Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Friday, June 17, 2011
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
The 90th anniversary of the Tulsa Race Riot
Oklahoma had been plagued by lynchings
The Tulsa race riot was a large-scale racially motivated conflict between the white and black communities of Tulsa, Oklahoma, including aerial attack, beginning May 31, 1921. During the 16 hours of the assault, over 800 people were admitted to local hospitals with injuries,more than 6000 Greenwood residents were arrested and detained in a prison camp, an estimated 10,000 were left homeless, and 35 city blocks composed of 1,256 residences were destroyed by fire caused by bombing.
The Tulsa race riot occurred in the racially and politically tense atmosphere of northeastern Oklahoma, some of which was a growing hotbed of anti-black sentiment at that time. The Ku Klux Klan made its first major appearance in Oklahoma on August 12, 1921, less than three months after the riot.
As in several other states and territories during the early years of the twentieth century, lynchings were not uncommon in Oklahoma. Between the declaration of statehood on November 16, 1907, and the Tulsa race riot some thirteen years later, thirty-one individuals — twenty-six of whom were black — were lynched in Oklahoma. During the twenty years following the riot, the number of lynchings statewide fell to two.
Tulsa-Greenwood before the riot
Greenwood, Okla.: The Legacy of the Tulsa Race Riot
In 1921, Greenwood, a successful, all-black enclave in Tulsa, was the site of the deadliest race riot in U.S. history. For the inhabitants of "the Black Wall Street," life would never be the same.
- By: Monée Fields-White | Posted: February 24, 2011 at 9:50 AM
- Monée Fields-White is a Chicago-based writer who covers a wide array of topics, including business and economic news.
The 90th anniversary of the Tulsa Race Riot on May 31, 2011, here's the story of a sad chapter of American history, pulled from The Root's archives.
J.B. Stradford, the son of a freed Kentucky slave, rose to prominence in Oklahoma during the early 1900s as one of the key developers of the all-black Tulsa enclave Greenwood. A lawyer and businessman, Stradford owned the 65-room hotel that sat right in the heart of the thriving community that would later become known as "the Black Wall Street."
But in a single day, all of that would change. On May 31, 1921, the arrest of a young black man on a questionable charge of assaulting a young white woman touched off the deadliest race riot in U.S. history. Whites charged through the community in retaliation, leaving an estimated 300 people dead, another 10,000 black residents homeless and 35 city blocks in ruin.
Stradford and 69 other black men were subsequently charged with inciting the riot. Stradford, however, jumped bail after his arrest and fled Tulsa for Kentucky. According to his great-granddaughter Laurel Stradford, his son (her grandfather), who was also a lawyer, used legal maneuvering to help his father avoid having to stand trial, including filing a petition for a writ of habeas corpus to keep him from being unlawfully detained.
"When I was a little girl, our grandmother used to tell us that J.B. had said that there was no greater gift that a man can be given than to have a son who saves his father's life," says Laurel Stradford. "There would be a lot of remembrance of my great-grandpa and the role he played in Tulsa, and the role my grandpa had in getting him free from being lynched."
But although J.B. -- who went on to run a successful law practice in Chicago -- managed to avoid facing "justice" in Oklahoma (he never returned to the state), the charges hung over him until he died. The Stradford family fought to clear J.B., but it wasn't until 1996 -- 75 years after the riot, and six decades after his death in 1935 in Chicago at the age of 75 -- that he was cleared of all charges. (Ultimately, none of the men indicted were convicted of anything.)
That 75th-anniversary year was also when the nation learned about the Tulsa Race Riot, which would come to be considered the most destructive race riot in U.S. history. "For years, silence engulfed this incident," says Hannibal B. Johnson, author of Black Wall Street: From Riot to Renaissance in Tulsa's Historic Greenwood. "In 1921, Tulsa was booming, so anything that would detract from its allure, such as the riot, was minimized."
A Black Mecca
Indeed, Tulsa had been attracting thousands -- blacks and whites -- to the rich oil fields. By 1920, the overall population had swelled to more than 100,000 residents. Black Americans, migrating from Southern states as far as Georgia and Mississippi, were also attempting to escape the harsh realities of Southern racism. But old Jim Crow laws followed them northwest. Tulsa was divided into two cities. Whites held court in the southern end of the city, closer to the larger main downtown area, while African Americans were segregated in the northern section of town.
The racial split, however, gave rise to black Tulsans' famed entrepreneurial mecca. Anchored by Greenwood Avenue, black-owned businesses stretched along the more than mile-long roadway. They included grocery stores, restaurants, medical and law offices, and two newspapers. Many black entrepreneurs in addition to Stradford -- including real estate developer and Greenwood founder O.W. Gurley -- thrived and reached regional and even national stature. Booker T. Washington, who had lectured in Tulsa, was the first to call Greenwood "the Negro's Wall Street." That moniker later became "the Black Wall Street."
Many white Tulsans, who referred to the district as "Little Africa," were not happy about the growth and prosperity of the community, according to Andrew Rosa, assistant professor of history at Oklahoma State University. "You had a pretty stable, upwardly mobile people in Greenwood, and the city's whites had their eye on Greenwood," says Rosa. "That was sort of the spirit of the friction."
White Rage Unleashed
The underlying racial and economic tension finally boiled over on May 30, 1921. Dick Rowland, a 19-year-old shoe shiner in downtown Tulsa, had gone to use the only bathroom for blacks, located at the top of an office building. He crossed paths with white elevator operator Sarah Page, 17, whom a store clerk claimed to have heard scream. The clerk said that he found a distraught Page and saw a young black man running from the building. There is no record of what Page told the police.
Rowland was arrested but never charged. The incident, however, made the front page of the Tulsa Tribune -- along with an editorial entitled, "To Lynch Negro Tonight."
Right before dawn on June 1, a mob of nearly 10,000 white men launched an all-out assault on the Greenwood District, systematically burning down every home and business. They dropped firebombs and shot at blacks from planes that had been used in World War I. Those blacks who were captured were held in internment camps around the city by the local police and National Guard units.
Martial law was eventually declared. The National Guard confirmed that 37 blacks and whites were killed, although historians (pdf) have put that number at closer to 300. Many of the dead black Americans were buried in unmarked graves around town, and some were laid to rest in an anonymous section of Tulsa's Oak Lawn cemetery. Some photographers made their pictures of the dead into postcards.
The riot "just shows you how irrelevant, not only from the view of Oklahoma but that of the nation as a whole, black life was. It was seen as expendable," says Rosa.
After the riot, black Tulsans, who were living in tents and forced to wear green identification tags in order to work downtown, still managed to turn the tragedy into triumph. Without state help, they rebuilt Greenwood, and by 1942 the community had more than 240 black-owned businesses.
Justice Denied
In subsequent decades, however, the community declined as the pioneers of Greenwood died and many of their descendants moved away. The district struggled most critically during the 1960s as Tulsa became more integrated, which led to a decline in the Greenwood population and also undermined many of the local black family-run businesses. In the 1970s, a large segment of Greenwood was demolished to make way for an interstate highway that became a main connector for the downtown area.
An Oklahoma state commission conducted an investigation of the riot from 1997 to 2001, questioning survivors about that day back in 1921. The commission recommended specific reparations to the community, the living survivors and their descendants.
The state did subsequently enact a law in June 2001 that provided about 300 scholarships for descendants, developed a memorial and pushed for development in Greenwood -- but the law fell far short of what the commission had recommended. The remaining survivors have continued to fight for further restitution, which is addressed in the 2008 documentary Before They Die!
For some descendants, the demise of such a prosperous business community highlights the struggles that black America continues to face today. "The difference is that our society now is desegregated much more, and the challenge now is for our businesses to do successful business with a majority of firms," says John Rogers Jr., the founder of Chicago-based Ariel Investments, LLC -- and the great-grandson of J.B. Stradford. "There's still a remnant of historical discrimination."
Another Account
The Tulsa race riot started when Dick Rowland, a 19-year old black shoe shiner in a shine parlor entered the elevator at a Drexel building to the colored washroom on the top floor around 4pm. In the elevator was a 17 year old white elevator operator named Sarah Page who was on duty. No one really knows what exactly happened in the elevator but the two must have been acquainted with each other at one point by sight. Most would say Rowland tripped in the elevator, and grabbed the arm of Page to prevent himself from falling. Page screamed and a clerk at one of the floors heard it, seeing the black man hurriedly leave the building. She assumed the young woman was assaulted and immediately called the authorities.
The next morning Rowland was detained by detective Henry Carmichael and Henry C. Pack and was taken to the jail for questioning. News spread about the event that day, along with an article titled ‘To Lynch Negro Tonight’ which was about whites assembling to lynch Rowland. As this newspaper hit the streets, white people gathered near the county Courthouse, seeking answers about the incident. Some were spectators only curious, but others were looking to participate and show support of the lynching of the young teenager. By sunset, hundreds of whites were assembled to have the making of a lynch mob. The sheriff Willard M. McCullough went outside and tried to talk the crowd into going home, but they did not listen. Eventually three white men entered the courthouse demanding Rowland be turned over, but deputies were able to turn them away. Eventually they were being vastly outnumbered by the crowed on the street.
A few blocks away, members of the black community gathered to discuss the situation at the courthouse. They came to a conclusion they were going to lynch Dick Rowland like they did to Roy Belton. Armed with rifles and shotguns they marched to the courthouse to support the sheriff and his deputies while defending Rowland from the angry whites. The sheriff though, assured them Rowland was safe and made them to return to Greenwood. The whites around the courthouse turned into 2000, many of them armed with weapons. Small groups of armed black started to go back to the courthouse in automobiles, ready to take action to protect Rowland.
It is said a white man told one of the armed black man to surrender his pistol, but he refused and fired a shot. It could have been accidental, or meant as a warning shot, but the ones followed were not, and eventually the courthouse was taking fire.
Immediately the white men returned fire, and the blacks continued firing back. It lasted only a few seconds, but already several men lay dead or dying in the street. The black mob retreated with the armed white mob following from behind. Innocent people from around were caught off guard and started to run as well. Panic came and mobsters started to fire at any black in the crowd. At 11 p.m. members of the National Guard assembled, joining patrols of the streets. Though, they were mainly being organized to protect the white districts near Greenwood. They rounded up any black who hadn’t made it back to Greenwood and took them to the armory for detainment.
The riot continued until Wednesday, June 1, 1921, progressively getting worst each minute. Whites eventually pushed into Greenwood, killing many innocent blacks along the way.
In 1921 the ABB (The African Blood Brotherhood for African Liberation and Redemption ) gained notoriety and a boost in membership after its Tulsa branch was linked to the armed resistance of local blacks during the Tulsa race riot.
Lynching believed to be at Mannford, Oklahoma
Click Here for;
Final Report of the Oklahoma Commission to Study The Tulsa Race Riot of 1921
Saturday, May 28, 2011
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Saheela Ibraheem 15-Year-Old Picks Harvard
15-Year-Old Picks Harvard After Being Accepted to 13 Colleges
By Abena Agyeman-Fisher on May 4th 2011 6:03PM
Do you know any 15-year-olds who are on their way to Harvard?
Meet Saheela Ibraheem (pictured), a senior at Wardlaw-Hartridge School in Edison, N.J.
Crediting her parents, who are Nigerian immigrants, for her academic achievements -- her father is said to have stayed up at night teaching her subjects not found at school -- Saheela's exceptional journey began as a 6th grader at Conackamack
Middle School in Piscataway, N.J.
While there, Saheela asked to be moved to a higher-level class because she was passionate about math. Instead, the school decided to skip her a grade.
But this would be just the beginning.
Saheela realized early on that her public school still wasn't doing it for her; consequently, the zealous student moved to Wardlaw-Hartridge, a private school, and skipped freshman year to land in 10th grade. Her new school would end up being the right place for Saheela, giving her the bandwith to feel challenged and excel. Wardlaw-Hartridge Director of Development William Jenkins says:
"She's learned and she's very smart. But she keeps pushing herself."
But this is not just the story of a student who has mastered education. Saheela takes the concept of stimulating the mind and body to a whole other level.
"She is a three-sport athlete, playing outfield for the school's softball team, defender on the soccer team, and swimming relays and 50-meter races for the swim team. She also sings alto in the school choir, plays trombone in the school band and serves as president of the school's investment club, which teaches students about the stock market by investing in virtual stocks."
Last year, Saheela applied to 14 colleges and universities that spanned the nation with a "grade point average (between a 96 and 97 on a 100-point scale) and her 2,340 SAT score (a perfect 800 on the math section, a 790 in writing and a 750 in reading)."
California Institute of Technology, Harvard, Princeton, the University of Pennsylvania, Columbia, Cornell, Brown, Williams College, Stanford, University of Chicago, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Washington University in St. Louis all accepted her.
Surprise, surprise, Saheela chose Harvard and wants to major in either neurobiology and neuroscience in order to study how the brain works.
Of her accomplishments, Saheela only had this to say:
I try my best in everything I do," Saheela said. "Anyone who's motivated can work wonders."
I am dumbfounded by Saheela's success. If she is like this as a teen, what will she accomplish as a full-fledged adult? Kudos to her family for doing such a fine job raising a balanced, ambitious child. As a fellow parent, that is not an easy thing to do.
Just a few months ago, the phenomenon of Amy Chua's Tiger Mom overwhelmed the airwaves as people discussed the strategy of raising a successful child. The Tiger Mom ideology tauted all work and no play, with everything -- consciously or unconsciously -- focusing on being the best academic student.
Saheela's parents, though, allowed their daughter (and other children who also attend the same school as Saheela) to have a more balanced existence, encouraging her in academics and extracurricular activities.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
Friday, May 6, 2011
linebacker Ray Lewis and former cornerback Reggie Howard
NFL Star Helps NY Boy After Mom's Suicide Plunge
Date: Wednesday, May 04, 2011, 11:11 am
By: Verena Dobnik, Associated Press
By: Verena Dobnik, Associated Press
NEW YORK (AP) — NFL linebacker Ray Lewis and former cornerback Reggie Howard are helping a 10-year-old New York boy whose mother drowned herself and three children by driving a van into the Hudson River.
The surviving child, La'Shaun Armstrong, attended a Manhattan fundraiser Saturday night for the United Athletes Foundation, which is supported by the Baltimore Ravens star. Some of the proceeds will go to create a relief fund to provide him with mentoring, counseling and tutoring.
Lewis reached out to the child as soon as he heard about the April 12 tragedy. The boy escaped through a van window after the car plunged into the water in Newburgh, N.Y., and was rescued by a passing driver. La'Shaun's 25-year-old mother, Lashanda Armstrong, reportedly was distraught over an argument with her boyfriend.
La'Shaun said meeting Lewis earlier this week was "awesome," according to Howard.
The 35-year-old linebacker went bowling with La'Shaun, saying the boy needs mentoring from a father figure. His biological father, Todd Johnson, is in prison on a robbery conviction.
Lewis is vice chairman of the United Athletes Foundation, which was created in 2008 by a group of professional athletes aiming to improve the lives of other athletes and their communities.
The president of the nonprofit is Howard, who took La'Shaun shopping for a new suit earlier this week.
"I hopped into a cab in Manhattan to his house (in Middletown, N.Y.) — and I had no idea it was more than 60 miles away!" Howard said as he prepared to host Saturday's event at Manhattan's Grand Hyatt hotel.
La'Shaun and his grandmother, Datrice Armstrong, who is raising him now, were the foundation's guests for the weekend, sleeping at the Grand Hyatt.
Besides a check presented to La'Shaun on Saturday — for an undisclosed amount — the foundation plans to help him well into the future, Howard said.
The surviving child, La'Shaun Armstrong, attended a Manhattan fundraiser Saturday night for the United Athletes Foundation, which is supported by the Baltimore Ravens star. Some of the proceeds will go to create a relief fund to provide him with mentoring, counseling and tutoring.
Lewis reached out to the child as soon as he heard about the April 12 tragedy. The boy escaped through a van window after the car plunged into the water in Newburgh, N.Y., and was rescued by a passing driver. La'Shaun's 25-year-old mother, Lashanda Armstrong, reportedly was distraught over an argument with her boyfriend.
La'Shaun said meeting Lewis earlier this week was "awesome," according to Howard.
The 35-year-old linebacker went bowling with La'Shaun, saying the boy needs mentoring from a father figure. His biological father, Todd Johnson, is in prison on a robbery conviction.
Lewis is vice chairman of the United Athletes Foundation, which was created in 2008 by a group of professional athletes aiming to improve the lives of other athletes and their communities.
The president of the nonprofit is Howard, who took La'Shaun shopping for a new suit earlier this week.
"I hopped into a cab in Manhattan to his house (in Middletown, N.Y.) — and I had no idea it was more than 60 miles away!" Howard said as he prepared to host Saturday's event at Manhattan's Grand Hyatt hotel.
La'Shaun and his grandmother, Datrice Armstrong, who is raising him now, were the foundation's guests for the weekend, sleeping at the Grand Hyatt.
Besides a check presented to La'Shaun on Saturday — for an undisclosed amount — the foundation plans to help him well into the future, Howard said.
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Are you sick of highly paid teachers?
by Everette Blacknall on Wednesday, April 27, 2011 at 7:03pm
Teachers' hefty salaries are driving up taxes, and they only work 9 or10 months a year! It's time we put things in perspective and pay them for what they do - babysit!
We can get that for less than minimum wage.
That's right. Let's give them $3.00 an hour and only the hours they worked; not any of that silly planning time, or any time they spend before or after school. That would be $19.50 a day (7:45 to 3:00 PM with 45 min. off for lunch and plan-- that equals 6 1/2 hours).
Each parent should pay $19.50 a day for these teachers to baby-sit their children. Now how many students do they teach in a day...maybe 30? So that's $19.50 x 30 = $585.00 a day.
However, remember they only work 180 days a year!!! I am not going to pay them for any vacations.
LET'S SEE.... That's $585 X 180= $105,300 per year. (Hold on! My calculator needs new batteries).
What about those special education teachers and the ones with Master's degrees? Well, we could pay them minimum wage ($7.75), and just to be fair, round it off to $8.00 an hour. That would be $8 X 6 1/2 hours X 30 children X 180 days = $280,800 per year. Wait a minute -- there's something wrong here! There sure is! The average teacher's salary
(nation wide) is $50,000. $50,000/180 days = $277.77/per day/30 students=$9.25/6.5 hours = $1.42 per hour per student--a very inexpensive baby-sitter and they even EDUCATE your kids!) WHAT A DEAL!
Show appreciation for educators...
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Monday, May 2, 2011
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Monday, April 25, 2011
First lady Michelle Obama
Declaring herself "first mom," Michelle Obama got right to work on the defining issues of her children's generation: obesity and improving the health of America's kids.
Her Let's Move campaign put obesity in the headlines in part because Americans under 25 are the first generation expected to live shorter lives than their parents because of diet-related illnesses. But Obama, 47, urged people to get up and do something.
She convinced her husband to establish America's first Childhood Obesity Task Force. She planted a teaching garden at the White House and reminded Americans that to know their farmers is to know their food. She enlisted the country's leading chefs to work with local schools and start cooking; at last count there were more than 1,000 such partnerships.
She's encouraging mayors around the country to embrace obesity-prevention programs. And perhaps most incredibly, she's had frank and challenging dialogues with some of America's largest corporations and persuaded them to change their business practices for the sake of the children.
While she knows none of these changes are easy, she's stood firm in her conviction that if we all just eat better and move more, then we can fight obesity. For her inspirational work, I salute First Lady Michelle Obama — a true revolutionary.
First lady Michelle Obama warned in remarks that the nation is seeing “a groundswell of support” for curbing childhood obesity, and she is unveiling new ammunition from current and retired military leaders.
“Military leaders … tell us that when more than one in four young people are unqualified for military service because of their weight,” the first lady said in prepared remarks, “childhood obesity isn’t just a public health threat, it’s not just an economic threat, it’s a national security threat as well."
“We can all agree that here in the wealthiest nation on earth, all children should have the basic nutrition they need to learn and grow and pursue their dreams. Because in the end, nothing is more important than the health and well-being of our children, ... and our hopes for their future should drive every decision we make. These are the basic values that we all share. They’re the values that this bill embodies. And that’s why we’ve seen such a groundswell of support for these efforts — not just from members of Congress here in Washington but from folks in every corner of the country.
“From educators working to provide healthier school meals, because they know the connection between proper nutrition and academic performance. From doctors and nurses who know that unhealthy kids grow into unhealthy adults — at risk for obesity-related diseases like diabetes, heart disease and cancer. From business and labor leaders who know that we spend nearly $150 billion a year to treat these diseases and worry about the impact on our economy. From advocates and faith leaders who know that school meals are vital for combating child hunger, feeding more than 31 million children a day.
Friday, April 22, 2011
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Monday, April 18, 2011
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Friday, April 1, 2011
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
