{"id":27108,"date":"2023-06-27T12:01:36","date_gmt":"2023-06-27T19:01:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=27108"},"modified":"2023-06-27T12:01:37","modified_gmt":"2023-06-27T19:01:37","slug":"let-the-world-know-elderly-survivors-of-the-tulsa-race-massacre-push-for-justice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2023\/06\/27\/let-the-world-know-elderly-survivors-of-the-tulsa-race-massacre-push-for-justice\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018LET THE WORLD KNOW\u2019: ELDERLY SURVIVORS OF THE TULSA RACE MASSACRE PUSH FOR JUSTICE"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Viola Ford Fletcher and her family fled a murderous white mob 102 years ago \u2013 today she\u2019s still demanding accountability<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

by David Smith<\/a> in Washington<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sun 25 Jun 2023 (TheGuardian.com)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

V<\/strong>iola Ford Fletcher<\/a> smiles as her mind burrows back in time more than a hundred years. \u201cWe were happy then,\u201d she says wistfully. \u201cBefore this happened, we had children in the neighbourhood to play with. We had schools, churches, hospitals, theatres and anything that people enjoyed. It was a strong community.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis\u201d refers to the 1921 Tulsa race massacre<\/a>, when a white mob descended on the neighbourhood of Greenwood, home to a business district known as Black Wall Street, killing an estimated 300 people and looting and burning businesses and homes. Thousands were left homeless and living in a hastily constructed internment camp.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For most Americans it is the stuff of history books and museum exhibits, as foreign and faraway as Charles Lindbergh or the Wall Street crash. For Fletcher, it is a childhood scar that never went away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now 109 and still dressing to the nines with earrings and bracelets, she is the oldest living survivor of the massacre. In 2021, the year of its centenary, \u201cMother Fletcher\u201d and her brother, Hughes \u201cUncle Red\u201d Van Ellis, testified to the US Congress<\/a> to push for reparations and travelled to Ghana, where they were treated like royalty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now Fletcher is thought to have become the world\u2019s oldest author with Don\u2019t Let Them Bury My Story<\/a>, a memoir that recounts the impact of the massacre on her life and advocates for racial justice. \u201cI\u2019ve enjoyed life so far, so I think if I can do it at this time, I should,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I remember seeing people running and being shot, falling dead, houses burning and noise<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Viola Ford Fletcher<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her debut book tour took her to New York for the first time (\u201cI think all the people in the United States is in New York!\u201d) and then on an Amtrak train for the first time (\u201cThat was really history for me, I thought it was very nice\u201d) to Washington, where on Juneteenth she is resplendent in white and speaking to the Guardian from a wheelchair in the cavernous atrium of a business hotel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She is joined by an attentive grandson, Ike Howard, 56, chief foundation officer of the Viola Ford Fletcher Foundation<\/a>, which operates in the US and Ghana. His \u201cconstant prodding\u201d persuaded Fletcher to overcome her fears and tell her story, he says, and they wrote the book together with Van Ellis, now 102, contributing a foreword.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fletcher was born before the first world war on 5 May 1914 in Comanche, Oklahoma<\/a>. Her parents were sharecroppers before moving to the prosperous Greenwood neighbourhood of Tulsa. On the night of 31 May 1921, she was a carefree seven-year-old girl with a favourite toy \u2013 a rag doll \u2013 and future full of possibilities. Then she was woken by her family and told they had to leave at once.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Part
Part of Greenwood district burned in race riots, Tulsa, Oklahoma, in June 1921. Photograph: Universal History Archive\/Universal Images Group\/Getty Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

She recalls: \u201cI remember seeing people running and being shot, falling dead, houses burning and noise \u2013 guns shooting. We were advised to get out of town before we were all killed. So my mother and father gathered six children and we were loaded into a horse-drawn cart and we got out of town safely.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are some things that time doesn\u2019t heal, at least not completely. More than a century later, Fletcher speaks about living through the massacre every day and not being able to sleep at night. Howard explains: \u201cAt midnight, she\u2019s awake. Three o\u2019clock in the morning, she\u2019s awake. She goes to sleep when the sun is high in the sky.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The family was forced to move from farm to farm and Fletcher lost her chance at education beyond the fourth grade. She recalls: \u201cThey would sharecrop. We wasn\u2019t able to go to school. The days we should be in school was time to harvest a crop or something. The family kept moving from one neighbourhood to another. I didn\u2019t know where we were going. Being a child, they didn\u2019t tell us everything. We had to follow.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Viola
Viola Fletcher, 109, known as \u2018Mother Fletcher\u2019, the oldest survivor of the Tulsa race massacre. Photograph: Shuran Huang\/The Guardian<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Fletcher married her husband, Robert, in 1932 and moved to California to work as an assistant welder in the shipyards during the second world war. \u201cDuring the war time, when my brothers were in service, I worked at a shipyard and helped build ships. I worked there until the war was over.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Later she and Robert returned to Oklahoma, where Fletcher became a domestic worker serving white families (she did not retire until was 85). She gave birth to two sons and a daughter and now has more than 20 great-grandchildren. Her life has spanned a century of civil rights struggles, with all their victories and setbacks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fletcher was 94, for example, when Barack Obama was elected the US\u2019s first Black president<\/a>. She recalls: \u201cIt was wonderful to see that. Before then I probably didn\u2019t notice about the presidents and all of that. I should know all the presidents but I don\u2019t. But with that one I naturally learned that this was our first.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two years ago Fletcher travelled to Washington for the first time to ask that her country acknowledge what happened in Tulsa in 1921. She testified to a House of Representatives judiciary subcommittee considering legal remedies and received a standing ovation. She laughs: \u201cI enjoyed it. There were portions I didn\u2019t quite understand but I guess I said something that they wanted to hear.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There has never been any direct compensation from the city of Tulsa or the state of Oklahoma for massacre survivors or their descendants. Racial disparities, compounded by gentrification and urban planning, persist in Tulsa today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last year a judge in Oklahoma issued an order<\/a> allowing Fletcher, Van Ellis and another survivor, Lessie Benningfield Randle, to continue seeking damages under state nuisance laws. The lawsuit argues that, in the years after the massacre, city and county officials actively thwarted the community\u2019s effort to rebuild in favour of overwhelmingly white parts of Tulsa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Let us have our day in court. If we win, we win. If we lose, we lose. But at least the situation will be reconciled to some degree<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Viola Ford Fletcher\u2019s grandson Ike Howard<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Howard, sporting a colourful T-shirt and gold chain necklace, comments: \u201cNow the court case hangs in the balance because the judge hasn\u2019t given us a decision. On her 109th birthday we were in court. I don\u2019t think the judge knew that it was her birthday but you would take that personal: they burn down your house, they run you out of town, then they have a court date on your 109th birthday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt makes it feel like they\u2019re waiting for you to die so the case can just go away. We\u2019re stronger together so it would be wise just to go ahead. Let us have our day in court. If we win, we win. If we lose, we lose. If we settle, we settle. But at least the situation will be reconciled to some degree.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also in 2021, Fletcher made her first trip to Africa. She and her brother met the Ghanaian president, Nana Akufo-Addo, as well as the vice-president, three kings and a group of ambassadors. They were granted royal Ghanaian names and subsequently citizenship<\/a>. She says: \u201cI was looking to see who could be some of our ancestors.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\u201cI
\u201cI remember seeing people running and being shot, falling dead, houses burning and noise \u2013 guns shooting. We were advised to get out of town before we were all killed,\u201d says Fletcher. Photograph: Science History Images\/Alamy<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Fletcher, who still lives in Tulsa, and her brother, based in Denver, Colorado, make a formidable team. Van Ellis, who served in an all-Black battalion during the second world war, has been at her side throughout the book tour. Wearing a grey suit with blue pinstripes and an \u201cArmy veteran 1939-1945\u201d cap, he comments: \u201cWe always stuck together. You have a family and you stick together, you can always make it through.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cShe and I went through all this. We went through 1921: I was only five months old: that was a bombing. I served in the United States army<\/a>: that was a bombing. I was in the 234th AAA gun battalion down in Burma. I survived that bombing so I would call myself blessed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But like his sister, Van Ellis was robbed of school and career opportunities by the massacre; he has previously said his family were \u201cmade refugees in our own country\u201d. He eventually became a handyman in Oklahoma City, working odd jobs in construction and as a painter and plumber.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He reflects: \u201cIf I had lived in Tulsa I would probably had a chance to get a good education and a decent job. But we had to work from sunup to sundown to make a living and feed our families.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Woman
Fletcher recently co-published her memoir Don\u2019t Let Them Bury My Story with her grandson, Ike Howard. Photograph: Shuran Huang\/The Guardian<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

For decades, Van Ellis recalls, the massacre was a taboo subject in Tulsa<\/a>, unspoken by neighbours, untaught in schools and uncommemorated by any memorial. \u201cWe were taught not to talk about it. They said, \u2018Don\u2019t talk about it. If you talk about it, your family is liable to get killed. Your dogs, your cats.\u2019 You could not talk about. I don\u2019t know why but that\u2019s what they said. \u2018Don\u2019t talk about it.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He was relieved when the conspiracy of silence came to an end and the city began to confront its past, including a search for the unmarked mass graves of victims and visit by Joe Biden<\/a> for the centenary. \u201cYou have to live. You can\u2019t stop. You have to keep going ahead. Do your best in the world,\u201d Van Ellis says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Having fought for the US overseas, he hopes the book will play at part in achieving justice at home after all these years. \u201cThis is a new world to me \u2013 I didn\u2019t think it would ever happen. It\u2019s exciting and it\u2019s history. Let the world know. It\u2019s been 102 years so I\u2019m proud I\u2019m living to tell about it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Van Ellis, who has seven children, 10 grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren, remains cautiously optimistic about the future of the country he served. \u201cI saw little changes but it could be better. I saw some changes and I think I\u2019m going to get better. I love America and I love people in America.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And he fully intends to live for another 28 years. His secret? Spinach<\/a>. Van Ellis, a palpably indomitable spirit, paraphrases: \u201cI\u2019m Popeye the Sailor Man \/ I\u2019ll eat my spinach and fight to the finish \/ I\u2019m Popeye the Sailor Man!\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Viola Ford Fletcher and her family fled a murderous white mob 102 years ago \u2013 today she\u2019s still demanding accountability by David Smith in Washington Sun 25 Jun 2023 (TheGuardian.com) Viola Ford Fletcher smiles as her mind burrows back in time more than a hundred years. \u201cWe were happy then,\u201d she says wistfully…. Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[730],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27108"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27108"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27108\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27109,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27108\/revisions\/27109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}