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None of my mostly African American 11th graders in Portland had ever heard of the so-called Tulsa Race Massacre, even though it stands as one of the most violent episodes of dispossession in U.S. history.
The term “race riot” does not adequately describe the events of May 31-June 1, 1921 in Greenwood, a Black neighborhood in Tulsa, Oklahoma. In fact, the term itself implies that both Blacks and whites might be equally to blame for the lawlessness and violence. The historical record documents a sustained and murderous assault on Black lives and property. This assault was met by a brave but unsuccessful armed defense of their community by some Black World War I veterans and others.
During the night and day of the riot, deputized whites killed more than 300 African Americans. They looted and burned to the ground 40 square blocks of 1,265 African American homes, including hospitals, schools, and churches, and destroyed 150 businesses. White deputies and members of the National Guard arrested and detained 6,000 Black Tulsans who were released only upon being vouched for by a white employer or other white citizen. Nine thousand African Americans were left homeless and lived in tents well into the winter of 1921.
Like pearls on a string, we can finger the beads of violent and “legal” expulsions of people of color from their land in the nation: The Cherokee Removal and multiple wars against indigenous people, the 1846-48 U.S. war against Mexico, the Dawes Act, government-sanctioned attacks on Chinese throughout the West, the
— source zinnedproject.org | Linda Christensen | May 28, 2013