoma City. Not sure where the law was going, Bobby Deneen, who was busted twice, cautiously opened a cool shop last year in Oklahoma City with partner Curtis Fletcher in an isolated corner of a martial arts dojo, with only their name "Cannibal Graphics" on the outside door. Of the countless Oklahoma tattooers who were arrested in these sting operations, before the new law went into effect, many simply paid the $500 fine and went back to work. In other cases, all charges (simple misdemeanors) were subsequently dropped by the local judiciaries, who realized that there were more important criminals out there than tattooers. At the time of this writing, not all tattoo shops operating in Oklahoma have permits, and disciplinary action is being taken by the health department, four months into the regulatory period. In addition, the busting of illegal, unlicensed home-tattoo operations still continues.

These new state laws inspired some Oklahoma cities to take action, like Ardmore, which passed new city codes with zoning restrictions for tattoo shops. Now with half-a-dozen tattoo studios, Lawton has initiated local licensing requirements, in addition to specific zoning limitations. Tulsa has at least ten visible shops, and towns like Norman, Broken Arrow, Stillwater, Altus, Elk City and Duncan also have new tattooing establishments.

Along with a rush to open tattoo shops in Oklahoma, there is a rush of certain individuals to take credit for this new legalization. Some tattooers and shop owners have misrepresented or exaggerated their importance in this process to the media, and caused animosities within the community. David Bennett comments on this unfortunate controversy:

"It has been a slow process, but we finally got it. It doesn't matter who the credit goes to. Back in 1999, I wrote to my representatives, [former] Senator Lewis Long and Representative Al Lindley. They wrote me back and said it was an interesting question. None of the licensed [piercing] shops had any complaints and we approached it from that direction. Look at it as a health issue, unregulated, it was still being done in Oklahoma. What we were concerned about was how many uninsured people, Oklahoma taxpayers, possibly got infections from an underground artist who didn't have an autoclave and didn't know the sterile techniques. These were the issues that brought it to the forefront and brought about the changes. It had a lot to do with these people being educated, the Heath Department being educated and representatives being educated. That way, they knew what they were writing up. A lot of it was simply groundwork. We worked together with several shops and organizations, we got people together that were knowledgeable and we shared techniques with each other and with the Heath Department. It's come a long way. You can argue who was the first shop, who was this and who was that. But none of that really matters. None of it would have been done without Tressa Madden, of the Oklahoma Heath Department. Ms. Madden put a lot of hours in off the clock. As far as getting it accomplished, getting it done, she was the lobbyist; she was the one knocking down the doors, writing her paperwork, going out and getting the information and asking the important questions. She's done an outstanding job. Her and Lindley and Long, who first introduced the bill. Oklahoma tattoo artist Brandon Mull was highly vocal and had a lot of input on it. And the new guys that have come on board, all these people, it has truly been a team effort. There were a lot of people there in the beginning, and then other people stepped up. It's just one of those issues that's taken time."

Others to mention include tattooers and shop owners, some expatriated natives from other states, who spoke at the several congressional hearings, like tattooer Dennis Tucker, who opened King Tat Tattoo in Tulsa in 2002, Kim and Jonathon Soltis of Just Another Hole, in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma and Corky from Creative Images in Denton, Texas.

All this rhetoric and politics aside, what is most important is that Oklahoma tattoo aficionados, including the tattoo artists themselves, will be more likely to get a safe and professional-quality tattoo without looking over their shoulders. Nationally known artist and Oklahoma native Mike Belzel has come home to open his tattoo shop Good Fortune at 9204 Classen in Oklahoma City and brings his art and experience to this scene. In lieu of the land rush, the established Oklahoma tattoo clique members are concerned with maintaining professional integrity and a high quality of artwork as much as they are concerned about sterility. D.J. Richardson sums up their position:

"Because of the situation here, there is camaraderie with other real artists in the scene. We watch each other's backs. There's no scene rivalry with us, just with these fly-by-night hacks. A lot of people are jumping in on the scene, thinking they can make a buck, and that is when the bad reputation comes in around here. A lot of customers don't know. They think they have to accept what they can get here. There's been no way for good artists to advertise and really promote themselves, and that's been a big issue."

With Oklahoma ink artists, continuing determination and zeal for their craft, their tattoo business will level off to a happier medium. The cream will always rise to the top and bad tattoo karma will always take care of itself. What we all can celebrate is the passing of a milestone in American tattoo history. We again unite our 50 states in socially accepting tattooing as a viable profession, like so many other vocations that are licensed and regulated by our local, state and federal governments. Although some counties and municipalities across the country still carry yet-to-be-contested statutes that prohibit tattooing in their local jurisdictions, we look forward to the day when these bans will be completely lifted and every legitimate tattoo artist will have the right to work anywhere in America and every adult American can legally enjoy this special freedom of expression. Please enjoy this great tattoo artwork coming out of Oklahoma and score one more for the home team.