1921 Tulsa Race Massacre

3 more sets of remains tied to the 1921 Tulsa race riots found with gunshot wounds

5:03am August 19, 2024

The 1921 Tulsa race riots began after a Black man was accused of assaulting a white woman. The case was later dismissed in court, but historians estimate that up to 300 people died during the riots.

(L-R) Survivors Lessie Benningfield Randle, Viola Fletcher, and Hughes Van Ellis sing together at the conclusion of a rally during commemorations of the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre in 2021.

National

Ruling raises another hurdle for Tulsa Race Massacre victims seeking reparations

5:32pm July 10, 2023

by Manuela López Restrepo

Over 100 years ago, one of the deadliest race riots in American history destroyed the prosperous neighborhood of Greenwood, in Tulsa, Okla. Will victims ever get justice?

A mural marking Black Wall Street, also called the Greenwood District, in Tulsa, Okla. The Tulsa Race Massacre in 1921 devastated Black Wall Street and claimed some 300 African American lives.

National

Tulsa Race Massacre investigators say they've sequenced DNA from 6 possible victims

3:08pm April 12, 2023

by Scott Neuman

The work is part of a years-long effort to get an accurate count of how many people were killed when a white mob decimated the city's prosperous Greenwood enclave, leaving upward of 300 people dead.

A dozen Black men were convicted of murder by all-white juries in connection with the 1919 massacre in Elaine, Ark. Above, defendants S.A. Jones, Ed Hicks, Frank Hicks, Frank Moore, J.C. Knox, Ed Coleman and Paul Hall with their attorney at the state penitentiary in Little Rock in 1925 after the Supreme Court overturned their convictions.

In 2 U.S. cities haunted by race massacres, facing the past is painful and divisive

7:00am December 11, 2022

by Scott Neuman

Tulsa, Okla., has offered a blueprint, however imperfect, for how to confront a history of racial violence. In neighboring Arkansas, the city of Elaine has found the Tulsa model hard to replicate.

Scientists at the site in Tulsa, Okla., will begin excavating by hand, using finer grain tools to clean up the coffins. That will help researchers analyze the construction style and hardware of the caskets in order to determine when they were interred.

National

21 more unmarked graves are discovered in the Tulsa Race Massacre investigation

3:28pm November 02, 2022

by Vanessa Romo

Historians say up to 300 Black people were killed in the 1921 attack and the days that followed. Nearly all are believed to have been buried in mass graves approved by white authorities of the time.

National

A North Carolina city begins to reckon with the massacre in its white supremacist past

5:00am November 10, 2021

by Scott Neuman

In 1898, a white supremacist mob burned the offices of Wilmington's Black-owned newspaper and gunned down scores of the city's African American residents. Now, the city is honoring some of the dead.

Tom Hanks recently wrote an essay in The New York Times urging more widespread teaching of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre. The Oscar winner has built a career on movies about American white men doing the right thing.

Arts

Opinion: Tom Hanks Is A Non-Racist. It's Time For Him To Be Anti-Racist

8:27am June 13, 2021

by Eric Deggans

TV critic Eric Deggans says the Oscar-winning actor whose career has been rooted in films based on U.S. history needs to take responsibility for helping dismantle the notion of white exceptionalism.

Artist Paul Rucker is creating a new multimedia work to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre. That's when a thriving African American community was destroyed in a horrific act of violence that wiped out hundreds of Black-owned busi

Arts

Artist's Black Wall Street Project Is About Tulsa 100 Years Ago — And Today

5:26am May 31, 2021

by Neda Ulaby

Paul Rucker's multimedia work tackles mass incarceration, lynching, police brutality and the ways America has been shaped by slavery. His latest marks the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre.

Anneliese M. Bruner's great-grandmother Mary E. Jones Parrish, a teacher and journalist, survived and documented the massacre in her self-published memoir, Events of the Tulsa Disaster.

National

A Century After The Race Massacre, Tulsa Confronts Its Bloody Past

10:59am May 24, 2021

Survivors and their descendants say facing the truth about the Tulsa Race Massacre is essential in the nation's struggle to confront racial injustice and violence against Black people.

Queue Listen Now

Workers reinforce the sides of an excavation site during the search for a potential unmarked mass grave from the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, at Oaklawn Cemetery in Tulsa, Okla., in July.

National

Scientists Discover Unmarked Coffins During Search For 1921 Tulsa Massacre Victims

5:34pm October 23, 2020

by Brakkton Booker

Tulsa officials said at least 12 coffins were discovered over four days of digging in the city-owned Oaklawn Cemetery. More tests need to be conducted to determine if remains are massacre victims.