First published 2014
In May 1921, thousands of white residents stormed through Tulsa's Greenwood district, killing hundreds of Black citizens and destroying an entire neighborhood. James Hirsch examines how this massacre happened and why America forgot it for decades. He traces the Jim Crow system that enabled the violence and documents how officials destroyed records and silenced witnesses. The book follows Greenwood survivors as they rebuilt despite official obstruction while white Tulsa embraced the Ku Klux Klan. Hirsch shows how the economic divide between Black and white communities deepened over decades, with urban renewal completing the destruction the riot began. He also reveals how the massacre's memory paradoxically prevented further racial violence in Tulsa during the turbulent 1960s. The author brings the story to the present, chronicling how academics and citizens gradually uncovered evidence of the atrocity and how Tulsa became central to debates over reparations. This account connects the Tulsa massacre to other racial violence at Rosewood, Selma, and Watts while exploring the tension between justice and reconciliation in contemporary America.
Genres: historical-fiction, 20th-century, non-fiction, 21st-century, african-american-historical-fiction, american-history
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: historical-fiction, social-issues
Setting: Greenwood, Tulsa
Period: 1921, 1960s
384 pages · Kindle Edition · Mariner Books
Content warnings: racism, violence