Tulsa, 2021: A Massacre's Centennial and a Nation's Reckoning

Summary

2021: As the centennial of one of the nation's worst race massacres approached, citizens of Tulsa faced the prospect with hope and dread. Hope that the anniversary would show Tulsa had changed since that day, when a white mob left the city's thriving African American Greenwood neighborhood a smoldering ruin. Dread that Tulsa's faults would be exposed as never before, its racism reinforced rather than mitigated. The anniversary was even more fraught than expected. Tulsa, 2021 offers a deeply informed, behind-the-scenes view of how Tulsans and Americans met that moment of crisis, and what the experience can tell us about racial politics today.

Randy Krehbiel brings a keen eye and an insider's understanding to the story of a city contending with racial and urban stresses that are both unique to Oklahoma and indicative of larger trends. The conflicts he uncovers were not split entirely along racial lines, but often revolved around the power of political messaging to shape public opinion. His picture of Tulsa in 2021 reveals how politics, unacknowledged racism, and fear destroyed or damaged promising relationships between white Republican leaders and Black, mostly Democratic Tulsans.

In 1921, factions of whites and Blacks fought to control the narrative of the Tulsa Race Massacre. As Tulsa, 2021 demonstrates, the struggle continues.