Kelenna Azubuike, Etan Thomas show how Tulsa Race Massacre goes untold

The Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921 is one of American's most unknown racist tragedies. Over two days, fires raged in the Oklahoma city's predominately black Greenwood District, destroying the African American base of the city.
 
By the end of it, 35 square blocks were destroyed, as many as 300 people were killed and another 800 people were injured. No arrests were made.
 
Though one of the biggest tragedies in American history, the events of 1921 are largely unknown to many, including to people who grew up in Tulsa. The disparity in knowledge was displayed on the latest episode of "Race in America: A Candid Conversation" when NBC Sports' Kelenna Azubuike and 9-year NBA veteran Etan Thomas, both Tulsa natives, revealed when they first learned of the tragedy.
 
Azubuike, the former Warrior who played high school ball at Victory Christian Academy, said he wasn't taught about the massacre in school while Thomas said he learned about it in middle school on the city's northside.
 
Despite the cumulative lack of knowledge, the Tulsa Race Massacre inseparable from the city's history. On May 30, 1921, a Black man named Dick Rowland was accused of sexually assaulting a Sarah Page, a white woman, in an elevator. Rowland was arrested the next day, but Page later wrote the county attorney to ask for the charges to be dropped.
 
In response to a sensationalized report in the Tulsa Tribune headlined “Nab Negro for Attacking Girl in Elevator,” a white mob went to the courthouse where Rowland was housed. Shots were fired and the African Americans onsite fled to Greenwood. By the next day, the Greenwood district was destroyed. Survivors claimed that airplanes -- which were relatively new at the time -- rained ammunition from the sky in one of the first aerial bombardments in U.S. history.
 
Before the uprising, Greenwood was a model for Black independence in the United States. Just north of the Frisco railroad tracks, the area known as "Little Africa" had Black-owned movie theatres, banks and other businesses. Booker T. Washington visited Tulsa in 1905 and once named the district "Negro Wall Street," which Thomas said made white residents insecure.
 
"Basically, white people got jealous," Thomas said. "That's basically what it was. A concerted effort. And it was strategically planned because there were bombs that were dropped. And the police came and they were looting. They looted all the stores, and they robbed everybody. And they were just shooting black people."
 
But the history of the event wasn't always shared. Azubuike said he didn't know about the massacre until he was an adult. Though Thomas was taught about the events as a youth, he was surprised when few of his Syracuse University classmates
 
"I remember sitting in this lecture hall, it was about 250 people, and only a few people knew or was even familiar with what happened with the Tulsa Massacre," he said. "And I was surprised. I was like, 'Wait, none of y'all know what happened?' And I think the other person was somebody from Texas. And somebody from around Oklahoma."

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Efforts have been made to educate people on the massacre. In February, Oklahoma announced it would develop a curriculum to teach children statewide about the massacre. Additionally, NBA stars LeBron James and Russell Westbrook have signed on to produce documentaries about the event.

Nonetheless, Azubuike is disappointed he wasn't taught sooner.
 
"I'm glad I learned about it later and understood that, but that's not good," he said. "That's not good, that schools aren't talking about all those things that happened. They're kind of picking and choosing different little things from history to share about, maybe the things that aren't as stark and the things that are nice. They kind of take those and put those in the history books and make sure the kids learn about that."

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