Oklahoma begins centennial remembrance of Greenwood riots

Oklahoma has launched a centennial remembrance of a once-thriving African American neighborhood in Tulsa decimated by deadly white violence.

The city’s Greenwood District has received growing recognition during America’s reckoning over police brutality and racial violence.

On Friday, Emmy Award-winning actress and Tulsa native Alfre Woodard and U.S. Sen. James Lankford both delivered remarks via video to a small crowd that gathered at the John Hope Franklin Reconciliation Park.

Violence erupted May 31 and June 1 in 1921, when a white mob killed an estimated 300 people and wounded 800 while burning 30 blocks of Black-owned businesses and homes.