Ten-Page Eyewitness Account of the Destruction of Black Wall Street
In 2015, a ten-page manuscript was recovered and donated to the African-American History Museum.
Presented on yellow legal paper, typewritten, and folded in thirds, the words come from an eyewitness of what took place on May 31, 1921, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, when “Black Wall Street was brutally attacked.
The manuscript also tells of Buck Franklin’s encounters with a black veteran, Mr. Ross, in 1917.
The Tulsa race riot was a large-scale, racially-motivated conflict on May 31 and June 1, 1921, during which a group of whites attacked the local, prosperous black community.
However, had it not been for Buck Franklin, who fought his way to the Oklahoma Supreme Court to defeat a law that attempted to prevent blacks from rebuilding the community, it never would have occurred.
