Tulsa, 1921: Reporting a Massacre. Greenwood functioned independently, with its own school system, post office, bank, library, hospital and public transit. The white mob grew to more than 2,000 and Tulsa police did not disperse the crowd. It occurred in Tulsa, Oklahoma, beginning on May 31, 1921, and lasting for two days. Old World War I airplanes dropped bombs on Greenwood, with the mob fatally shooting Black people and looting and burning their homes and businesses. Here I am, said Jackson. When first published in 2001, society apparently wasn't ready for such an unstinting narrative. Tape 3 (1999.069.03) - interviews with Elizabeth Cooley Chappelle, Annie Birdie Beard, Augusta Mann, George Monroe, and Eldoris McCondichie to this report. In July of 2020, the Greenwood Community Development Corporation in Tulsa, Oklahoma, received an NEH grant to reopen and prepare its historic site for visitors to return. In the early hours of June 1, 1921, then-Gov. What little we had would be stolen from us, Ellis told the committee. Brandy Thomas Wells, who provided historic context for and ramifications of the massacre; and Reverend Dr. Robert Turner of Historic Vernon Chapel A. M. E. Church, who shared the perspective of a community leader in Tulsa. In this book, Krehbiel describes the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921 and discusses the antecedents and consequences of the tragic event that left somewhere around ~300 African Americans dead (estimates unknown and widely varying) and destroyed Tulsa's prosperous "Black Wall Street" in the neighborhood of Greenwood. During the course of eighteen terrible hours on May 31 and June 1, 1921, more than one thousand homes and businesses were destroyed, while credible estimates of deaths range . That evening mobs of both African Americans and whites descended on the courthouse where Rowland was being held. Beginning on June 26, 1921, the Tulsa grand jury findings were published in newspapers. Other historical acts of racist terrormob attacks on Black communities in Detroit, Cincinnati, Dayton, and New Yorkoccurred prior to the Civil War. Some still unidentified men in khakis, who come up frequently in the testimony, looked down and asked, Are you Dr. Jackson? Learning it was, indeed, Dr. Jackson on the ground, one of them said, Oh shit, those boys have done it now!. A Conversation with Hannibal B. Johnson: The Tulsa Race Tape 1 (1999.069.01) - introduction by Eddie Faye Gates, and interviews with George Monroe, Lola Streeter-Jackson, Veneice Dunn-Simms, Kenny Booker, Edward Lett, and Ernestine Gibbs Segregation produced a captive marketplace, and Black entrepreneurs prospered. From the terror of 31 May 1921 to. The panel presented perspectives representing different aspects of the states African American community. Summary. At the time, Greenwood was very likely the most prosperous Black community in the country, and Tulsa, the Magic City, was one of Americas fastest-growing cities, an oil boomtown, following the 1905 discovery of the Glenn Pool Oil Reserve 15 miles south of town. Thats Dr. Jackson, yelled Oliphant. African Americans had been around Oklahoma for a long time. Viewers wondered if the events depicted were more fiction than science. The truth. Later that night, the armed Black men returned to protect Rowland and a fight broke out when a white man tried to disarm a Black man, prompting shooting that lasted through the night, the report said. Quraysh Ali Lansana, an Oklahoma native and the acting director of the Center for Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation at Oklahoma State University, Tulsa, is helping organize an exhibition about the historic Black Wall Street neighborhood, its destruction and its rebirth, for Tulsas Philbrook Museum of Art with Tri-City Collective. John Williams, originally from Mississippi, opened an automobile repair shop and then Williams Dreamland Theatre, offering live stage shows and silent films, in addition to the air-conditioned Williams Confectionery. In 1921, one of the most devastating race massacres in American history occurred in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Omissions? Late in the battle as gunfire was sporadic, Jackson walked back to his home, after attending to victims, with his hands up. By 1921, according to historian Scott Ellsworth, a revived Tulsa Ku Klux Klan claimed an active membership of 3,200. Desk Blotter Report Tulsa County Jail . This site uses cookies. The city's "Black Wall Street" was among the most prosperous neighborhoods in America, and a Black utopia and then it was burned to the ground. Death in a promised land : the Tulsa race riot of 1921 by Scott Ellsworth; John Hope Franklin (Foreword by) Call Number: Boca Raton General Collection ; F704.T92 E44 ISBN: 9780807108789 Publication Date: 1982-02-01 Tulsa 1921 : reporting a massacre by Randy Krehbiel; Karlos K. Hill (Foreword by) Call Number: View Online ISBN: 0806163313 Take me. Dont shoot him! OHS-215 - Case Dockets #23347-23416, 1921. Tulsas Greenwood Cultural Center tabulates that in the span of 24 hours 35 city blocks of Black Wall Street were burned to the ground. Later that afternoon at the Black-owned Williams Dreamland Theatre, sixteen-year-old Bill Williams watched as a neighbor jumped on stage and announced: Were not going to let this happen. Tape 4 (1999.069.04) - interviews with Jobie Elizabeth Holderness, Eunice Jackson, Myrtle Rollerson, and Beulah Loree Smith, Most of the historic resources directly associated with Greenwood were destroyed during the massacre and many of the resources from the period of post-massacre reconstruction were destroyed by urban renewal in the 1970s. 1,090 pages. As eleven-year-old Sarah Rector, a member of the Muscogee Creek Nation, became the Richest colored girl in the world when a gusher was discovered on her land, many African Americans feared for their lives. Get the full version of this audiobook: https://audiobookscloud.com/B0851DWL7GTulsa 1921: Reporting a MassacreIn 1921, Tulsa's Greenwood District - known the. While most mob members were not deputized, the general feeling was that they were acting under the protection of the government. When the massacre ended on June 1, the official death toll was recorded at 10 whites and 26 African Americans, though many experts now believe at least 300 people were killed. In the commentary, the HBO producers mentioned that they lifted the idea of the bi-plane bombings from this book: "The Burning: Massacre, Destruction, and the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921.". You have an incident like that, then the breach in trust is huge. Full Report: The Case for Reparations in Tulsa. Use the links below to listen on YouTube. Tulsa police commissioner J. M. Adkison and police chief John Gustafson were under pressure to keep law and order in the rough and tumble boomtown. But Oklahoma, which became a state in 1907, was still staunchly segregated at the time. From May 31 to June 1, mobs of white Tulsa residents ransacked, pillaged, bombed, and burned over 1,000 homes, businesses, and churches and murdered scores of African Americans in the Tulsa's Black community of Greenwood. Enjoy a great reading experience when you buy the Kindle edition of this book. By Victoria Macchi | National Archives News Enlarge An image from the American Red Cross Disaster Relief, Tulsa Chapter, Condensed Report on the events of May 31 and June 1, 1921, known as the Tulsa Race Massacre. (Show) Current holds 0 current holds with 1 total copy. Arsonists reportedly waited for white women to fill bags with household loot before setting homes on fire. This thriving business district and surrounding residential area was referred to as "Black Wall Street.". Following World War I, Tulsa was recognized nationally for its affluent African American community known as the Greenwood District. Were going to go downtown and stop this lynching. True to their word, an armed contingent of 25 Black men went to the Tulsa County Courthouse. The House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties held a hearing on the issue May 19 in which three remaining known survivors, experts and advocates called on Congress to issue reparations to the living survivors and all descendants to rectify the lasting impact of the massacre. "Examines the events and players contributing to, participating in, and responding to Tulsa's 1921 race riot and massacre and the social, political and historical context in which it occurred"--. This wasnt the case for us. In addition to the 24-hour destruction of the Black community by a variety of White Tulsans in . Some filed insurance claims or lawsuits, but none resulted in payment due to riot clauses, the report said. Our country may forget this history, but I cannot.. Before emancipation, Blacks enslaved by the Indians fared better than those enslaved by whites. He is author of, State and Jurisdictional Humanities Councils, HUMANITIES: The Magazine of the National Endowment for the Humanities, SUBSCRIBE FOR HUMANITIES MAGAZINE PRINT EDITION, Sign up for HUMANITIES Magazine newsletter, Chronicling America: History American Newspapers. Sidestepping discrimination in the oil industry, Blacks arriving in Tulsa prospered as maids, shoeshines, waiters, chauffeurs, cooks, barbers, mammies, and gardeners to the newly rich. Johnson said there are two main casualties of the massacre that contribute to these discrepancies and affect everyday life a breach in trust between Black and white communities and the inability to transfer accumulated wealth. Extent. Tulsa police officers were identified by eyewitnesses as setting fire to Black homes, shooting residents and stealing. Materials are presented uncensored and unaltered to reflect the historical record, and some content may be disturbing to viewers. White mobacrats employed extralegal tactics to gain an advantage over Blacks, Indians, and even white union organizers. The fact that after the disaster none of them were convicted of crimes vindicates that position. In 1921 Tulsa's Greenwood District, known then as the nation's "Black Wall Street," was one of the most prosperous African American communities in the United States. Believed to be the single worst incident of racial violence in American history, the bloody 1921 outbreak in Tulsa has continued to haunt Oklahomans. Publisher's Summary. We were made to feel that our struggle was unworthy of justice and that we were less valued than whites, that we weren't fully American., Fletcher served white families for most of her life as a domestic worker. Gurley, a wealthy Black landowner, purchased 40 acres of land in Tulsa in 1906 and named the area Greenwood. DuBois had already warned the Black veterans of World War I, in the May 1919 issue of the, Details are difficult to gather, because many survivors of the massacre fled the city. But 100 years ago, on May 31, 1921, and into the next day, a white mob destroyed that district, in what experts call the single-most horrific incident of racial terrorism since slavery. In many ways, it is poetic irony that science fiction has forced America to confront its very real history. . On the morning of June 1, 1921, a white mob numbering in the thousands marched across the railroad tracks dividing black from white in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and obliterated a black community then celebrated as one of America's most prosperous. This prosperity continued through the years even as racial terrorism around Tulsa grew, the Ku Klux Klan gained power, and Oklahomas Supreme Court regularly upheld voting restrictions such as poll taxes and literacy tests for Black voters. . 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