Material Detail

The story continues.  Even after 90 years, the argument about what happened in the "Black Wall Street" of Tulsa, Oklahoma on May 31, 1921 the truth is being debated. From 1921 to 1995 the costliest Race Riot in America was kept hidden from the Oklahoma History text, and the American Public until the then Governor of Oklahoma, Keating, confirmed the bloody action had taken place. I was part of the Oklahoma Segregated School and Oklahoma History was part of the curriculum. Blacks were absent in the text, and if not for the courageous teachers of the Black Teachers who taught Negro History with Oklahoma History, the cover-up would have remained just that, cover-up by a media which closed ranks and kept the Nation in darkness. This writing is signficant for it brings to focused Daniel Patrick Moynihan's report which has been used by Whites to claim the pathogenic nature of Black families due to female head of household. The introduction of Moynihan's report is even more signifcant because of his prediction of the length of time it would take for Negroes to gain their full Constitutional Rights and addresses the question of when "race" would no longer be an issue.  This is often overlooked and scholars have omitted dialogue and some cover-up this statement: In this new period the expectations of the Negro Americans will go beyond civil rights. Being Americans, they will now expect that in the near future equal opportunities for them as a group will produce roughly equal results, as compared with other groups. This is not going to happen. Nor will it happen for generations to come unless a new and special effort is made. There are two reasons. First, the racist virus in the American blood stream still afflicts us: Negroes will encounter serious personal prejudice for at least another generation. Second, three centuries of sometimes unimaginable mistreatment have taken their toll on the Negro people. The harsh fact is that as a group, at the present time, in terms of ability to win out in the competitions of American life, they are not equal to most of those groups with which they will be competing. Individually, Negro Americans reach the highest peaks of achievement. But collectively, in the spectrum of American ethnic and religious and regional groups, where some get plenty and some get none, where some send eighty percent of their children to college and others pull them out of school at the 8th grade, Negroes are among the weakest. These articles are not only excellent discussion starters to create the dialogue about race, but even well to see why the conditions of today were impacted by the past, and not because of the issue of family values. It is the lack of consistent world viiew, collision of values.  This article along with the report offers solutions when America is ready to talk about race. As indicated in the article by the The Tulsa World Staff Reporter RANDY KREHBIEL, reporting on the meetings of the Oklahoma Riot Commission, it was the words of Whites against Blacks and the commission was finding it difficult in making a determination whether planes had been used to drop bombs on the beleagured Greenwood community. The cover-up continues, for the issue of reparations has only resulted in a recommendation for scholarships.  Cover-up cover up!