Ep 54: Tulsa wasn’t no “Race Riots”!

On this episode of #IDKMYDE B Daht explains why the Tulsa Oklahoma "Race Riots" that took place in 1921 should be labeled a massacre.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
On today's episode. If I didn't know, maybe you didn't either.
There wasn't no race riots. That was a massacre. I
didn't know. I didn't know. I didn't know. Maybe you didn't.
I didn't know. I didn't know. I didn't know. They
called him to tussa race riots. But it's really the

(00:21):
massacre on black Wall Street. It was a two day
long massacre from May thirty first to June first in
nineteen twenty one. Mobs of white residents, some of them
was even deputies and armed by the city government officials.
They burned and destroyed more than thirty five square blocks.
At one time, this was the wealthiest black community in
the United States. They called it black Wall Street. Now.

(00:44):
The Oklahoma Bureau of Vital Statistics officially recorded thirty six dead,
but after contemporary autopsy reports, death certificates, and other records,
they estimate that anywhere from seventy five to three hundred
people were killed. Nineteen year old Dick Roland, he was
a shoeshiner, got accused of assaulting a white seventeen year
old elevator operator named Sarah Page. Hundreds of white men

(01:08):
gathered at the jail, you know, to expedite the process. Well,
seventy five black men pulled up and yes, some of
them were armed, and the sheriff persuades both groups to leave.
As they're leaving, there's an old white man roll up
on Obi Man and demanded that he give up his pistol.
Obi Man said, nah, you ain't getting my pistol. So
the old white dude tries to take the gun from

(01:29):
Obi Man. A gunshot rings out, and that's when all
hell broke loose. By the time the dust settle, twelve
people were dead, ten white, two black Black folk retreating
to their neighborhoods in Greenwood, firing at the white mob
in defense man. Then white folk invaded Greenwood that night
and it led on to the next morning, killing men,
killing women, killing kids, burning in looting stores and homes.

(01:52):
By noon on June first, the Oklahoma National Guard had
imposed martial law. About ten thousand black people were left homeless.
They said it cost a property damage amount of the
more than one point five million dollars in real estate
and about seven hundred and fifty thousand in personal property
equivalence about thirty five million dollars today. By the end
of nineteen twenty two, A lot of the residents had

(02:13):
their homes rebuilt, but the city and real estate companies
refused to compensate any of them. So when we're discussing
the atrocities that happened un Tulsa, Oklahoma, from May thirty
first to June first, in nineteen hundred and twenty one,
let's not refer to those as riots. I was a
massacre and I didn't know. Maybe you didn't either. The