WEBVTT - Selects: The Tulsa 'Race Riots' 0:00:00.720 --> 0:00:03.600 Hey, everybody, it's me Josham for this week's select I've 0:00:03.640 --> 0:00:08.320 chosen our January twenty twenty episode on the Tulsa massacre. 0:00:08.840 --> 0:00:10.920 It's such a vile event that it left us stain 0:00:11.000 --> 0:00:13.960 that spread out of Tulsa and even out of Oklahoma 0:00:14.280 --> 0:00:16.919 to become a blemish on the history of the entire US. 0:00:17.360 --> 0:00:19.360 And it's a lesson and how important it is to 0:00:19.400 --> 0:00:22.040 talk about the past, even the worst of the past, 0:00:22.480 --> 0:00:25.040 to move forward to heal. It's also a lesson on 0:00:25.079 --> 0:00:27.440 how you just can't bury the past no matter how 0:00:27.480 --> 0:00:29.600 hard you try. I hope you get a lot out 0:00:29.600 --> 0:00:30.560 of this episode. 0:00:35.040 --> 0:00:42.839 Welcome to Stuff you should know, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:44.800 --> 0:00:47.640 Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's 0:00:47.720 --> 0:00:50.800 Charles w Chuck Bryan over there, there's Jerry over here. 0:00:51.520 --> 0:00:55.080 We have all come together in the year twenty twenty 0:00:55.760 --> 0:00:59.960 to wear a silver jumpsuits as always I know, right, 0:01:00.240 --> 0:01:06.640 and talk about a buried, overlooked blemish in the history 0:01:06.800 --> 0:01:08.800 of the United States. 0:01:09.240 --> 0:01:12.440 Are we not going to recount no anything about this 0:01:12.480 --> 0:01:15.959 past year, no talk about this being the first recording 0:01:15.959 --> 0:01:21.280 of the new year. Nope, all right, we've had a 0:01:21.280 --> 0:01:25.640 break here I'm going to push forward. We've been off 0:01:25.680 --> 0:01:29.640 for a couple of weeks, which was pretty glorious to 0:01:29.720 --> 0:01:33.520 not have to just over text my brain. But it 0:01:33.600 --> 0:01:36.160 was also nice to get back in here into the 0:01:36.200 --> 0:01:37.040 stank of this room. 0:01:37.480 --> 0:01:39.560 This room, I don't think this room stinks. 0:01:41.240 --> 0:01:41.800 Well right now. 0:01:41.800 --> 0:01:45.840 It smells like you're caramel vanilla Freppa lape. 0:01:46.600 --> 0:01:49.480 This is just black coffee. This happens to be flavor blake. 0:01:49.680 --> 0:01:51.640 It's really I mean, it smells great. 0:01:51.720 --> 0:01:57.000 It's I think a green mountain or something. Caramel vanilla coffee. 0:01:56.640 --> 0:02:01.320 Pod man. It is super fragrant. Yeah, it's nice in 0:02:01.360 --> 0:02:03.040 a great way. It makes me. It smells like an 0:02:03.040 --> 0:02:03.800 ice cream Sunday. 0:02:04.200 --> 0:02:04.920 It's pleasant. 0:02:05.200 --> 0:02:06.000 It is very. 0:02:05.800 --> 0:02:08.880 Pleasant, but it's not doing the job. Like I'm still 0:02:09.120 --> 0:02:11.040 I'm a little tired, a little groggy. 0:02:11.520 --> 0:02:15.280 You know, I had a four shot latte earlier. Oh yeah, 0:02:15.320 --> 0:02:17.640 and so I'm kind of gotcha. 0:02:17.720 --> 0:02:18.520 Maybe that's what I mean. 0:02:18.639 --> 0:02:20.720 I'm zippy and go downstairs to I know you don't 0:02:20.760 --> 0:02:23.480 like to pay for coffee, but yeah, go downstairs to 0:02:23.520 --> 0:02:24.160 Spiller Park. 0:02:24.480 --> 0:02:25.960 Okay, Hugh Atchison's place. 0:02:26.320 --> 0:02:28.280 A four shot latte? 0:02:28.880 --> 0:02:31.679 Yes, Okay, that that has me going. 0:02:31.639 --> 0:02:34.360 Well, I give it about a half hour before Chuck 0:02:34.400 --> 0:02:35.360 crashes everybody. 0:02:35.480 --> 0:02:37.760 Yeah, seriously, anyway, I'm glad to be back. 0:02:38.800 --> 0:02:40.639 Well, I'm glad you're back to You know, we've been 0:02:40.680 --> 0:02:45.920 here the whole time. This is where you spent Christmas 0:02:45.960 --> 0:02:49.200 and New Year's Yes, both in this room and Thanksgiving. 0:02:49.280 --> 0:02:52.200 And I guess you, me and Momo slept over there 0:02:52.200 --> 0:02:52.640 in the corner. 0:02:52.680 --> 0:02:55.600 They come to visit sometimes they say, please, please come on, 0:02:55.680 --> 0:02:57.160 please stop working. I say, I can't. 0:02:57.280 --> 0:02:59.079 They slide the food tray through the slot. 0:03:01.639 --> 0:03:03.760 You know where I got this idea, And I know 0:03:03.800 --> 0:03:06.240 you haven't watched it, but the Watchmen. 0:03:06.320 --> 0:03:09.519 I came across mentioned of that. I was like, why 0:03:09.560 --> 0:03:12.640 is everybody talking about the Watchmen with the Tulsa race riot? 0:03:13.160 --> 0:03:15.680 Or more appropriately, why is everyone all of a sudden 0:03:15.760 --> 0:03:17.600 talking about the Tulsa massacre? 0:03:18.440 --> 0:03:18.680 Yeah? 0:03:18.760 --> 0:03:22.000 Yeah, because the Watchmen really put it on the map 0:03:22.040 --> 0:03:22.640 in a big way. 0:03:22.720 --> 0:03:23.480 Yeah. That's great. 0:03:24.360 --> 0:03:28.040 Utilize it quite well in the storyline, and I have 0:03:28.080 --> 0:03:31.560 a recommendation for everyone, even though it is a marketing piece. 0:03:32.360 --> 0:03:34.320 There's a thing in the Atlantic called the Massacre of 0:03:34.360 --> 0:03:39.440 Black Wall Street, paid for by HBO, but it tells 0:03:39.480 --> 0:03:41.280 the story in a comic book. 0:03:41.080 --> 0:03:44.520 Form in the Atlantic. H Oh cool, very cool. 0:03:44.320 --> 0:03:46.440 And I didn't notice it was a marketing piece until afterward. 0:03:46.560 --> 0:03:48.000 But well, it's still. 0:03:47.840 --> 0:03:50.160 Good sure, as long as the content's good. 0:03:50.280 --> 0:03:51.920 Yeah, it's cool and very well done. 0:03:52.360 --> 0:03:58.119 So this is like, it's great that the Watchmen has 0:03:58.160 --> 0:04:02.880 brought attention to this, yeah, because it wasn't until about 0:04:02.960 --> 0:04:06.280 two thousand and one, maybe the late nineties, really that 0:04:06.320 --> 0:04:07.720 people started talking about this. 0:04:07.920 --> 0:04:08.200 I know. 0:04:08.720 --> 0:04:11.040 And this event that we're going to talk about happened 0:04:11.040 --> 0:04:15.840 in nineteen twenty one, and almost the week after, basically 0:04:15.840 --> 0:04:19.080 the week after, everyone said, don't talk about this, Yeah, 0:04:19.440 --> 0:04:23.479 just forget it ever happened. We're's moving forward and we're 0:04:23.480 --> 0:04:28.760 going to bury the past, literally buried people, the evidence, 0:04:28.800 --> 0:04:31.320 all this stuff. It was buried, and people just acted 0:04:31.400 --> 0:04:34.279 like nothing happened in Tulsa, Oklahoma for like eighty years. 0:04:34.400 --> 0:04:36.440 And when you hear what we're about to talk about, 0:04:36.600 --> 0:04:42.280 it's astounding that the community, both black and white, agreed 0:04:42.320 --> 0:04:46.240 to just basically pretend this never happened, at least publicly 0:04:46.320 --> 0:04:47.000 or civically. 0:04:47.520 --> 0:04:52.320 Yeah, and it's hard to find some information still on 0:04:52.720 --> 0:04:55.040 some of the key events and definitely some of the 0:04:55.120 --> 0:04:56.279 key players. 0:04:56.120 --> 0:04:58.880 Because a lot of them died of old age without 0:04:58.920 --> 0:05:00.000 ever having been interviewed. 0:05:00.080 --> 0:05:03.479 Yeah, no follow ups, Like, I mean, we'll get to it, 0:05:03.520 --> 0:05:05.080 but a couple of the most key players. 0:05:05.080 --> 0:05:07.479 It's like, this is kind of all we know, right. 0:05:07.680 --> 0:05:09.560 I looked them up too, and it's like, what do 0:05:09.600 --> 0:05:12.040 you mean you have no idea? Yeah, even who this 0:05:12.600 --> 0:05:14.960 guy was let alone? You know, what became of him? 0:05:15.040 --> 0:05:18.359 Or what do you mean? Like just no one kept track. 0:05:18.760 --> 0:05:22.200 But that's how complete and total this cover up was. 0:05:22.279 --> 0:05:24.880 It was a cover up. Yeah, so let's talk about 0:05:24.880 --> 0:05:27.560 it first. Let's talk about Greenwood, which I was not 0:05:27.680 --> 0:05:32.920 familiar with. But Greenwood was an affluent i guess almost 0:05:33.000 --> 0:05:37.520 suburb adjacent to Tulsa, just north of Tulsa. And what 0:05:37.680 --> 0:05:40.000 was odd about the fact that it was affluent is 0:05:40.040 --> 0:05:43.480 that it was an all black community in you know, 0:05:43.560 --> 0:05:46.080 the turn of the last century, and yet it was 0:05:46.160 --> 0:05:49.400 one of the most affluent communities in the entire United States. 0:05:49.720 --> 0:05:49.920 Yeah. 0:05:49.960 --> 0:05:53.480 I mean, now it's just part of Tulsa, like a neighborhood. 0:05:53.520 --> 0:05:57.000 But back then just sort of like my neighborhood would 0:05:57.000 --> 0:05:59.239 have been a suburb of Atlanta in the nineteen twenties, 0:05:59.440 --> 0:06:02.040 even though I'm you know, five miles from downtown. 0:06:01.680 --> 0:06:02.360 Right exactly. 0:06:02.520 --> 0:06:06.080 But in nineteen twenty one, it was, like you said, 0:06:06.160 --> 0:06:10.120 super affluent. They had a lot of I think there 0:06:10.120 --> 0:06:12.480 were ten thousand black residents there. It's called the Black 0:06:12.520 --> 0:06:16.280 Wall Street, like I mentioned, Yeah, and six hundred businesses. 0:06:16.720 --> 0:06:22.560 There were fifteen African American millionaires living in this district. 0:06:22.920 --> 0:06:27.400 Yeah, fifteen black millionaires in nineteen twenty one in Tulsa, Oklahoma. 0:06:27.560 --> 0:06:30.240 Yeah, and it wasn't I mean, like the whole area 0:06:30.400 --> 0:06:32.880 was very well to do. There was like indoor plumbing, 0:06:33.400 --> 0:06:37.200 the public schools there were like top not. Yeah, and 0:06:37.240 --> 0:06:41.560 in many cases Greenwood had a lot to boast about that. 0:06:41.680 --> 0:06:45.799 Like the white areas in Tulsa just over the railroad tracks, 0:06:46.080 --> 0:06:49.960 literally on the other side of the track, Yeah, didn't 0:06:50.000 --> 0:06:52.960 have like like this is far better off than some 0:06:53.000 --> 0:06:54.600 parts of white Tulsa. 0:06:54.839 --> 0:06:59.120 Yeah, including one of the top African American surgeons, if 0:06:59.160 --> 0:07:03.360 not the top in the country, endorsed by the doctor 0:07:03.400 --> 0:07:04.799 Mayo himself. 0:07:04.440 --> 0:07:05.279 The Mayo brothers. 0:07:05.680 --> 0:07:05.880 Yeah. 0:07:05.920 --> 0:07:08.960 This guy's doctor A C. Jackson, and he was one 0:07:09.000 --> 0:07:10.680 of the people murdered in this massacre. 0:07:11.280 --> 0:07:11.480 Yeah. 0:07:11.960 --> 0:07:14.800 Yeah, I was going to say there was a spoiler, 0:07:14.800 --> 0:07:16.400 but I guess we've already kind of mentioned there's a 0:07:16.440 --> 0:07:20.720 massacre coming, right, Yeah, so just to take a step 0:07:20.760 --> 0:07:24.480 back even further, so it's pretty impressive to think of, like, 0:07:24.560 --> 0:07:28.160 this is the Jim Crow era United States. Yes, this 0:07:28.240 --> 0:07:31.760 is we're talking about. You know, this massacre took place 0:07:31.800 --> 0:07:35.680 in nineteen twenty one, that's you know, fifty years after 0:07:35.920 --> 0:07:39.800 the end of the Civil War. In many ways, the 0:07:39.880 --> 0:07:43.760 Jim Crow era was just as bad as the Antebellum 0:07:43.880 --> 0:07:47.840 slavery era. But so the idea to us today looking 0:07:47.880 --> 0:07:50.520 back at this time of well, there's a black community 0:07:51.600 --> 0:07:55.080 in Oklahoma that was one of the most affluent areas 0:07:55.160 --> 0:07:57.800 in the country. It's kind of mind boggling. But if 0:07:57.800 --> 0:08:00.560 you dig even deeper into how it was formed, it 0:08:00.800 --> 0:08:03.200 almost you developed like a sense of pride in this 0:08:03.320 --> 0:08:07.640 that these these people came together under these conditions and 0:08:07.680 --> 0:08:12.480 not only survived, but like thrived and create a carved 0:08:12.480 --> 0:08:15.800 out a place for themselves where like being black was 0:08:15.840 --> 0:08:18.920 celebrated and where you could be proud and you took 0:08:19.000 --> 0:08:22.200 pride in your home, in your children, and your children's 0:08:22.280 --> 0:08:24.440 education and the healthcare that they were getting, in the 0:08:24.440 --> 0:08:27.000 bus service, and the quality of the theater that you 0:08:27.080 --> 0:08:30.720 went to. The confection area, the soda fountain, like that's 0:08:30.760 --> 0:08:33.640 where you went to go like proposed marriage. Like. There 0:08:33.720 --> 0:08:37.800 was this incredibly developed community. And one of the ways 0:08:37.840 --> 0:08:40.719 that it was that it was able to flourish and 0:08:40.880 --> 0:08:43.600 was able to kind of grow like this is because 0:08:44.640 --> 0:08:48.400 the first thing that Oklahoma did when it became a state. 0:08:48.920 --> 0:08:52.160 Remember it was originally a territory for forced relocation of 0:08:52.240 --> 0:08:57.920 Native Americans and their African slaves to this area. When 0:08:57.920 --> 0:09:01.040 it became a state, when white side came in and said, no, 0:09:01.120 --> 0:09:03.800 we want this instead, we're going to take this territory 0:09:03.840 --> 0:09:06.480 we gave you away and turn into stay. The first 0:09:06.840 --> 0:09:12.199 piece of legislation they passed was that black people have 0:09:12.280 --> 0:09:15.280 to stay in their own area. They can't marry outside 0:09:15.320 --> 0:09:18.599 their race, they can't frequent white owned businesses, they have 0:09:18.720 --> 0:09:21.880 to stay over here. And so the people of Greenwood said, 0:09:22.360 --> 0:09:24.360 fine with us. We're going to pass a covenant that 0:09:24.400 --> 0:09:27.480 says you have to be a black person to own 0:09:27.600 --> 0:09:30.480 land here, or to even rent a place here, to 0:09:30.520 --> 0:09:34.720 own a business here. It's a covenant restricted community, and 0:09:35.080 --> 0:09:37.600 we're going to take a tremendous amount of pride and 0:09:37.679 --> 0:09:41.360 in circulating our currency, our hard earned money that we're 0:09:41.400 --> 0:09:44.160 making by working for these white businesses that we're not 0:09:44.200 --> 0:09:46.640 allowed to patronize. We're going to go make our own 0:09:46.720 --> 0:09:49.959 businesses over here, and we're going to support them with 0:09:50.120 --> 0:09:53.880 our community, not only because we can't spend our money elsewhere, 0:09:53.920 --> 0:09:56.120 but because we have a lot of pride in the 0:09:56.160 --> 0:09:58.840 businesses that we've built over here. And so in this way, 0:09:59.240 --> 0:10:03.440 Greenwood flourished because of and in spite of these Jim 0:10:03.520 --> 0:10:06.640 Crow era laws that black people had to deal with 0:10:06.840 --> 0:10:08.040 in Oklahoma at the time. 0:10:08.320 --> 0:10:10.599 Yeah, and this was Dave Ruz helped put us to 0:10:10.960 --> 0:10:14.080 put this together, and some of the research he got 0:10:14.520 --> 0:10:18.640 was from the book The Burning Colon, Massacre, Destruction and 0:10:18.679 --> 0:10:21.600 the Tulsa Race Ride of nineteen twenty one by Tim 0:10:21.679 --> 0:10:26.720 Madigan and various Stuteley points out that this was this 0:10:26.800 --> 0:10:29.280 happened in Oklahoma, of course, but this kind of thing 0:10:29.360 --> 0:10:32.240 was happening all over the country, not just in the 0:10:32.280 --> 0:10:34.520 South or the whatever you call Oklahoma. 0:10:34.840 --> 0:10:38.119 I guess it's the West Midwest, Yeah, but not Midwest. 0:10:38.360 --> 0:10:40.439 I don't know. I think you just call it Oklahoma. 0:10:40.520 --> 0:10:43.160 It's interesting some people there identify with the South, but 0:10:43.480 --> 0:10:46.160 if you're from Georgia, Oklahoma it's not the South might 0:10:46.200 --> 0:10:48.559 as well be you know, Montana. 0:10:49.120 --> 0:10:52.560 I think of Oklahoma as like Native America. Yeah, and 0:10:52.640 --> 0:10:54.160 then what it says on the license. 0:10:53.800 --> 0:10:57.800 Plate, maybe it says middle of the country with a 0:10:58.080 --> 0:11:01.679 with a little apostrophe. 0:11:00.280 --> 0:11:02.400 And there's a picture of the Mountain DO logo on. 0:11:03.760 --> 0:11:06.920 But this was happening everywhere. There were In nineteen nineteen, 0:11:06.960 --> 0:11:08.080 there were two dozen. 0:11:07.840 --> 0:11:12.400 Race riots in places like Chicago, Washington, d C. 0:11:12.600 --> 0:11:13.240 Saint Louis. 0:11:14.200 --> 0:11:16.080 In between the end of the Civil War and World 0:11:16.120 --> 0:11:19.599 War Two, there were more than four thousand lynchings in 0:11:19.640 --> 0:11:23.280 the United States, right, which is, you know, it's important 0:11:23.320 --> 0:11:27.080 to point that out because what and we'll get into 0:11:27.080 --> 0:11:30.600 the story here, but a lynching is what was the 0:11:30.640 --> 0:11:33.760 aim of the white people of Oklahoma on this night. 0:11:34.160 --> 0:11:36.440 Right, But I have seen also one of the reasons 0:11:36.600 --> 0:11:41.160 I went to so much lengths to explain Greenwood, Yeah, 0:11:41.320 --> 0:11:45.240 in part was to because to show what was lost here, 0:11:45.720 --> 0:11:49.400 but also to show there are a lot of people 0:11:49.440 --> 0:11:53.840 who consider this massacre to have been carried out or 0:11:53.880 --> 0:11:57.960 fueled in part by envy, right, because the people of 0:11:57.960 --> 0:12:00.240 Greenmaw were so much better off in some instances than 0:12:00.280 --> 0:12:03.520 the white people who were carrying out this massacre. 0:12:03.920 --> 0:12:06.200 All right, maybe we should take a break, No, and 0:12:06.240 --> 0:12:08.480 then we'll come back. Man, we got to start twenty 0:12:08.520 --> 0:12:10.760 twenty with an argument over a break. 0:12:10.880 --> 0:12:12.280 Yeah, let's do it. 0:12:12.559 --> 0:12:13.520 All right, let's take a break. 0:12:13.559 --> 0:12:16.560 We'll come back and talk a little bit about the 0:12:16.600 --> 0:12:19.240 beginnings of what would end up being the Tulsa massacre. 0:12:41.760 --> 0:12:45.480 All right, So we should talk about the key player here, 0:12:46.000 --> 0:12:49.200 or players, And in this case it is Diamond. 0:12:49.480 --> 0:12:52.600 Dick Rowland, one of the greatest names I've ever heard 0:12:52.600 --> 0:12:53.080 in my life. 0:12:53.120 --> 0:12:53.800 It's pretty good. 0:12:54.280 --> 0:12:58.320 He was a shoeshine boy in Tulsa, and by all accounts, 0:12:58.360 --> 0:13:02.160 he was smart. He was a handsome young guy, and 0:13:02.280 --> 0:13:05.560 he was sort of a man about town. 0:13:05.640 --> 0:13:06.560 He was popular with the. 0:13:06.600 --> 0:13:08.400 Ladies, had the world on a string. 0:13:08.640 --> 0:13:09.520 Yeah, pretty much. 0:13:09.720 --> 0:13:13.160 And there was a girl named Sarah Page who ran 0:13:13.200 --> 0:13:16.360 an elevator at the Drexel Building, a building that I 0:13:16.360 --> 0:13:19.240 have walked past with my own two feet Oh wow. 0:13:19.559 --> 0:13:21.199 Right, And she was white. 0:13:21.600 --> 0:13:25.480 She was white, and you know, Dick thought she was cute, 0:13:25.480 --> 0:13:28.080 and he would go down there and basically kind of 0:13:28.160 --> 0:13:30.160 make up excuses to ride her elevator. 0:13:30.360 --> 0:13:33.360 Okay, I saw something different than that, Oh yeah, I 0:13:33.400 --> 0:13:37.160 saw that he was on the elevator because he was 0:13:37.400 --> 0:13:42.000 he could use the segregated bathroom on the top floor 0:13:42.000 --> 0:13:44.400 of the Drexel building only, so he had to ride 0:13:44.480 --> 0:13:47.120 up the elevator up and down, okay, to get to 0:13:47.160 --> 0:13:49.760 the bathroom, the closest bathroom for him to be able 0:13:49.800 --> 0:13:50.960 to use. That's what I saw. 0:13:51.080 --> 0:13:53.240 So you're saying he didn't fancy Sarah Paget, Oh No, 0:13:53.400 --> 0:13:53.760 I don't know. 0:13:53.800 --> 0:13:55.880 But I also saw a different explanation for why he 0:13:55.880 --> 0:13:57.959 would have been on the elevator as often as he 0:13:58.000 --> 0:13:58.760 supposedly was. 0:13:58.960 --> 0:13:59.960 All Right, maybe it was both. 0:14:00.880 --> 0:14:03.240 Yeah, maybe he went to the bathroom a little more 0:14:03.280 --> 0:14:05.360 often than he had to because they did, think Sarah Pegq. 0:14:05.520 --> 0:14:08.199 Who knows. I'm not saying they necessarily contradict each other. 0:14:08.200 --> 0:14:10.840 I'm just saying I've seen other explanations as well. I 0:14:10.840 --> 0:14:14.520 got you that sounded very lowyally for some reason, didn't it. 0:14:15.040 --> 0:14:18.000 Man, Maybe this is the new YU in twenty twenty 0:14:18.160 --> 0:14:20.400 Matt Locke, Josh Clark Esquire. 0:14:20.560 --> 0:14:22.520 Yeah, a spree. 0:14:23.160 --> 0:14:24.440 That's different than Esquire. 0:14:24.800 --> 0:14:27.360 So at any rate, we should probably also point out that, 0:14:29.240 --> 0:14:32.280 and you know, mixed race couples still get sideways looks 0:14:32.280 --> 0:14:35.360 in some parts of America today, but certainly in nineteen 0:14:35.400 --> 0:14:39.120 twenty one in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the idea of a black 0:14:39.160 --> 0:14:41.440 man fancying a white woman. 0:14:41.400 --> 0:14:43.360 He was even looking at a white woman. 0:14:43.480 --> 0:14:48.320 Yeah, it was not only untoward, but like a threat 0:14:48.400 --> 0:14:49.360 worthy of a lynching. 0:14:49.720 --> 0:14:49.840 Right. 0:14:50.000 --> 0:14:53.480 It was still that time in America where if you 0:14:53.600 --> 0:14:56.480 made any advances, that was sort of the biggest fear 0:14:56.520 --> 0:14:59.520 for some white men was black men coming in and 0:14:59.560 --> 0:15:01.040 takingquote unquote their women. 0:15:01.200 --> 0:15:05.280 Yeah, which is character I are popularized thanks to Birth 0:15:05.320 --> 0:15:08.680 of a Nation, which depicts the clan, you know, coming 0:15:08.720 --> 0:15:10.560 to the aid of white women who were about to 0:15:10.600 --> 0:15:14.640 be raped by maniacal black men who just could couldn't 0:15:14.640 --> 0:15:17.720 help themselves. They were just so in love with white 0:15:17.760 --> 0:15:20.240 women that they just had to rape. That was just 0:15:20.320 --> 0:15:22.560 what black guys did. That was the view of black 0:15:22.600 --> 0:15:25.120 guys at the time, right, that that's just how it was. 0:15:25.400 --> 0:15:30.840 So to white people, like you kept an eye out 0:15:30.880 --> 0:15:32.600 for that, Like when you saw a black man and 0:15:32.640 --> 0:15:34.200 there's a white woman over there, you wanted to make 0:15:34.240 --> 0:15:37.080 sure that he wasn't going to you know, rapeer. Yeah, 0:15:37.280 --> 0:15:39.680 that was the mentality that people were walking around with 0:15:39.760 --> 0:15:40.160 back then. 0:15:40.320 --> 0:15:42.640 Yeah, that movie was actually partially shot in my old 0:15:42.640 --> 0:15:43.920 neighborhood in LA. 0:15:44.280 --> 0:15:46.000 You have a lot to do with this episode. 0:15:46.360 --> 0:15:48.560 Well, it's just weird to think about birth of a nation, 0:15:50.160 --> 0:15:52.560 you know, being shot in Los Feeless, which is this 0:15:52.840 --> 0:15:55.360 very like kind of hip community and on the east 0:15:55.400 --> 0:15:56.200 side of Hollywood. 0:15:56.320 --> 0:15:56.640 Sure. 0:15:57.160 --> 0:16:03.000 But anyway, on May thirtieth, nineteen twenty one, Dick Roland 0:16:03.040 --> 0:16:06.480 went into that elevator to either flirt or use the 0:16:06.520 --> 0:16:10.240 restroom or both. And what I saw was that the 0:16:10.480 --> 0:16:14.720 It was well known that the third floor landing did 0:16:14.720 --> 0:16:20.240 not land flush with the threshold, and supposedly this is why, 0:16:20.640 --> 0:16:23.600 as the story goes, Dick Roland tripped when he was 0:16:23.600 --> 0:16:26.200 getting onto the elevator. So maybe if that bathroom was 0:16:26.240 --> 0:16:28.440 on the third floor, that could make sense. 0:16:28.600 --> 0:16:30.680 I heard top floor. I don't know how many floors 0:16:30.720 --> 0:16:33.920 of the dot I don't remember. Actually, was it more than three? 0:16:34.120 --> 0:16:36.280 I don't know, I don't remember. Actually, I just I 0:16:36.280 --> 0:16:38.920 don't think they'd call a building the something building if 0:16:38.960 --> 0:16:40.600 it only has three floors, you know what I mean, 0:16:40.680 --> 0:16:46.320 You're probably right, that's like an eight plus floor like Moniker. 0:16:46.520 --> 0:16:49.480 I think you're probably right. But at any rate, he 0:16:49.560 --> 0:16:53.400 gets on the elevator. As the story goes, stumbles getting 0:16:53.440 --> 0:16:56.640 on and kind of falls forward and grabs her arm, 0:16:56.960 --> 0:16:58.920 which was kind of the first thing that he could 0:16:59.080 --> 0:17:02.800 get a hold of from falling. As the story goes, 0:17:02.800 --> 0:17:04.680 she started beating him over the head with her purse 0:17:05.320 --> 0:17:09.399 because I guess it's an old Looney Tunes cartoon and 0:17:09.440 --> 0:17:13.200 she didn't have a rolling pins And the elevator opened. 0:17:13.200 --> 0:17:16.520 On the ground floor, people see this sort of scuffle 0:17:16.560 --> 0:17:19.520 going on, or what appears to be a scuffle. She 0:17:20.200 --> 0:17:23.959 allegedly cries out that she had been assaulted, and people 0:17:24.080 --> 0:17:27.240 on the first floor called the police as Dick flees 0:17:27.440 --> 0:17:28.280 on foot. 0:17:28.400 --> 0:17:30.280 Right takes off. 0:17:30.400 --> 0:17:33.479 Yeah, and you know, no one knows exactly how this 0:17:33.520 --> 0:17:34.160 all went down. 0:17:34.560 --> 0:17:37.639 No one even knows exactly who Diamond Dick Roland. 0:17:37.400 --> 0:17:40.960 Was or Sarah Page. Yeah, for that matter, always are. Yeah, 0:17:41.000 --> 0:17:43.760 all we found out what was that she was an orphan. 0:17:44.840 --> 0:17:46.560 She could have been a young at sixteen. I've seen 0:17:46.560 --> 0:17:49.240 reports of seventeen and was working to pay her way 0:17:49.240 --> 0:17:50.199 through business college. 0:17:50.960 --> 0:17:55.439 And that's what the Tulsa Tribune reported like the day after. 0:17:55.800 --> 0:17:57.840 Yeah, and I saw that elsewhere, But I also saw 0:17:58.000 --> 0:17:59.919 like literally nothing else about her. 0:18:00.040 --> 0:18:01.119 Yeah, I couldn't find anything. 0:18:01.200 --> 0:18:04.240 And then Dick Roland. They think that he might have 0:18:04.320 --> 0:18:07.480 possibly been named Jimmy Jones, right, I saw that too, 0:18:07.560 --> 0:18:11.160 and who was raised by his grandparents whose last name 0:18:11.200 --> 0:18:13.960 was Roland, so he took their name. And there is 0:18:14.000 --> 0:18:17.560 a guy who would have matched his birth date named 0:18:17.640 --> 0:18:20.600 Jimmy Jones that they found buried in Tulsa, but he 0:18:20.680 --> 0:18:23.199 died like two months before these events took place, so 0:18:23.200 --> 0:18:24.399 it couldn't have possibly been him. 0:18:24.560 --> 0:18:26.359 Yeah, there were a few years apart too, I think, Right, 0:18:26.440 --> 0:18:29.800 how was it? Yeah, okay, but it's unbelievable that so 0:18:29.880 --> 0:18:31.120 much of this is lost to history. 0:18:31.200 --> 0:18:35.359 Yeah, these two people who set off this one of 0:18:35.400 --> 0:18:37.840 the most despicable events that it's ever taken place in 0:18:37.840 --> 0:18:41.600 this country's history just vanish almost after this point. It's 0:18:41.680 --> 0:18:44.600 just you guys played your role. Now everyone else is 0:18:44.640 --> 0:18:45.400 going to step in. 0:18:45.960 --> 0:18:49.720 So Dick goes home his mom, I guess. He tells 0:18:49.760 --> 0:18:53.240 his mom what happened, and she obviously was pretty scared 0:18:53.320 --> 0:18:56.399 right away because she knew probably what this meant. But 0:18:56.720 --> 0:19:01.520 for that night, at least, nothing really happened. The next day, 0:19:02.080 --> 0:19:04.800 he goes out to meet up with some friends and 0:19:05.000 --> 0:19:08.639 the Tulsa police pull up and take him in. 0:19:08.720 --> 0:19:11.159 Basically on an assault charge. 0:19:11.040 --> 0:19:13.199 Right, which is I don't know why they didn't go 0:19:13.200 --> 0:19:15.520 pick him up at home or whatever, but they I 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:18.280 also read somewhere that they had arrested him on the spot. 0:19:18.359 --> 0:19:24.399 But what you're you're recounting matches what I've seen most right, right, Yeah, 0:19:24.440 --> 0:19:26.840 But that's that's history, especially suppressed history. 0:19:26.880 --> 0:19:27.000 Right. 0:19:27.040 --> 0:19:29.360 One person writes, and then somebody else reports, and then 0:19:29.960 --> 0:19:31.680 enough people report it, and then that's. 0:19:31.480 --> 0:19:33.040 Fact exactly, that's the story. 0:19:33.800 --> 0:19:38.159 But so either way he came into police custody, we 0:19:38.240 --> 0:19:40.960 know that is the way it is. And then this 0:19:41.119 --> 0:19:45.120 is like a white sheriff named William Sullivan. 0:19:44.720 --> 0:19:46.360 I think, right, William McCullough. 0:19:46.520 --> 0:19:47.800 McCullough I was very close. 0:19:48.000 --> 0:19:50.240 Yeah, And when you're starting to read the story, you 0:19:50.320 --> 0:19:54.240 hear about this, you know, white mustache sheriff and immediately think, 0:19:54.280 --> 0:19:56.159 oh boy, this guy's in trouble. 0:19:56.320 --> 0:19:58.840 Well, this guy had replaced the last guy that it 0:19:59.000 --> 0:20:03.320 was trouble, right, who had allowed a white mob to 0:20:03.400 --> 0:20:08.359 take an arrested black man out of his custody and 0:20:08.680 --> 0:20:09.160 lynch him. 0:20:09.200 --> 0:20:11.320 Oh it says here it was a white person. Is 0:20:11.359 --> 0:20:11.880 that not true? 0:20:12.040 --> 0:20:14.800