The Black Wall Street

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This article is about the business district. For the record label, see The Black Wall Street Records

The Black Wall Street, originally known as the Negro's Wall Street, is a term, reportedly coined by Booker T. Washington, to describe the segregated black business district of Durham, North Carolina.^[1] A similar Black Wall Street had been created on the south end of Greenwood Avenue in Greenwood, Tulsa, Oklahoma during the early 1900s. It was a prosperous area, made so partly by the segregation laws in effect at the time: African Americans could not spend their money in white areas, but they could earn from selling to those areas. These entrepreneurial enclaves benefitted from those who saved and used their "black dollars" to do business inside the district.

On June 1, 1921 the Greenwood district of some 35 square blocks was reduced to rubble after a large-scale civil disorder known as the Tulsa Race Riot, one of many outbreaks of mass racial violence in the United States.^[2] Despite the devastation, the community mobilized its resources and rebuilt the Greenwood area within the next five years.

Contents 1 Legacy 2 See also 3 References 4 Video 5 Literature

[edit] Legacy

Recently, "The Black Wall Street" received recognition when rapper The Game named his record label The Black Wall Street Records saying he wants to bring back the spirit of the original.

Taking the first letter of the three major thoroughfares of Black Wall Street (Greenwood, Archer, and Pine), the legendary soul singers, The Gap Band also commemorated the Black Wall Street in adopting their moniker. The band members are natives of Greenwood.

[edit] See also

• Mass racial violence in the United States
• Tulsa Race Riot
• Tulsa Reparations Coalition
• Ethnic enclaves
• Jim Crow laws
• Racial segregation
• Greenwood, Tulsa, Oklahoma
• History of Tulsa, Oklahoma

[edit] References

[edit] Video

• Carla Davidson, "Find of a Lifetime: A Lost African-American World on Film", American Heritage magazine, on line, September 13, 2006. Excerpts from silent films of African-American towns in Oklahoma in the 1920's, made by Rev. S. S. Jones for the National Baptist Convention. Retrieved September 16, 2006.

[edit] Literature

• James S. Hirsch, Riot and Remembrance: The Tulsa Race War and Its Legacy. Houghton Mifflin (February 22, 2002)
  ISBN 0618108130

• Tim Madigan, The Burning: Massacre, Destruction, and the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921. St. Martin's Griffin; Reprint edition (February 1, 2003) ISBN 0312302479

• Jay Jay Wilson, Black Wallstreet: A Lost Dream. Seaburn Publishing (March 2004) ISBN 1592327001

• Alfred L. Brophy, Reconstructing the Dreamland: The Tulsa Riot of 1921: Race, Reparations, and Reconciliation, foreword by Randall Kennedy. Oxford University Press, USA; New Ed (February 14, 2003) ISBN 0195161033

• Scott Ellsworth, Death in a Promised Land: The Tulsa Race Riot of 1921. Louisiana State University Press; Reprint edition (February 1992) ISBN 0807117676 A large part of this work in online at Scott Ellsworth, The Tulsa Race Riot - Pages 37 - 102

• Hannibal B. Johnson, Black Wall Street: From Riot to Renaissance in Tulsa's Historic Greenwood District. Marion Koogler McNay Art Museum (September 1998) ISBN 157168221X