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The Ground Breaking : : an American City and its Search for Justice

Ellsworth, Scott. Book - 2021 Black Studies 305.8 El, Adult Book / Nonfiction / History / United States / 20th Century / Ellsworth, Scott 1 On Shelf 1 request on 3 copies Community Rating: 5 out of 5

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Call Number: Black Studies 305.8 El, Adult Book / Nonfiction / History / United States / 20th Century / Ellsworth, Scott
On Shelf At: Downtown Library

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Adult Book / Nonfiction / History / United States / 20th Century / Ellsworth, Scott 4-week checkout Due 04-22-2024

1921 -- After -- Awakenings -- Two Summers -- Death in a Promised Land -- Where are the rest? -- The Lady With a Cane -- Calls and Camera Crews -- Reparations and Reprisals -- The Steps to Nowhere -- Rolexes and Pickup Trucks -- Reminding a City of Her Sins -- Breaking Ground -- Bodies of Evidence -- The Dirt Whisperers.
"The definitive, newsbreaking account of the ongoing investigation into the Tulsa race massacre In the late spring of 1921, Tulsa, Oklahoma, erupted into the worst single incident of racial violence in American history. Over the course of sixteen hours, mobs of white men and women looted and burned to the ground a prosperous African American community, known today as Black Wall Street. More than one thousand homes and businesses were destroyed, and scores, possibly hundreds, of people lost their lives. Then, for nearly a half century, the story of the massacre was actively suppressed. Official records disappeared, history textbooks ignored the tragedy, and citizens were warned to keep silent. Now nearly one hundred years after that horrible day, historian Scott Ellsworth returns to his hometown to tell the untold story of how America's foremost hidden racial tragedy was finally brought to light, and the unlikely cast of characters that made it happen. Part true-crime saga, part archaeological puzzle, and part investigative journalism, The Ground Breaking weaves in and out of recent history, the distant past, and the modern day to tell a compelling story of a city-and a nation-struggling to come to terms with the dark corners of its past"-- Provided by publisher.

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As close to an enjoyable read as can be possible on a horrible topic submitted by JPollak on June 25, 2021, 5:07pm The author, Scott Ellswoth, is a professor at the University of Michigan. Like Dr. Ellsworth, your reviewer, too, grew up in Tulsa, Oklahoma, before migrating to Ann Arbor. Many generations of (white) Tulsans and Oklahomans, state that they never learned about the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921 in school even though "Oklahoma History" is a mandatory course for high school graduation in the state. That's not true for me -- I learned about it in the 1990s when I was a student at George Washington Carver Middle School and Booker T. Washington High School in Tulsa when my classes read excerpts from Dr. Ellsworth's 1982 book, "Death in a Promised Land." But, as Dr. Ellsworth illustrates, for his generation of Tulsans and many, many others around the country today, the events of the Tulsa Race Massacre are new, even though they occurred 100 years ago.

There is such a pitifully limited amount of literature that covers this important and horrifying chapter in American history that it feels easy to get your arms around all of the well-presented secondary sources. In my opinion, the two best other sources are the aforementioned "Death in a Promised Land" and the 2001 "Report of the Oklahoma Commission to Study the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921." "The Ground Breaking: An American City and Its Search for Justice," which is really more of a historiography than a history book, focuses on the way that the Tulsa Race Massacre has finally entered the American consciousness as an important historical event. In addition to interesting notes on Dr. Ellsworth's prior research, the new revelations in this book largely have to do with the search for mass graves of those killed in the Massacre. The story of how the search developed from rumors within an oral tradition to actual excavation and exhumation is fascinating. And, particularly for historiography, the writing is exceedingly accessible.

I have to recommend first reading "Death in a Promised Land" (which is also in the AADL catalog) to get a grounding in the facts of the events, but if you started with "The Ground Breaking," then the early chapters do a good job of explaining with an appropriate amount of detail.

Understanding some of "The Ground Breaking" is enhanced by knowledge of the geography of the city of Tulsa, and I think that a map would have been a helpful addition to this book. There's plenty of description in the text, but the understanding of where 'Black Wall Street' once stood in relationship to possible mass graves and land wasted by highway construction would still be helpful.

The inspired student who wants to delve beyond the Race Massacre or get more of a feel for the area could also consider the following: "Killers of the Flower Moon" by David Grann which is written by a journalist, not a historian, so it reads a little differently and is about another race-based crime that occurred in northeastern Oklahoma. And, "The Outsiders" by S.E. Hinton (or the 1983 Francis Ford Coppola adaptation which was filmed in Tulsa) which is fiction but includes many landmarks of 1960s Tulsa.

Amazing book submitted by lballard on July 19, 2022, 5:24pm This is a bit of history that was buried. It’s a tale of how it was uncovered. As I am not a professional writer, it’s hard to convey its depth, and how worthwhile it is to read this.