Tulsa 1921 - 99 years ago today

[malaise]

https://www.tulsaworld.com/tulsa-race-massacre-intent-on-killing-stealing-and-destruction-white-mobs-leveled-a-thriving-black/article_192fbc66-2a19-5727-a7cb-485052269bbf.html
<snip>
A riot that began at the Tulsa County Courthouse on the night of May 31, 1921, escalated into an all out assault on Greenwood on the morning of June 1. White mobs stormed through the community setting fires, stealing and killing and wounding countless black Tulsans. Thirty-five blocks of businesses, homes and churches were left in smoldering ruins; just about everything left standing had been looted and vandalized.

Although 37 deaths were confirmed, as many as 300 people are believed to have been killed. Hundreds more were injured and thousands were homeless.

For the better part of a century, the events of May 31-June 1, 1921, were rarely discussed in public. The race massacre, as it’s now known, was not generally included in history courses and only in the past 20 years has it again become common knowledge among Tulsa’s residents.

With the massacre’s centennial only a year away, this special section looks back at the secret Tulsa could never quite forget.
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Much more at link

[yellerpup]

1. The Mayor of Tulsa in answer to a question about the chances of rioting starting up in Tulsa

yesterday, said, "In Tulsa the black community has never been to blame for the 1921 Greenwood riots; it was the white people who were rioting."

[malaise]

3. Correct

Why do they hate us so

[yellerpup]

6. I've written a play set in 1920 following a mixed blood Tulsa family

(various degrees of white/black/Cherokee) about the year leading up to the Greenwood Massacre. The simple element of "why" it happened is white jealousy. Tulsa was the most segregated town in America, blacks could only use phones meant for blacks. The Greenwood community had the most popular (not to mention cleanest) hotels, theaters and dance and concert halls, good restaurants, boutiques, hairdressers, and offered all kinds of skilled services and comforts that white people were accustomed to but had never learned how to do themselves. People of color were not allowed to shop south of the railroad tracks so that kept the money they earned in the community and fueled their economy and they prospered impressively. The KKK was growing and, IMO, had been planning this attack for a long time. They went after the richest families first, murdering the owner of the theaters and a nationally admired, famous black surgeon on the first day of the riot. Sorry, I'll drop off here. I can talk about this for hours. The play, "Blood Boundary" was taught last semester at Oklahoma City University and has been produced (on a small scale) in Oklahoma City and in NYC both in 2017.

[malaise]

7. Thanks for this

I'd love to see your play

Talk more about it - I want more

[yellerpup]

8. "Blood Boundary" is actually the third part of a trilogy.

The plays are all framed around the Dawes Rolls (the only census ever taken where one had to declare their blood quantum). What were the initial expectations, how did those expectations play out in the next generation, and how the experiment (at least for this family) ended finally in 1921. In HOOP JUMPER, Weli suffers the most hurtful, personal revelation that his wife doesn’t think he’s good enough because he isn’t white enough; in BROKEN HEART LAND, Weli’s daughter, Alma, is manipulated by her grandfather and married off to a white man at age 13 so he may profit from her Cherokee allotment; in BLOOD BOUNDARY, Alma’s son, James, raised by his white grandmother as white, meets the Cherokee side of his family for the first time to discover they are also mixed with black. He accepts them as family and sides with them against the growing racial oppression in Tulsa.

There's more detail at the link. I can't post the script here, but if you want to read it we can make arrangements for you to see it. From people who saw "Broken Heart Land" in NY I learned that this sort of arranged marriage was common throughout the Caribbean.


http://www.mooneyart.com/trilogy

[malaise]

9. I've bookmarked Broken Heart Land

Thank you

[panader0]

17. I will be looking for your work.

It sounds very impressive.

[bobbieinok]

12. Greenwood was called Black WallStreet. White developers planned to buy up destroyed area

Some powerful whites blocked that plan

Many blacks lived in tents that winter

[Celerity]

2. Watchmen

[malaise]

4. Thanks for the link

[Celerity]

5. it's a superb show, if you get a chance to watch it

[bobbieinok]

10. Thanks for reminding us. Went to Tulsa schools through 12th---never mentioned.

Heard about it once from Gramma, who helped a family she knew

Surprise, surprise---newspaper article that roused up white men to attack black man who supposedly 'insulted' white woman elevator operator ...that issue disappeared from paper's archives almost immediately

[malaise]

11. My great aunt told us about Tulsa

Decades ago

[Wounded Bear]

13. American history has been largely white washed...

Events like the Tulsa massacre have been curiously "omitted."

[malaise]

14. Literally

[BannonsLiver]

19. I grew up in Tulsa in the 80s and 90s

The race massacre was not taught in schools or talked about in the white suburbs where I resided. I was a young adult before I knew anything about the event. So yes, it was definitely omitted.

[DVRacer]

20. It was in Owasso

We went over it in 7th grade late 80’s
My grandpa helped me with my paper he was born in 1922 and grew up in Dawson.

[BannonsLiver]

21. That's great.

It was not taught at Jenks Public Schools. At all. And we spent about 5 minutes on civil rights in general.

[yellowdogintexas]

15. Even "My Favorite Murder" took on the Tulsa Race Massacre. Feb 27 program

featured a long and well researched segment. Say what you will about their crazy humor and banter, everything presented on this podcast is well researched, and you can feel their emotional response to this story. It was quite well done, and I learned a lot about it.

I learned a lot more about that incident after listening to Georgia and Karen.

https://myfavoritemurder.com/211-it-was-my-birthday-forensic-files/ This was the Feb 27 program.

A Tulsa Massacre survivor story was featured on the March 23 episode.

[malaise]

16. Thanks for the link

[Gothmog]

18. ACLU-Today marks the anniversary of the Tulsa Massacre of 1921.

Link to tweet