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From Uprising to Massacre: The Fight for Reparations

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The 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre

Abstract

When mentioned at all in the years that immediately followed the collective violence in Tulsa, most accounts continued to refer to the occasion as an “uprising” or a “race riot.” In fact, public discourse related to the events of May 31 and June 1, 1921, quietly disappeared both in Tulsa and beyond (Ellsworth 1982). A review of most Oklahoma history textbooks prior to the 2000s yields few references to the riot. Accounts that do exist tended to be brief, one-sided, erroneous, and/or sanitized, often casting whites in the role of savior, in the immediate aftermath. For instance, an Oklahoma historian referenced a “disgraceful race riot,” but offered few details about what precipitated the outbreak and what transpired during the event. Instead, he summarily reports that “…the civil authorities at Tulsa and in Tulsa County exerted themselves to the utmost to alleviate the suffering and distress of the negro people…The city of Tulsa promptly announced that it would rebuild their homes” (Thoburn 1929, p. 694).

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  1. Colorado State University Pueblo, Pueblo, CO, USA

    Chris M. Messer

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  1. Chris M. Messer
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Correspondence to Chris M. Messer .

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Messer, C.M. (2021). From Uprising to Massacre: The Fight for Reparations. In: The 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-74679-7_5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-74679-7_5

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