One hundred years after the Tulsa massacre, the biggest attack …

The memory of the flames and the dead was as terrible as the decades of official silence. The city of Tulsa, state of Oklahoma, commemorates the largest racial massacre in the history of the last century in the United States, when in 1921, a mob of white men burned down and completely sacked Greenwood, one of the most prosperous African-American neighborhoods of the time. The horror unfolded after an encounter in an elevator in which a teenager accused a young black man of assaulting her, but it never mattered much. Between May 31 and June 1, 1921, a crowd of white men, in collusion with the National Guard, razed, looted and burned more than 1,200 housesndas of Greenwood.

The exact death toll is unknown as no one wanted to seriously investigate until now, although historians place the deceased at at least 300. Not a single person has been arrested or charged for what happened in this city in the middle of the United Statesand no compensation was paid to families who lost their homes and belongings. President Joe Biden will pay tribute this Tuesday a late tribute to the hundreds of African Americans slaughtered exactly 100 years ago.

On May 31, 1921, news of the arrest in Tulsa of 19-year-old African American Dick Rowland accused of assaulting 18-year-old white girl Sarah Page drew hundreds of gunmen. at the door. from the courtyard to demand that the authorities surrender the accused. Fearing lynching, some 75 members of the black community came to one place to defend Rowland. Another group of African-American World War I veterans joined him in protecting the life of the humble shoe shiner.

The tension increased and the first shots were fired. This initial fight left 12 dead. Black residents fled to the Greenwood neighborhood, known at the time as “Black Wall Street” for its large number of African-American-owned businesses. The next day and at dawn, White men looted and burned buildings, chasing and beating black people who lived there, and leaving hundreds of corpses dumped in the streets.

The police not only did not intervene but joined in the planned destruction. And when the attacks ended, hundreds of African descendants were taken at gunpoint to camps where they were held for weeks at forced labor.

Only three survivors of this atrocious massacre remain, all children at the time and direct witnesses to the horror. One of these three people is Viola Fletcher, 107, who appeared before Congress a few days ago, where he attacked the oblivion of all these decades. “We and our history have been forgotten, erased. (…) Our country can forget this story, but I can’t. I won’t and the other survivors won’t, our descendants won’t, ”he defiantly told lawmakers in the room.

“I will never forget the violence of white groups. I still see black men shot in the streets.”, he expressed. “I can still smell the smoke and see the fire. I can still see the black stores burning. I can still hear the planes flying overhead. I still hear the screamsAdded the woman who, at the time of the tragedy, was barely seven years old.

the Fletcher’s brother Hughes Van Ellis, now 100 years old and who had just been born when the attacks took place, said that the black families who survived the horror had nothing left, expelled and refugees in their own country. “We call for justice for a lifetime of persistent harm”Van Ellis assured. “Give us the opportunity to be whole. Please don’t leave this land without justice,” he added.

According to an official investigation conducted by the state of Oklahoma, the results of which were not known until 2001, The massacre left 39 confirmed deaths, most of them black, although he estimated the actual death toll to range from 75 to 300. More than 800 people were treated in hospitals, more than 1,200 houses were set on fire and more than 10,000 residents of the neighborhood were left homeless. In addition, hundreds of local businesses have been demolished.

In this same report it was not clear what exactly happened when Rowland and Page met briefly in the elevator. from a building where she worked as an elevator operator on May 30, 1921. Page was questioned by police and said she would not press charges. Police determined that there had been no attack, but shoe shiner Rowland was arrested the next day because he feared for his life.

According to witnesses and some historians, many targets involved in the violent riots, including members of the Ku Klux Klan, were armed by the local commissioner himself. The lawsuit to seek reparations from the victims argues that the national guard, which has been called upon to contain violence, participated in the massacre described by American historian John Hope Franklin as an “American pogrom”.

One hundred years later, the city of 400 thousand inhabitants, which maintains about 15 percent of the black population, still with the wound open. Last year the then president Donald trump stirred up tensions when held a campaign rally in Tulsa on June 21, presenting himself as the candidate of “law and order” in the midst of a strong repudiation of racism and police violence.

Perhaps a small first step so that this tragedy is not forgotten is Visit of President Joe Biden to Tulsa this Tuesday. It will be the first US president to visit the city on this special dateAnd it does so after the wave of racial justice protests that lived in the country last year, sparked by the murder of African American George Floyd at the hands of a white policeman in Minneapolis.

One hundred years after the massacre, at the foot of modern buildings on a street in Greenwood, inconspicuous metal plaques bear the names of businesses that were owned by blacks in this affluent area of ​​Tulsa at the time: “Shoemaker Grier” or “Real Estate Earl” are just a few of the inscriptions that can be read.

An urban planning policy led by the city of Tulsa since the 60s ended up evicting the black owners whose houses or businesses, considered dilapidated, were demolished to make way for new buildings. The construction of a seven-lane freeway crossing the center of Main Street has finished disfiguring the neighborhood.

At the Black Wall Street Liquid Lounge cafe, Kode Ransom smiles every time he greets a customer. “Back when Greenwood was Greenwood, you had 40 blocks, and now it’s all condensed into a half street … And even that half street is still not really black on Wall Street. “says the 32-year-old African-American entrepreneur. With Democrat Biden’s city tour, and after a year marked by the Black Lives Matter movement, the Tulsa massacre resonates more than ever in the United States.