Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
Editorials & Other Articles
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
A Long-Lost Manuscript Contains a Searing Eyewitness Account of the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/long-lost-manuscript-contains-searing-eyewitness-account-tulsa-race-massacre-1921-180959251/?no-istThe ten-page manuscript is typewritten, on yellowed legal paper, and folded in thirds. But the words, an eyewitness account of the May 31, 1921, racial massacre that destroyed what was known as Tulsa, Oklahoma’s “Black Wall Street,” are searing.
“I could see planes circling in mid-air. They grew in number and hummed, darted and dipped low. I could hear something like hail falling upon the top of my office building. Down East Archer, I saw the old Mid-Way hotel on fire, burning from its top, and then another and another and another building began to burn from their top,” wrote Buck Colbert Franklin (1879-1960).
The Oklahoma lawyer, father of famed African-American historian John Hope Franklin (1915-2009), was describing the attack by hundreds of whites on the thriving black neighborhood known as Greenwood in the booming oil town. “Lurid flames roared and belched and licked their forked tongues into the air. Smoke ascended the sky in thick, black volumes and amid it all, the planes—now a dozen or more in number—still hummed and darted here and there with the agility of natural birds of the air.”
Franklin writes that he left his law office, locked the door, and descended to the foot of the steps.
“The side-walks were literally covered with burning turpentine balls. I knew all too well where they came from, and I knew all too well why every burning building first caught from the top,” he continues. “I paused and waited for an opportune time to escape. ‘Where oh where is our splendid fire department with its half dozen stations?’ I asked myself. ‘Is the city in conspiracy with the mob?’”
*snip*
19 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
Last edited Mon May 31, 2021, 02:29 PM - Edit history (1)
https://edan.si.edu/slideshow/viewer/?damspath=/Public_Sets/NMAAHC/NMAAHC_Slideshows/2015_176_1 
A good idea, but the time window was off. 
http://fly.historicwings.com/2017/02/the-bombing-of-tulsa/
Air Power Employed
With the attack on Tulsa less than an hour old, a group of pilots from Tulsa’s white community gathered at the nearby airport of Curtiss-Southwest Field. Almost certainly, these were the commercial flight crews working for the Curtiss-Southwest Airplane Company, a firm that had formed a year and a half earlier in 1919 and which, more or less, ran the airport of the same name. Curtiss-Southwest was the nation’s first commercial interstate air freight shipping business, though that honor is usually forgotten due to what they did that day. The company was also a dealer for the Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company, selling surplus government planes and new models from the Curtiss company to the general public.
Between them, the pilots prepared about a dozen or more light planes. These were surplus World War I Curtiss JN-4 Jenny training planes that had been purchased from the US Army Signal Corps after the end of the war. Curtiss-Southwest had purchased and put these planes to work in its new airfreight business. Other planes were resold by the Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company to the general public. The US Army sold the planes at a price of $1,500 each and Curtiss-Southwest marked up and resold the planes to willing buyers at a significant profit, charging between $2,500 and $4,000 each. Newly built models that came directly from the Curtiss factory went for $5,000 to $9,000, depending on the type of engine mounted.
Most of the planes that flew that day over Tulsa had served as trainers for America’s military pilots during the First World War. The company, while offering new planes to the public, itself was somewhat underfunded. As such, it flew only surplus, used US Army planes. Most of these had flown at the University of Texas military flight training program at Kelly Field, in San Antonio. Kelly Field had trained over 320 squadrons of pilots during the war. These Curtiss JN-4 Jenny biplanes were the same type later made famous for barnstorming across much of middle America, putting on one-plane airshows and offering rides for a few dollars each.
With the riots in full swing, the pilots at Curtiss-Southwest Field didn’t have barnstorming or their usual oil business flying on their mind. Each pilot took an “observer” on board and, as some reports later claimed, loaded up their planes with balls of fabric soaked in turpentine. Matches were carried to light the incendiary balls on fire before dropping. They took off at 6:00 am, returning and refueling to fly additional missions later in the morning and in the early afternoon.
...
Ad in the Morning Tulsa Daily World newspaper from November 16, 1919, for an airshow put on by the Curtiss-Southwest Airplane Company in Tulsa — ironically, the event promises a “Bombing Raid”.
Curtiss JN-4 Jenny biplane trainers flying in formation from Kelly field, Texas; these would later be made surplus and sold to the general public; perhaps some of these very planes shown participated in the bombing of Tulsa. Photo Credit: US Army Air Service
Air Power Employed
With the attack on Tulsa less than an hour old, a group of pilots from Tulsa’s white community gathered at the nearby airport of Curtiss-Southwest Field. Almost certainly, these were the commercial flight crews working for the Curtiss-Southwest Airplane Company, a firm that had formed a year and a half earlier in 1919 and which, more or less, ran the airport of the same name. Curtiss-Southwest was the nation’s first commercial interstate air freight shipping business, though that honor is usually forgotten due to what they did that day. The company was also a dealer for the Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company, selling surplus government planes and new models from the Curtiss company to the general public.
Between them, the pilots prepared about a dozen or more light planes. These were surplus World War I Curtiss JN-4 Jenny training planes that had been purchased from the US Army Signal Corps after the end of the war. Curtiss-Southwest had purchased and put these planes to work in its new airfreight business. Other planes were resold by the Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company to the general public. The US Army sold the planes at a price of $1,500 each and Curtiss-Southwest marked up and resold the planes to willing buyers at a significant profit, charging between $2,500 and $4,000 each. Newly built models that came directly from the Curtiss factory went for $5,000 to $9,000, depending on the type of engine mounted.
Most of the planes that flew that day over Tulsa had served as trainers for America’s military pilots during the First World War. The company, while offering new planes to the public, itself was somewhat underfunded. As such, it flew only surplus, used US Army planes. Most of these had flown at the University of Texas military flight training program at Kelly Field, in San Antonio. Kelly Field had trained over 320 squadrons of pilots during the war. These Curtiss JN-4 Jenny biplanes were the same type later made famous for barnstorming across much of middle America, putting on one-plane airshows and offering rides for a few dollars each.
With the riots in full swing, the pilots at Curtiss-Southwest Field didn’t have barnstorming or their usual oil business flying on their mind. Each pilot took an “observer” on board and, as some reports later claimed, loaded up their planes with balls of fabric soaked in turpentine. Matches were carried to light the incendiary balls on fire before dropping. They took off at 6:00 am, returning and refueling to fly additional missions later in the morning and in the early afternoon.
...
Ad in the Morning Tulsa Daily World newspaper from November 16, 1919, for an airshow put on by the Curtiss-Southwest Airplane Company in Tulsa — ironically, the event promises a “Bombing Raid”.
Curtiss JN-4 Jenny biplane trainers flying in formation from Kelly field, Texas; these would later be made surplus and sold to the general public; perhaps some of these very planes shown participated in the bombing of Tulsa. Photo Credit: US Army Air Service