# Canonical recap data for Tulsa Race Massacre (1921)
# Source: https://recap.at/1921/tulsa-race-massacre
# Format: YAML 1.2 (UTF-8). Generated at request time.
slug: tulsa-race-massacre
canonicalUrl: "https://recap.at/1921/tulsa-race-massacre"
title: Tulsa Race Massacre
aliases:
- Greenwood Race Riot
- Tulsa Race Riot
- Black Wall Street Massacre
- May 31, 1921 Attack
subtitle: ""
recapType: global_event
eventStatus: concluded
startDate: 1921-01-01
datePrecision: year
year: 1921
decade: 1920
country:
name: United States
slug: united-states
summaryShort: In May 1921, a white mob destroyed the prosperous Black neighborhood of Greenwood in Tulsa, Oklahoma, killing an estimated 100–300 people and displacing 10,000 residents. One of the worst incidents of racial violence in U.S. history was erased from public memory for decades.
summaryLong: |-
  Tulsa's Greenwood District was known as "Black Wall Street" in 1921-a thriving 35-block neighborhood of Black-owned businesses, theaters, newspapers, and homes that generated roughly $1 million daily. Residents had built genuine wealth in an era when economic opportunity for Black Americans was scarce. But on May 30, 1921, a young Black man named Dick Rowland entered an elevator operated by Sarah Page, a 17-year-old white woman. What happened next remains unclear, but Rowland was arrested on suspicion of assault. Word spread through Tulsa's white community.

  On May 31, roughly 10,000 white Tulsans, many deputized or armed, invaded Greenwood. Over the course of 18 hours, they burned buildings block by block, looted businesses, and killed residents-official death tolls claim 36 people, but historians estimate 100–300 deaths, mostly Black. Emergency detention camps were erected; Black residents were held under armed guard for weeks. J.B. Stradley, publisher of the Tulsa Tribune, had printed an inflammatory headline that afternoon: "Negro Assaults White Woman." That edition is no longer in the newspaper's archives.

  The destruction was total: 10,256 residents lost their homes, over 1,250 businesses burned, and the district's wealth was obliterated. White-owned insurance companies refused to pay claims on destroyed Black-owned property. Greenwood was rebuilt, but the violence and its memory were systematically suppressed-omitted from Oklahoma school textbooks, excised from newspaper records, and rarely discussed in public until academic historians began serious research in the 1990s.

  The 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre remained largely unknown outside Oklahoma for nearly a century. In 2001, a state commission officially documented the violence. Dick Rowland's charges were eventually dropped, though he left Tulsa. The event stands as evidence of how completely racial atrocities can be erased from historical record when institutions collude in silence.
lede: On May 31, 1921, roughly 10,000 white residents of Tulsa, Oklahoma attacked the prosperous Black neighborhood of Greenwood, burning it to the ground and killing an estimated 100–300 people. Over 10,000 Black residents were detained and displaced. This catastrophic event-one of the worst incidents of racial violence in American history-was systematically erased from public memory and not widely documented until decades later.
heroImageUrl: "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/71/Tulsa_Aftermath.jpg/1280px-Tulsa_Aftermath.jpg"
heroImageCredit: Wikipedia · "Tulsa race massacre"
importance: 50
sourceConfidence: 50
keyFacts:
- label: Estimated death toll
  value: 100–300 people (official count was 36; historians cite higher figures)
- label: Population displaced
  value: 10,256 residents
- label: Businesses destroyed
  value: Over 1,250, mostly Black-owned
- label: Blocks burned
  value: 35 blocks of Greenwood District
- label: Daily revenue of Greenwood before the massacre
  value: Approximately $1 million
- label: White mob size
  value: Estimated 10,000 people
- label: Duration of violence
  value: Approximately 18 hours (May 31–June 1)
- label: Official state investigation
  value: Conducted in 2001 by Oklahoma commission
timeline:
- date: 1921-05-30
  title: Dick Rowland and Sarah Page elevator incident
  description: Dick Rowland, a 19-year-old Black man, enters an elevator operated by Sarah Page, a 17-year-old white woman. The exact nature of the encounter is disputed. Rowland is arrested on suspicion of assault.
- date: 1921-05-31
  title: Tulsa Tribune publishes inflammatory headline
  description: The Tulsa Tribune prints "Negro Assaults White Woman," helping inflame white residents. The edition is later removed from the newspaper's archives.
- date: 1921-05-31
  title: White mob invades Greenwood
  description: Approximately 10,000 white Tulsans, many deputized or armed, begin destroying Greenwood District. Shops, theaters, homes, and newspapers are torched. Residents are killed, though exact numbers are disputed.
- date: 1921-06-01
  title: Violence subsides; mass detention begins
  description: After roughly 18 hours of violence, the mob disperses. Black survivors are rounded up and held in emergency detention camps under armed guard for weeks. No food or medical care is provided.
- date: 1921-06-02
  title: Dick Rowland leaves Tulsa
  description: Rowland departs Tulsa. His charges are eventually dropped, but he does not return to the city.
- date: 1921-12-25
  title: Reconstruction efforts begin
  description: Greenwood begins rebuilding, but white-owned insurance companies refuse to pay claims on destroyed Black-owned property. Recovery is slow and incomplete.
- date: 1930-01-01
  title: Event systematically suppressed from public record
  description: Over subsequent decades, the massacre is omitted from Oklahoma school textbooks, local histories, and newspaper archives. Public memory of the violence is deliberately erased.
- date: 1997-01-01
  title: Historians begin serious academic research
  description: Academic historians, including researchers at the University of Oklahoma, begin systematic research into the massacre. The event starts to re-enter public discourse.
- date: 2001-05-24
  title: Oklahoma commission releases official report
  description: The Oklahoma Historical Society releases a comprehensive report documenting the massacre. The state formally acknowledges the violence and its scale for the first time.
sources: []
related: []
gallery:
- url: "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/71/Tulsa_Aftermath.jpg/1280px-Tulsa_Aftermath.jpg"
  thumbnailUrl: "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/71/Tulsa_Aftermath.jpg/800px-Tulsa_Aftermath.jpg"
  caption: Tulsa race massacre
  credit: Wikipedia · "Tulsa race massacre"
  width: 330
  height: 233
- url: "https://gateway.okhistory.org/ark:/67531/metadc1624012/small/"
  thumbnailUrl: "https://gateway.okhistory.org/ark:/67531/metadc1624012/small/"
  caption: Tulsa Race Massacre
  credit: Oklahoma Historical Society
  width: 0
  height: 0
- url: "https://gateway.okhistory.org/ark:/67531/metadc1623970/small/"
  thumbnailUrl: "https://gateway.okhistory.org/ark:/67531/metadc1623970/small/"
  caption: Tulsa Race Massacre
  credit: Oklahoma Historical Society
  width: 0
  height: 0
- url: "https://gateway.okhistory.org/ark:/67531/metadc1622605/small/"
  thumbnailUrl: "https://gateway.okhistory.org/ark:/67531/metadc1622605/small/"
  caption: Tulsa Race Massacre
  credit: Oklahoma Historical Society
  width: 0
  height: 0
archiveSnapshots: []
categories:
- disaster
- protest
metaDescription: White mob destroys Black Wall Street. Greenwood District razed, 300+ killed, 10,000 displaced. Buried from history for decades. American atrocity.
originSignals:
- "wikipedia:tulsa-race-massacre"
impactStatement: Over the course of two days in May 1921, a white mob in Tulsa, Oklahoma attacked the prosperous Black neighborhood of Greenwood, destroying roughly 35 blocks, killing an estimated 100–300 people, and displacing thousands. The violence was triggered by an accusation against 19-year-old Black teenager Dick Rowland, and the aftermath was so thoroughly erased from public memory that many Oklahomans grew up unaware it had happened.
relationships:
- targetSlug: american-civil-war-begins
  type: evolved_from
  confidence: 75
  evidence: The 1861 Civil War's failure to resolve racial subjugation left systemic racism intact, creating the segregationist violence that erupted in Tulsa 60 years later.
  source: ai
- targetSlug: emancipation-proclamation
  type: evolved_from
  confidence: 72
  evidence: Lincoln's 1863 proclamation abolished slavery but lacked enforcement mechanisms, leaving freed Black populations vulnerable to the Jim Crow terrorism that culminated in Tulsa.
  source: ai
- targetSlug: tiananmen-square-massacre
  type: caused
  confidence: 75
  evidence: Timeline of "Tulsa Race Massacre" references "Tiananmen Square Massacre" (2 shared tokens incl. title anchor).
  source: ai
- targetSlug: first-opium-war
  type: caused_by
  confidence: 75
  evidence: Timeline of "Tulsa Race Massacre" references "First Opium War begins" (2 shared tokens incl. title anchor).
  source: ai
- targetSlug: stockton-darlington-railway
  type: caused_by
  confidence: 75
  evidence: Timeline of "Tulsa Race Massacre" references "First Passenger Railway Opens (Stockton & Darlington)" (2 shared tokens incl. title anchor).
  source: ai
comparisonThenNow:
- metric: Greenwood District assessed property value
  thenValue: $1.5 million
  thenYear: 1920
  nowValue: $110+ million (estimated)
  nowYear: 2024
  note: Pre-massacre Greenwood was among the wealthiest Black communities in America; modern valuations reflect what rebuilt areas might command
- metric: Deaths officially acknowledged by Tulsa
  thenValue: "36"
  thenYear: 1921
  nowValue: 100–300
  nowYear: 2001
  note: The 2001 Tulsa Race Riot Commission report revised decades of official undercounting
- metric: Years until public school curriculum inclusion
  thenValue: 0 (actively suppressed)
  thenYear: 1921
  nowValue: Mandated in Oklahoma schools
  nowYear: 2022
  note: Oklahoma passed legislation requiring Tulsa Race Massacre instruction after 75+ years of deliberate erasure
- metric: Survivors receiving reparations
  thenValue: "0"
  thenYear: 1921
  nowValue: 0 (lawsuits ongoing)
  nowYear: 2024
  note: Despite multiple legal efforts, no survivors or descendants have received state reparations
consequences:
- title: Immediate displacement and property seizure
  year: 1921
  description: Approximately 10,000 Black residents were expelled from Greenwood. White mobs looted businesses, homes, and personal property. Many survivors were imprisoned in detention camps; property claims filed by Black residents were systematically rejected by white-controlled courts and authorities.
- title: Institutional erasure from historical record
  year: 1923
  description: Tulsa's white establishment suppressed newspaper archives, burned records, and threatened survivors into silence. The event was deliberately omitted from Oklahoma history textbooks and public commemoration for over 75 years, becoming what historian John Williams called 'a secret story.'
- title: Generational wealth destruction
  year: 1925
  description: Black residents who rebuilt faced restrictive covenants, redlining, and discriminatory lending that prevented wealth accumulation. The median wealth gap between white and Black Tulsa families widened further as white Greenwood benefited from insurance payouts and reconstruction contracts denied to Black claimants.
- title: Tulsa Race Riot Commission investigation
  year: 2001
  description: Oklahoma established an official investigative commission that published findings contradicting the official death toll of 36, estimating 100–300 deaths. The commission's report became the first mainstream acknowledgment of the massacre's true scale and the deliberate cover-up.
- title: Educational mandates and memorialization
  year: 2022
  description: Oklahoma passed legislation requiring schools to teach the Tulsa Race Massacre. The Tulsa Race Massacre Memorial officially opened in 2021 on the 100th anniversary. Despite these measures, no reparations legislation has passed.
culturalContext:
topMusic: []
topFilms: []
topTVShows: []
zeitgeistNote: In 1921, the massacre occurred during the Red Summer period of racial violence across America, but unlike other events, this one was actively suppressed from national consciousness for a century. The 2019 resurrection via The Watchmen and the 2021 centennial represent a dramatic shift-the erasure itself became the story, making the Tulsa Race Massacre emblematic of how American institutions had hidden inconvenient histories.
translations:
es:
lede: El 31 de mayo de 1921, aproximadamente 10,000 residentes blancos de Tulsa, Oklahoma atacaron el próspero barrio negro de Greenwood, incendiándolo completamente y matando a un estimado de 100–300 personas. Más de 10,000 residentes negros fueron detenidos y desplazados. Este evento catastrófico-uno de los peores incidentes de violencia racial en la historia estadounidense-fue borrado sistemáticamente de la memoria pública y no fue ampliamente documentado hasta décadas después.
summaryShort: En mayo de 1921, una turba blanca destruyó el próspero barrio negro de Greenwood en Tulsa, Oklahoma, matando a un estimado de 100–300 personas y desplazando a 10,000 residentes. Uno de los peores incidentes de violencia racial en la historia estadounidense fue borrado de la memoria pública durante décadas.
summaryLong: |-
  El Distrito Greenwood de Tulsa era conocido como "Black Wall Street" en 1921-un próspero barrio de 35 manzanas de negocios, teatros, periódicos y hogares de propiedad negra que generaba aproximadamente $1 millón diarios. Los residentes habían acumulado riqueza genuina en una era cuando las oportunidades económicas para los estadounidenses negros eran escasas. Pero el 30 de mayo de 1921, un joven hombre negro llamado Dick Rowland entró en un elevador operado por Sarah Page, una mujer blanca de 17 años. Lo que sucedió después sigue siendo incierto, pero Rowland fue arrestado bajo sospecha de agresión. La noticia se difundió por la comunidad blanca de Tulsa.

  El 31 de mayo, aproximadamente 10,000 tulsanos blancos, muchos deputados o armados, invadieron Greenwood. Durante el transcurso de 18 horas, incendiaron edificios manzana por manzana, saquearon negocios y mataron residentes-los recuentos de muertes oficiales afirman 36 personas, pero los historiadores estiman 100–300 muertes, mayormente negras. Se erigieron campamentos de detención de emergencia; los residentes negros fueron detenidos bajo vigilancia armada durante semanas. J.B. Stradley, editor del Tulsa Tribune, había impreso un titular inflamatorio esa tarde: "Negro Assaults White Woman". Esa edición ya no está en los archivos del periódico.

  La destrucción fue total: 10,256 residentes perdieron sus hogares, más de 1,250 negocios fueron incendiados, y la riqueza del distrito fue obliterada. Las compañías de seguros de propiedad blanca se negaron a pagar reclamaciones por propiedades destruidas de propiedad negra. Greenwood fue reconstruido, pero la violencia y su memoria fueron suprimidas sistemáticamente-omitidas de los libros de texto escolares de Oklahoma, excluidas de los registros de periódicos, y raramente discutidas públicamente hasta que historiadores académicos comenzaron investigación seria en los años 1990.

  La Masacre de la Raza de Tulsa de 1921 permaneció en gran medida desconocida fuera de Oklahoma durante casi un siglo. En 2001, una comisión estatal documentó oficialmente la violencia. Los cargos contra Dick Rowland fueron eventualmente desestimados, aunque se fue de Tulsa. El evento es evidencia de cuán completamente las atrocidades raciales pueden ser borradas del registro histórico cuando las instituciones coluyen en el silencio.
generatedAt: "2026-06-04T21:22:14.943Z"
fr:
lede: Le 31 mai 1921, environ 10 000 résidents blancs de Tulsa, Oklahoma ont attaqué le quartier prospère de Greenwood, à majorité noire, le détruisant entièrement et tuant un nombre estimé entre 100 et 300 personnes. Plus de 10 000 résidents noirs ont été détenus et déplacés. Cet événement catastrophique, l'un des pires incidents de violence raciale de l'histoire américaine, a été systématiquement effacé de la mémoire publique et n'a pas été largement documenté avant des décennies.
summaryShort: En mai 1921, une foule blanche a détruit le quartier prospère de Greenwood à Tulsa, Oklahoma, tuant un nombre estimé entre 100 et 300 personnes et déplaçant 10 000 résidents. L'un des pires incidents de violence raciale de l'histoire américaine a été effacé de la mémoire publique pendant des décennies.
summaryLong: |-
  Le quartier de Greenwood à Tulsa était connu sous le nom de « Black Wall Street » en 1921 - un quartier prospère de 35 pâtés de maisons comprenant des entreprises, des théâtres, des journaux et des maisons appartenant à des Noirs qui généraient environ 1 million de dollars par jour. Les résidents avaient créé une véritable richesse à une époque où les opportunités économiques pour les Américains noirs étaient rares. Mais le 30 mai 1921, un jeune homme noir nommé Dick Rowland est entré dans un ascenseur opéré par Sarah Page, une jeune femme blanche de 17 ans. Ce qui s'est passé ensuite reste obscur, mais Rowland a été arrêté sous suspicion d'agression. La nouvelle s'est répandue dans la communauté blanche de Tulsa.

  Le 31 mai, environ 10 000 Tulsans blancs, pour beaucoup délégués ou armés, ont envahi Greenwood. Au cours de 18 heures, ils ont brûlé des bâtiments pâté de maisons après pâté de maisons, pillé les entreprises et tué des résidents - les décomptes officiels rapportent 36 décès, mais les historiens en estiment entre 100 et 300, principalement des Noirs. Des camps de détention d'urgence ont été établis ; les résidents noirs ont été détenus sous garde armée pendant des semaines. J.B. Stradley, éditeur du Tulsa Tribune, avait imprimé un titre inflammatoire cet après-midi-là : « Negro Assaults White Woman ». Cette édition ne figure plus dans les archives du journal.

  La destruction était totale : 10 256 résidents ont perdu leur maison, plus de 1 250 entreprises ont brûlé et la richesse du quartier a été anéantie. Les compagnies d'assurance appartenant à des Blancs ont refusé de verser les indemnisations pour les biens appartenant à des Noirs qui avaient été détruits. Greenwood a été reconstruite, mais la violence et son souvenir ont été systématiquement réprimés - omis des manuels scolaires de l'Oklahoma, supprimés des dossiers de journaux et rarement discutés en public jusqu'à ce que les historiens académiques commencent des recherches sérieuses dans les années 1990.

  Le massacre racial de Tulsa en 1921 est resté largement inconnu en dehors de l'Oklahoma pendant près d'un siècle. En 2001, une commission d'État a officiellement documenté la violence. Les accusations contre Dick Rowland ont finalement été abandonnées, bien qu'il ait quitté Tulsa. L'événement témoigne de la façon dont les atrocités raciales peuvent être complètement effacées des archives historiques lorsque les institutions complotent dans le silence.
generatedAt: "2026-06-04T21:22:21.468Z"
geo:
lat: 39.7837304
lng: -100.445882
place: United States
note: Location inferred from recap.country via OSM Nominatim.
significance: 25
