May 31, 1921: The Tulsa Race Massacre

May 31, 1921: The Tulsa Race Massacre begins, and continues into the next day. Mobs of White residents, some of them deputized and given weapons by city officials, attacked Black residents and destroyed homes and businesses of the Greenwood District in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The attacks burned and destroyed more than 35 square blocks of the neighborhood – at the time one of the wealthiest Black communities in the United States, known as "Black Wall Street."

More than 800 people were admitted to hospitals, and as many as 6,000 Black residents of Tulsa were interned in large facilities, many of them were interned for several days. The Oklahoma Bureau of Vital Statistics officially recorded 36 dead. The actual death toll may have been as high as 300.

The massacre began when 19-year-old Dick Rowland, a Black shoeshiner, was accused of assaulting Sarah Page, the 17-year-old White elevator operator in the nearby Drexel Building. He was taken into custody. After he was arrested, rumors which stated that he was going to be lynched were spread throughout the city.

Upon hearing reports that a mob of hundreds of White men had gathered around the jail where Rowland was being held, a group of 75 Black men, some of whom were armed, arrived at the jail in order to ensure that Rowland would not be lynched. The sheriff persuaded the group to leave the jail, assuring them that he had the situation under control.

An old white man approached O.B. Mann, a Black man, and demanded that he hand over his pistol. Mann refused, and the old man attempted to disarm him. Mann shot him, and then, according to the sheriff's reports, "all hell broke loose." At the end of the exchange of gunfire, 12 people were dead, 10 White and 2 Black. Subsequently the militants fled back into Greenwood shooting as they went. White rioters invaded Greenwood that night and the next morning, killing men and burning and looting stores and homes. Around noon on June 1, the Oklahoma National Guard imposed martial law, ending the massacre.

About 10,000 Black people were left homeless, and property damage amounted to more than $1.5 million in real estate and $750,000 in personal property, equivalent to $32.7 million today. Many survivors left Tulsa, while Black and White residents who stayed in the city largely kept silent about the terror, violence, and resulting losses for decades.

The massacre was largely omitted from local, state and national histories. Growing up white in a mostly-white suburb in the 1970s and '80s, I didn't learn about it until around 2000 or so. With the growth of the Black Lives Matter movement in the early 21st Century, the event has re-entered the national consciousness, including as a plot point in the 2017 TV miniseries version of Watchmen.

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May 31, 1921 was a Tuesday. It was the off-season for the NFL and the NHL. The NBA had not yet been founded. But a full slate of Major League Baseball games was played that day:

* The New York Yankees lost to the Washington Senators, 12-5 at Griffith Stadium. Waite Hoyt did not have good stuff, and allowed 7 runs in the 2nd inning. Tom Zachary went the distance for the Senators, despite giving up a home run to Babe Ruth in the 9th. In 1927, Ruth would hit a much more significant home run off Zachary, his 60th of the season.

* The New York Giants lost to the Philadelphia Phillies, 10-5 at the Polo Grounds.

* The Brooklyn Dodgers beat the Boston Braves, 4-2 at Braves Field in Boston.

* The Boston Red Sox swept a doubleheader from the Philadelphia Athletics, at Shibe Park in Philadelphia. The Sox won the opener 5-3, and the nightcap 8-4.

* The Chicago Cubs beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 7-6 in 12 innings, at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 6-5 in 10 innings, at Redland Field (later renamed Crosley Field) in Cincinnati.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Detroit Tigers, 7-4 at Navin Field in Detroit. This ballpark would be renamed Briggs Stadium in 1938 and Tiger Stadium in 1961.

* And the St. Louis Browns beat the Chicago White Sox, 8-7 at Comiskey Park in Chicago.