Survivors seek justice 105 years after the Tulsa race massacre

Added: 2026-05-31

[00:00:00]Welcome back everyone. As we prepare to mark 105 years since the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, the events from that day still reverberate throughout a community seeking justice. ABC Senior National Correspondent Steve Osunsami takes a look back at the events that led to that fateful day and where justice and reparations stand for the victims.

[00:00:25]>> This is Oaklawn Cemetery here in Tulsa where it was long believed that there were 18 black men from the Tulsa riot who were killed who were buried here, but no one could ever find their bodies.

[00:00:39]>> [music] >> The people who are buried here one day walked out of their home, disappeared, and were never seen again.

[00:00:58]>> [music] >> Nearly a hundred years ago to the day, it was America's racism on full display.

[00:01:07]A mob of white neighbors here were on the black side of town shooting proud black families dead. The Greenwood neighborhood was under attack.

[00:01:18]>> Airplanes above us, bullets raining down all around us.

[00:01:24]>> And as we went out the door, you could see telephone poles falling, fire, and that's when I was >> Sister said, "Kenneth, the world on fire."

[00:01:33]>> And somehow over the many years, both the white mob and [music] their black victims, seen here with the guns at their backs, kept the massacre a secret.

[00:01:44]>> We never did discuss it, and we don't even know.

[00:01:52]>> [music] >> The Greenwood neighborhood in Tulsa, Oklahoma was the pride and joy of America's former slaves [music] in 1921.

[00:02:02]The shops and businesses did so well, they called it Black Wall Street.

[00:02:07]>> It was an extremely vibrant community.

[00:02:10]>> [music] >> Citizens could get anything that they wanted, you know, right near their homes. This was really quite the place.

[00:02:17]>> But there was resentment living on the other side of the railroad tracks that divided [music] the city.

[00:02:23]In the white neighborhoods, they like to call Greenwood Little Africa.

[00:02:29]The evening of May 30th was the beginning of the white lash. That's when Dick Rowland, a 19-year-old black shoe shiner, needed to use the so-called colored restroom downtown.

[00:02:42]It was on the top floor of the Drexel building, and a young white woman named Sarah Page was in charge of the elevator.

[00:02:49]>> We think as Dick walked on the elevator, he tripped. He automatically threw his hands out to break his fall, that he might have hooked his hand on Sarah Page's dress, that it tore, she screamed, and he ran out of the elevator.

[00:03:03]>> A white store clerk who heard her scream told police that Dick Rowland attacked her. They arrested him the next day. The word across town was that they were going to lynch this man.

[00:03:15]>> All I could see was black rolling smoke down south, [music] and the people going north. The crowd was just the whole back of the railroad track.

[00:03:26]>> The law, they never held anyone responsible for killing as many as 300 black Americans.

[00:03:37]>> From that night is where they burned that [music] night that we could see them burning the Negroes part of town.

[00:03:42]We saw them burning it.

[00:03:44]It was just terrible.

[00:03:47]>> The long road to justice for the last of the survivors of the Tulsa race massacre has not come to the end they wished.

[00:03:53]Before she died, we sat down with one of them, Ms. Viola Fletcher, and her attorney, Damario Solomon Simmons. They were suing for compensation for the property, family, and friends lost when a mob of white neighbors executed black Americans here more than 100 years ago.

[00:04:12]>> Is it safe to say you and the other survivors are pushing for payments?

[00:04:19]>> Yes, whatever it takes to replace our loss.

[00:04:23]Yes.

[00:04:23]>> In your lifetime?

[00:04:24]>> Yes, sir. While I'm living.

[00:04:28]>> Ms. Fletcher died last year. Only one survivor is still alive. The courts have rejected almost all of their claims. The U.S. Justice Department decided it could do nothing either.

[00:04:39]For now, the families have been given an apology from the city of Tulsa and a new museum that tells the truth of what happened here.