Black Wall Street
Reading time: 6 – 9 minutes
Many African Americans moved to Oklahoma in the years before and after 1907, which is the year when Oklahoma became a state. Oklahoma represented change and provided a chance for African Americans to get away from slavery and the harsh racism of their previous homes.Most of them traveled from the states in the south where racism was very prevalent, and Oklahoma offered hope and provided all people with a chance to start over. They traveled to Oklahoma by wagons, horses, trains, and even on foot.
When Tulsa became a booming and rather well noted town in the United States, the residents and government attempted to leave out important aspects of the city. Many people considered Tulsa to be two separate cities rather than one city of united communities. The white residents of Tulsa referred to the area north of the Frisco railroad tracks as “Little Africa” and other derogatory names. They were threatened by the success of the African American community and worried that the community might continue to grow. This community later acquired the name Greenwood and in 1921 it was home to about 10,000 African American men, women, and children.
Greenwood was centered on a street known as Greenwood Avenue. This street was important because it ran north for 
over a mile from the Frisco Railroad yards, and it was one of the few streets that did not cross through both black and white neighborhoods. The citizens of Greenwood took pride in this fact because it was something they had all to themselves and did not have to share with the white community of Tulsa. Greenwood Avenue was home to the African American commercial district with many red brick buildings. These buildings belonged to African Americans and they were thriving businesses, including grocery stores, clothing stores, barber shops, and much more. Greenwood was one of the most affluent communities and became known as “Black Wall Street.”
During the oil boom of the 1910s, the area of northeast Oklahoma around Tulsa flourished—including the Greenwood neighborhood, which came to be known as “the Negro Wall Street” (now commonly referred to as “the Black Wall Street”) The area was home to several prominent black businessmen, many of them multimillionaires. Greenwood boasted a variety of thriving businesses that were very successful up until the Tulsa Race Riot. Not only did African Americans want to contribute to the success of their own shops, but also the racial segregation laws prevented them from shopping anywhere else other than Greenwood.
The buildings on Greenwood Avenue housed the offices of almost all of Tulsa’s black lawyers, realtors, doctors, and other professionals. In Tulsa at the time of the riot, there were fifteen well-known African American physicians, one of whom was considered the “most able Negro surgeon in America” by one of the Mayo brothers. Greenwood published two newspapers, the Tulsa Star and the Oklahoma Sun, which covered not only Tulsa, but also state and national news and elections.
One of the nation’s worst acts of racial violence—the Tulsa Race Riot—occurred there on June 1, 1921, when 35 square blocks of homes and businesses were torched by mobs of angry whites. The riot began because of an alleged assault of a white woman, Sarah Page, by an African American man, Dick Rowland. This incident produced even more hatred between the whites and the blacks even though there was no proof of the assault. The case was simply a white woman’s word against a black man’s word. The Tulsa Tribune got word of the incident and published the story in the paper on May 31, 1921. Shortly after the newspaper article surfaced, there was news that a white lynch mob was going to take matters into its own hands and kill Dick Rowland.
African American men began to arm themselves and join forces in order to protect Dick Rowland; 
however, this action prompted white men to arm themselves and confront the group of African American men. There was an argument in which a white man tried to take a gun from a black man, and the gun fired a bullet up into the sky. This incident promoted many others to fire their guns, and the violence erupted on the evening of May 31, 1921. Whites flooded into the Greenwood district and destroyed the businesses and homes of African American residents. No one was exempt to the violence of the white mobs; men, women, and even children were killed by the mobs.
Troops were deployed on the afternoon of June 1st, but by that time there was not much left of the once thriving Greenwood district. Over 600 successful businesses were lost. Among these were 21 churches, 21 restaurants, 30 grocery stores and two movie theaters, plus a hospital, a bank, a post office, libraries, schools, law offices, a half-dozen private airplanes and even a bus system. Property damage totaled $1.5 million (1921). Although the official death toll claimed that 26 blacks and 13 whites died during the fighting, most estimates are considerably higher.
After the riot had ended the Tulsa Tribune published another controversial article, which discussed not allowing the Greenwood district to be rebuilt. It brutally spoke about the once thriving African American community and the article made it clear that the city of Tulsa did not want to recreate the prosperity that Greenwood once possessed. But the citizens of Greenwood refused to allow a newspaper article to prevent them from rebuilding their lives. It was not an easy effort to rebuild the community out of the ashes but the residents of Greenwood were not going to allow anyone to kick them while they were down, and instead they chose to stand up among the wreckage and restore their homes and businesses. The strong religious faith of the African Americans provided support for each person and allowed them to join together in the faith that they could get their lives back.
The community mobilized its resources and rebuilt the Greenwood area within five years of the Tulsa Race Riot and the neighborhood was a hotbed of jazz and blues in the 1920s.However, the neighborhood fell prey to an economic and population drain in the 1960s, and much of the area was leveled during urban renewal in the early 1970s to make way for a highway loop around the downtown district. Several blocks of the old neighborhood around the intersection of Greenwood Ave. and Archer St. were saved from demolition and have been restored, forming part of the Greenwood Historical District.
Black Wallstreet: The Tulsa Riots pt 1
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Thanks for pointing out how the people of Tulsa rebuilt after being torn down. If they weren’t scared to do this back in 1900s, why are we scared?
I’m tired of cowards in our community who say if Black folks do something positive and constructive, they going to come and take us out or tear us down. These are the same cowards you can check back on year to year and see they still doing the same ish, different day.
As much as some of our people hate to hear it, the reason Black Wall Street thrive is because of consumerism, not the business owners. The type of business they built after the riot were boutiques that were sensitive to the economy, kinda like what most brothas and sistas do nowadays.
Ed people are scared period! You have to get a association of businessman to build it because people who don’t think of money in those terms only see it as a burden more than a blessing!
Well the type of businesses listed are consumer driven so I’ll give you that but you still need the businessman to open up shop! Restaraunts, hospitals, banks and grocery stores require a certain level of thinking on money. For cats to have private airplanes and a bus system requires real money knowledge.
I wanted to point out that these were NOT a bunch of cowardice Blacks who didn’t fight back! They built their own without worrying and even taking pride that they didn’t need white dollars to make it. They weren’t looking to do partnerships with Starbucks and bring them into their neighborhood. They had their own banks, grocery stores, law offices, libraries and hospitals without one white dime.
Whenever I tell people to do for self they always think I am so short sighted but we have our money and thus our own economy! The issue to me is gathering enough businessman and women to take over a area instead of just trying to get put on at the Bank of America building!
Thanks Freeman. I think we all heard about BWS but I never got a full accounting of what they actually built. Plus I didn’t know they rebuilt it 5 years later! The brothers came to the other cats defense and that’s definitely something we don’t hear about when it comes to BWS. We just hear they burned down their town and shot them with propeller planes. Thanks again!
As much as I like the advice you give, I think I like these historical pieces even more. I wish more people would read this. Maybe you should make it into a rap song or something so young cats will know they can do more than wear oversized white t-shirts and “make it rain” (sarcasm).
Keep up the good work.
@No.Cal – I think a lot of us heard about it but few really dig deep. They had me fooled to because I kept thinking what kind of MOFO just lets cats come and run them out of town and lynch them. If we are going to die might as well buss back ya dig! Sometimes it takes a little bit more investigation of our own past to find out what was reported was told in a way to make us look weak.
@TrueMan – Well since I try to find them every Thursday it makes me go and do some digging on my own. So I enjoy somewhat forcing myself to know more than the average cat.
I don’t know about rap because cats can see when it’s phony from a mile away. The last one to do it was KRS-1 and that was during the era of those Africa pendants so the populace was ready to receive. We just have to start teaching our kids earlier because I don’t remember what the hell Albert Einstein really did and it’s significance but I remember his name. So we just have to start letting them identify with our own past and then they can dig deeper later.
Unlike Rosewood – Tulsa rebuilt.
I once ran a (primarily) Black Jazz and Blues club that was vandalized with racist graffiti after we’d closed.
The next day, when the owners showed up to open the place, I arrived to see them sitting in their car crying.
The club was down the street from a multi-million dollar (primarily white) entertainment development that was losing money.
As their partrons would pass by, they would see our lots full of Benzes, BMWs, Jags, Hummers, etc. all owned by our Black patrons.
(These were older Blacks who bought their cars with cash.)
After a while, many of the prominant whites started coming to our club and leaving the other (white) area to the kids.
After this, the owners wanted to close the club down.
I sent them home and opened the club anyway.
I called the local television and radio stations and the local news papers to give them a heads-up before calling the police.
Fearing embarrassment, the city had the building cleaned and repainted before we opened the next day.
Even though I finished my contract to run the club – I still enjoy it when some white people get mad that all these brotha’s are doing better than themselves (and for a lower start up cost).
I actually saw the documentary Of Black Wall Street that was at a local Movie Store and No where in that documentary did they have this ending! I’m like everybody else Thank you for posting it because the documentary I saw had Blacks looking weak and defenseless. They highlight whites that had come back from the World War and had strategically took Tulsa block by block from the Blacks and had the planes flight like they were dropping bombs or something. They also had the Governor of Oklahoma refusing to accept aid from the Government to Help rebuild the city. I am so glad you shredded light on the other side of the story. Because I was fusious seeing white women walk away with furs and nice clothes of the black women and men homes they ramshackled.
I am glad you did do the research it makes me not even take documentary as the only truth.
Just like (almost) everybody else, I had no idea that they rebuilt. All I’ve ever heard is how the Black folks there were just victimized. And just like you, I’ve always wondered why (if they were so rich) they couldn’t have bought some guns and fought back. Apparently they did. But as usual, our history is always told in terms of us being weak or just screwing up.
@UBJ – You are indeed a cat who has seen a lot. I guess you can sit there and cry or you can reopen. I liked the angle of letting the television stations know because it’s one thing we know “White People do no like to be seen as racist” they don’t even want any hints of it around them. I’m surprised you didn’t get a candlelight vigil! LOL
It’s not just a race thing as anyone who is doing better will have to defend their hustle against people who really hate you. I’m just glad you could see past it and not get caught up in feeling sorry. Sometimes we just have to start building again but this time keep a gun!
@Freedom – I just took the article primarily from the internet then I went to the Greenwood cultural center online and copied and pasted stuff to make it all succinct. I’m not a deep researcher as much as I just take about a week to put up some of the articles for Black History. I just want to make sure I put them up there the right way.
I guess you never know what people will discover because I wanted people to see what kind of businesses they had open. Stuff that we can do right now and really what I advocate on this blog they made a whole thriving community off of. I was more amazed with 30 grocery stores and a bus line! But that’s just me
We all know history keeps on making look like we were running for our lives. Like we didn’t have the same anger that you and I have right now for someone coming to take my stuff away from me. They want to paint us as docile so they can control your thinking when naturally you should get mad. Hopefully it makes people investigate 2 more articles deeper or at least go to the society that is trying to preserve the TRUTH!
@Carl – I’m with you I didn’t know they rebuilt either and now that I know it makes me look at that time in history a bit different. We just have to tell the truth by exposing one lie at a time. What’s shocking is our “so called” leaders have not investigated the truth for thierselves. The Blind leading the Blind!
I too am more impressed by ALL the businesses they had at that time and the fact that thewy rebuilt(almost)all of them Back.
None of that was highlighted in the documentary I saw. I had wondered why it was called the “Black Wall Street” but never took the time to do my own research. I know it is not about some deep thing but looking things up for yourself.
And please understand that I do know this site is geared towards “REAL TALK ABOUT REAL MONEY THE AFRICAN-AMERICAN WAY!” and I will govern myself accordingly in future
Yeah, all we ever know about Tulsa is the riots but not the businesses. We don’t know what these guys built and how they did it. We don’t know any of that stuff. We know it’s Black Wall St but no one tells us WHY except the riots.
You don’t have to govern yourself that’s up there to let people know I’m not talking in terms of the world. When I talk about business it’s more catered toward how Black people can do for self. If I didn’t everyone would wonder why I state that I’m Black and include Black history in my explanations.