`Crying out from the soil: Remember me'
TULSA — Homage was paid on Saturday to a Black man who lived in Black Wall Street and was lynched during the Tulsa Race Massacre.
AS oil Collection Ceremony was held just outside the Greenwood Rising Black Wall Street History Center construction site at Greenwood Avenue and Archer Street because that is where Reuben Everett lived and where he was fat ally attacked by white mobs.
The 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre Commission partnered with Tiffany Crutcher, Ph. D., and t he Equal Justice Initiative to host the poignant ceremony.
Phil Armstrong, 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre Centennial Commission project manager, served as host of the event.
Because of COVID-19, the event was limited to a small invitation-only group of about 30 people. Organizers said the ceremony had its roots in both indigenous and African cultures.
Crutcher, chair of the Tulsa Community Remembrance Coalition, said the white news media in 1921 did little to cover and share details about the lives of Black race massacre victims.
"We believe they are crying out from the soil: 'Remember me,'" she said.
Kristi Williams, Greenwood activist and community historian, said Everett, 42, lived at 610 Archer Street with his wife and children until he was lynched during the infamous race massacre that began on May 31 and lasted into June 1. Williams and Crutch er said Everett was taken to Morningside Hospital where he and other Black victims were treated in the basement but he died on June 1. An estimated 300 Black Tulsans were attacked and killed by white mobs during the race massacre and hundreds of others were left homeless when the thriving Black Wall Street community was burned down.
"Oklahoma was the promised land for a lot of Black people from across the states and they came here wanting to build their families and businesses and just to be respected as human beings and to live peacefully," Williams said.
"I want you to know that the ancestors of Greenwood are not at rest. Those ancestors will not be at peace until justice takes her seat in Little Africa, our beloved Greenwood."
Crutch er said the Tulsa Community Remembrance Coalition is made up of people who have made it their mission to see that the lives of race massacre victims and survivors are not forgotten.
She said jars filled with soil representing about 36 r ace massacre victims will eventually be displayed in an exhibit "where people can reflect, show honor and deference to those people." She said Everett is one of two race massacre victims who were buried in Oaklawn Cemetery, but it was crucial to honor his life and memory at the very place he lived and suffered fatal wounds.
Crutch er said her own great-grandmother survived the massacre but was too afraid to talk about it. She said families from the massacre have gone years without proper burials but through soil collection ceremonies, community members may collect soil from the site of the massacre as personal memorials and "public witness to these crimes."
"We've made it our mission to right this wrong," she said. "It' s sacred work. It' s very emotional work. We don't take this work lightly."
'Feel that soil'
Participants used a garden spade to transfer soil f rom the property where Everett once lived into a jar bearing his name. Surrounded by white carnations, the jar filled with dark brown soil stood out against the history center construction site in the background.
Chief Egunwale Amusan, president of the African Ancestral Society of Tulsa, played a drum during portions of the ceremony. He also led an African burial ritual, at times speaking in Yoruba, an African language.
"We collect soil as we've always done when we've been uprooted," he said.
The Rev. Robert Turner, senior pastor of historic Vernon African Methodist Episcopal Church and a member of the 1 921 Tulsa Race Massacre Commission, shared opening and closing prayers. Maggie Hille Yar, executive director of the Hille Foundation, and her mother, foundation cofounder Mary Ann Hille, also participated in the ceremony. The Hille Foundation donated the land where the Greenwood Rising history center is being built.
Other members of the 1 921 Tulsa Race Massacre Commission and Tulsa Community Remembrance Coalition of different races and ethnicities each took soil and placed it in the jar.
Ken Levit, a commission member and executive director of the George Kaiser Family Foundation, participated in the ceremony.
"It's a very powerful experience. It connected me with the history of our community and atonement for the crimes that were committed here in my own hometown," he said.
Tulsa attorney Damario Solomon-Simmons also took part in the ritual as a member of the Tulsa Community Remembrance Coalition. Solomon-Simmons is the lead attorney for a lawsuit demanding reparations for race massacre victims, survivors and North Tulsa.
"To be here and feel that soil and know that we're standing right where this man lived is very, very touching to me and sad to know that all these years later, he still hasn't gotten any justice."
The recent ceremony was the latest in a series of events and activities that appear to be part of Tulsa's modern-day reckoning with the tragedy and racial injustice of the 1921 massacre. In October, 10 bodies were found in an unmarked mass grave as experts searched for victims. In a news release, the City of Tulsa said it is still to be determined whether the burials are associated with the massacre.