Examine the Tulsa race massacre 100 years later
Learn about the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre on the one hundredth anniversary of the crime.
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Fred Vigeant
Watch Tulsa: The Fire and the Forgotten Monday, May 31 at 9:00pm on WITF. You can stream WITF TV live on our website and through the PBS Video app on Roku, Apple TV and iPhone and Android smartphones. The program is also available on-demand through the PBS Video app.
Although rarely mentioned in textbooks, there is no question that the Tulsa Race Massacre was one of the most horrific incidents of racial violence in American history. As the country continues to reflect on the shocking murders and arson that took place from May 31-June 1, 1921, and considers more recent incidents of social injustice like the killing of George Floyd last May, a new documentary Tulsa: The Fire and the Forgotten examines this deadly assault on humanity on the 100th anniversary of the crime.
Directed by Jonathan Silvers, and reported by The Washington Post’s DeNeen L.Brown, Tulsa: The Fire and the Forgotten looks back at the explosion of violence when the once prosperous neighborhood known as “Black Wall Street” was destroyed by a mob of white residents. Hundreds of Black-owned businesses and homes in the Greenwood district of Tulsa, Oklahoma, were burnt to the ground, killing an estimated 100-300 Black residents and leaving an estimated 10,000 Black residents homeless. This 90-minute documentary, narrated by Emmy-winning journalist Michel Martin, Amanpour and Company contributor and weekend host of All Things Considered on WITF radio, also chronicles present-day public efforts to memorialize the Tulsa Race Massacre and other racial violence around the country, and how Black and white communities view such efforts.
Tulsa: The Fire and the Forgotten features interviews with civil rights activists, lawyers, Black community leaders, archaeologists, anthropologists and historians, including Greg Robinson II (Community Activist and Descendant), Kristi Williams (Community Activist), Regina Goodwin (Oklahoma State Representative – Tulsa House District 73), G.T. Bynum (Mayor of Tulsa), Rev. Robert Turner (Pastor, AME Church), Dreisen Heath (Investigator, Human Rights Watch), Nicole Austin-Hillery (Director of US Programs, Human Rights Watch), Hannibal Johnson (Historian), and more. Producer Eric Stover, founder of the Human Rights Center at University of California, Berkeley School of Law, who has investigated numerous acts of genocide and mass murder over many decades, also speaks with Tulsa natives and surveys the current excavation and search for mass graves. The documentary also features a moving performance from Tulsa native artist Majeste Pearson, who is scheduled to perform the Black national anthem on the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre.
As Tulsa Mayor G.T. Bynum cautions in the film, “It is terrifying because you realize that it could happen today. It is an instance of hatred overpowering the rule of law in a community…I hope that people see that it’s never too late to try and do the right thing. The investigation that we’re doing right now, we shouldn’t be doing it. The city should have done this 98 years ago.…We as a community are trying to do right by our neighbors in 2020 and 21.”
Watch Tulsa: The Fire and the Forgotten Monday May 31 at 9pm. Then, stay tuned following the documentary for Tulsa Revisited at 10:30pm to explore the events and themes presented in the film, Tulsa: The Fire and the Forgotten, both in the context of historical events, and current social issues. Themes will include current civil unrest, the issue of reparations, the historical racial landscape in America and generational efforts to level the playing field.
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