Tulsa massacre victims deserve Oklahoma’s honor, just like Kirk

Each year, Oklahoma leaders seem content to let June pass by without ordering our state’s flags be lowered in remembrance of one of the worst acts of racial violence in our nation’s history: the Tulsa Race Massacre.

In fact, for at least the past decade, a review of state records shows governors haven’t typically issued executive orders requiring flags be lowered to half-staff to commemorate the anniversary of the attack, including during the 100th-anniversary events in 2021 that drew thousands to Tulsa.

The omission feels purposeful. Oklahoma officials lower flags frequently to memorialize the fallen of 9/11, the Oklahoma City bombing, the Pearl Harbor attack, the Vietnam War, Peace Officers Memorial Day and for federal holidays such as Veterans Day and Memorial Day. We, as a state, show this sign of reverence after the deaths of state and federal officials, judges, firefighters, soldiers, astronauts, law enforcement officers and even students killed in mass shootings at schools outside of Oklahoma.

But not on June 1 each year. That’s the date of the culmination of a White mob looting and burning 35 blocks of homes and businesses in Tulsa’s affluent Black neighborhood of Greenwood from May 31 through June 1, 1921. Until then, it had been a Black cultural and economic hub known as “Black Wall Street.” Records show at least three dozen residents were killed, but some estimates indicate that the number of dead could be in the hundreds. Up to 1,200 homes were destroyed.

Apparently, June 1 is a day that many of our state leaders would rather forget.

So a pastor in Tulsa believes she should take matters into her own hands to force our state to remember those victims, too.

Francetta L. Mays, who works at Vernon AME Church in Greenwood, is running a petition to get a measure on the ballot that would designate June 1 each year as “Greenwood Remembrance and Reconciliation Day.”

And this isn’t just to remember history from a century ago. There are believed to be at least two survivors still living. Experts, including the University of Oklahoma’s Oklahoma Archaeological Survey, have been excavating a cemetery in the area to search for more victims who might have been killed to get a more accurate count of the deaths. Some historians say that some victims were hastily buried in unmarked graves and the true death toll may be much higher.

Passing a law creating a day of remembrance seems like something lawmakers could easily do to acknowledge the event. Instead, Mays is being forced to collect over 92,000 signatures to even get the measure before voters.

It’s puzzling in a state whose lawmakers are willing to commemorate many others who were slain.

If you don’t believe me, check out what they’re already trying to do to honor Charlie Kirk, the close ally of President Donald Trump, who was assassinated while holding an event at a Utah college this month.

Kirk hadn’t even been laid to rest in his home state of Arizona before Sen. Shane Jett, R-Shawnee, filed legislation to declare Oct. 14 as “Charlie Kirk Free Speech Day.” He also filed a bill that would require every public college and university in the state to develop a prominent area and name it the “Charlie Kirk Memorial Plaza.” Additionally, he wants these institutions to erect a statue of Kirk. He’s also filed a proposal seeking to recognize Kirk as a martyr for “truth, faith and free speech.”

The Oklahoma State Republican Party, meanwhile, wants lawmakers to create a state holiday in Kirk’s honor, with the party chair saying that “we feel like his death should be commemorated and is no different than Martin Luther King, or any other civil rights activist.”

Let’s not forget that Oklahoma doesn’t have state holidays to honor former U.S. Presidents John F. Kennedy and Abraham Lincoln, who were both assassinated, and also very influential in their own ways. Lincoln, after all, is credited with helping end slavery in America.

Our leaders can muster up the energy to honor Kirk, but we can’t do the same to honor the victims and survivors of the Tulsa Race Massacre —

This is a legacy that causes discomfort, and we’ve treated it like a dirty family secret.

people who lived here?

It doesn’t seem that complicated. In fact, it seems laudable.

But perhaps it’s easier for lawmakers to ignore this night of terror. We’re a state, after all, whose lawmakers passed a law that bars teaching topics that cause feelings of “discomfort, guilt, anguish or any other form of psychological distress.”

This is a legacy that causes discomfort, and we’ve treated it like a dirty family secret.

It wasn’t until the 100th anniversary of the rampage approached that I learned about it for the first time. Historians believe the incident was sparked by a 19-year-old Black man accidentally stepping on the foot of a 17-year-old white female elevator operator. Misinformation quickly spread about what happened in that elevator, and a newspaper reported that the man had attempted to sexually assault the teen. Historians say the paper also published an editorial promoting lynching.

It took decades before the massacre was first required to be taught, but in 2002 there was little guidance about how it should be taught. In 2019, education leaders fixed that to include required content in various grades. Sometimes I wonder though how those lessons can be taught without running afoul of state law.

It seems like lawmakers are A-OK with remembering one horror, Charlie Kirk’s killing, over another, the race massacre.

If that’s the case, that leaves us with a quandary. How should we choose the lives we remember and honor?

Janelle Stecklein is editor of Oklahoma Voice. An award-winning journalist, Stecklein has been covering Oklahoma government and politics since moving to the state in 2014. Oklahoma Voice is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.