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One of the worst incidents of racial violence in American history occurred 100 years ago, May 31-June 1, 1921. Known as the Tulsa Race Massacre, a mob of white residents set fire to “Black Wall Street” – hundreds of Black-owned businesses and homes in the Greenwood district of Tulsa, Oklahoma – killing an estimated 100-300 Black residents and leaving an estimated 10,000 Black residents homeless. The new documentary Tulsa: The Fire and the Forgotten, premiering Monday, May 31 at 9 p.m. on PBS (check local listings), pbs.org and the PBS Video app, examines this deadly assault on the 100th anniversary of the crime in the context of other racial massacres and police killings, including the one-year anniversary of the killing of George Floyd (May 25, 2020).<\/p>\n
This explosion of racial terror was compounded by the silence that followed. No one was punished for the crimes committed, and history textbooks often made no reference to them, so many Americans are still unaware of this history. In Tulsa: The Fire and the Forgotten<\/em>, The Washington Post reporter DeNeen L. Brown interviews descendants of Greenwood residents and business owners and today’s community activists. She asks them about the city’s 2018 decision to search for mass graves from 1921, community demands for reparations, and today’s efforts to revive the Black district of Greenwood through education, technology, business development, and more. The documentary also explores issues of atonement, reconciliation, and reparation in the past, present, and future through the historical lens of white violence and Black resistance.<\/p>