A Lynched Black Wall Street

This book remembers one hundred years since Black Wall Street

Reflecting on the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, Black Wall Street was the most successful Black business district in the United States. However, due to racism, it remained isolated from the prospering white oil town of Tulsa, Oklahoma.

During the early twentieth century, African-Americans lived under the constant threat posed by white supremacy, lynchings, and the oppressive Jim and Jane Crow laws. This text delves deep, adopting a Womanist perspective, to discuss the moral dilemmas surrounding Black ontology and the existential challenges faced by Black Americans in their quest to live as equals alongside white Americans.

This flourishing Black business district and residential area faced destruction at the hands of white terror, hatred, envy, and the exertion of hegemonic power. Such acts of terrorism were historically rooted in false narratives of Black inferiority and were often legitimized by law and white supremacist ideologies.

Disturbingly, such forms of terror persist and continue to haunt the lived experiences of African-Americans in contemporary times. This research further investigates the relationships between Native Americans and African-Americans, the migration of Black populations to the west, the pivotal role of religion, the invaluable contributions of Black women, the horrifying history of lynching, and the unwavering resilience demonstrated by Black Americans throughout history.