Cynics Unlimited

The Greenwood neighbourhood, located near Tulsa, Oklahoma, stood out among black neighbourhoods in that it flourished during the oil boom of the 1910’s. Its economic success led to the nickname “Negro Wall Street” (later to be known as black wall street) and was home to several black millionaires. Black Wall Street was also home to one of America’s worst race riots in 1921, causing roughly 300 deaths (mostly black) and nearly $1.5 million in property damage.

Below are excerpts from various sources about the life and death of Black Wall Street.

Origins of Black Wall Street

Oklahoma’s first African-American settlers were Indian slaves of the so-called “Five Civilized Tribes”: Chickasaws, Choctaws, Cherokees, Creeks, and Seminoles. These tribes were forced to leave the Southeastern United States and resettle in Oklahoma in mid-winter over the infamous “Trail of Tears.” After the Civil War, U.S.-Indian treaties provided for slave liberation and land allotments ranging from 40-100 acres, which helps explain why over 6000 African-Americans lived in the Oklahoma territory by 1870. Oklahoma boasted of more All-Black towns and communities than any other state in the land, and these communities opened their arms to freed slaves from all across the country. Remarkably, at one time, there were over 30 African-American newspapers in Oklahoma.

Tulsa began as an outpost of the Creek Indians and as late as 1910, Walter White of the NAACP, described Tulsa as “the dead and hopeless home of 18,182 souls.” Suddenly, oil was discovered and Tulsa rapidly grew into a thriving, bustling, enormously wealthy town of 73,000 by 1920 with bank deposits totaling over $65 million. However, Tulsa was a “tale of two cities isolated and insular”, one Black and one White. Tulsa was so racist and segregated that it was the only city in America that boasted of segregated telephone booths.

-Vaughan, Leroy. Black People and Their Place in World History. 2002.

Success through Self-Reliance

Tulsa’s saga promotes the best in self-reliance and talent that black Americans have to offer. These were universal and successful themes that would apply later in all businesses, including the securities industry. Ironically, what drew the best out of these individuals was the harsh reality of segregation. Restricted form hair salons, supermarkets, restaurants and other white-owned business establishments, the black residents of Tulsa built their own. Other black communities spent their dollars at white businesses, despite being viewed as inferior. In contrast, the people of Tulsa realized the power of ownership. Because black shop-owners provided all the needed services to cater to the black community, all monies and investment stayed within the community and it blossomed. In that 35-block span, there were 1500 black-owned businesses and houses, including 10 millionaires and many families with substantial savings.

-Bell, Gregory S. In the Black: A History of African Americans on Wall Street. John Wiley and Sons, 2002.

The Riot

[The] Riot began on May, 31,1921 because of an incident the day before. A black man named Dick Rowland, stepped into an elevator in the Drexel Building operated by a woman named Sarah Page. Suddenly, a scream was heard and Rowland got nervous and ran out. Rowland was accused of a sexual attack against Page. One version of the incident holds that Rowland stepped on Page’s foot, throwing her off balance. When Rowland reached out to keep her from falling, she screamed. The next day, Rowland was arrested and held in the courthouse lockup. Headlines in the local newspapers inflamed public opinion and there was talk in the white community of lynch justice.

On June 1,1921, a big cloud of smoke covered The northern region of Tulsa. Later that morning, the last stand of the conflict occurred at foot of Standpipe Hill. According to the Tulsa Tribune, the National Guard mounted two machine guns and fired into the area. The black groups surrendered and were disarmed. They were taken in columns to Convention hall, the McNulty Baseball Park, the Fairgrounds and to a flying field. Some survivors later alleged that planes were involved in the destruction of Greenwood City.

The African Americans, being outnumbered, begin to retreat back to their section of town. Mobs of whites began to drive around the streets, shooting any African American person they saw. Sometime near 1am, the mayor and the chief of police sent a message to the governor, informing him that the riot was out of control and requested assistance. The governor activated the Oklahoma National Guard and requested two companies of soldiers from Fort Sill. The first group of guardsmen arrived before 2:30am. By 5am, a mob of 10,000-15,000 whites gathered near First St. and Elgin then marched on Greenwood, setting fire to every building standing.

-NorthTulsa.com, “Little Africa 1921 Aftermath”

Final Comments

Black Wall Street did rebuild after the riots and flourished a few more decades before fizzling out - due to both a mass exodus after integration during the 1960’s and to urban renewal projects during the 1970’s. The most important lesson from Black Wall Street is that a cohesive community can be self-sufficient (if not prosperous) even under severe discrimination. However, that cohesiveness must come from within – it cannot be granted by a government or made efficient by outside charity. Too often it seems that the community leaders who should be building Black Wall Streets (or at least building a black presence in local economies) are too concerned with being on the 6:00 news or shaking down the government for another handout disguised as a program. One does not learn by having everything done for him. There is more than enough opportunity to acquire capital within the black community to transform a “disadvantaged” community like Rexdale or Flemingdon Park into a mini Black Wall Street – someone just needs to convince the local community that the cheap credit and social incentives available today would be better utilized for businesses and schools than bling and protests. It’s almost literally mind over matter.

The land of Nubia was located in what is now Sudan and lower Egypt. Home to what is considered to be the earliest black culture, Nubia’s waves of Central African and Asiatic inhabitants managed to transform a land notorious for its high temperatures and infrequent rainfall into a series of kingdoms that influenced, occasionally conquered and inevitably outlasted their more famous Egyptian neighbours. Nubian achievements include the world’s first Archaeoastronomy devices, conceived approximately a millennium before Stonehenge.

Below are excerpts from various historical and archeological sources that describe the progression of the Nubians from the initial organization of the “A-Group” settlers to the end of Christian domination around 1400AD. The reader is encouraged to follow the embedded links to find more information.

A-Group

A-Group is the designation for a distinct culture that arose between the First and Second Cataracts of the Nile in Nubia between the Egyptian 1st dynasty and the 3rd millennium BC. The A-Group settled on very poor land with scarce natural resources, yet they became the first Nubians to develop agriculture. This culture was one of the two important “kingdoms” in Lower Nubia. Artifacts from this culture were discovered in 1907 by Egyptologist George A. Reisner.

A-Group royal tombs were found to be two centuries older than those of the Egyptians. It is believed that the Egyptians developed their grave site customs for honoring pharaohs from Central Africa. The A-Group had strong beliefs in the afterlife. A great deal of time was put into their cemeteries and funerals.

-“A Group”. Wikipedia

C-Group

The so-called C-Group appeared in Lower Nubia about 400 years later and persisted from about 2500 to 1500BC. They likely like their cultural origins in Upper Nubia, and many of the artifacts that they left are quite different from those of their A-Group predecessors in the area. The C-Groupers traded with the Egyptians, but the Egyptians themselves wanted to exert more control over their southern neighbours. During the Middle Kingdon, they built forts near the second cataract of the Nile. During Dynasty 13, Egypt lost control of Nubia, and Nubians occupied the Egyptian formts. And toward the end of Dynasty 17, the rulers of Nubia and Hyksos rulers were treating each other as equals.

-Ryan, Donald P. The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Egypt. Penguin Group (USA), 2002. ISBN 0028642775

Kerma Culture

The Kerma culture, called Kush or Kushite by the Egyptians, was the first Nubian state, situated between the fourth and fifth cataracts of the Nile River in what is now the Sudan, between 2500 and 1500 BC. Early Kerma society was agricultural in nature and had round hut dwellings with distinctive circular tombs; later Kerma developed into a foreign trade-based society with mud-brick architecture, dealing in ivory, diorate, and gold.

-Hirst, Kris K. “Kerma Culture”. About.com: Archeology

Known as the “Land of the Yam” to the Egyptians, Kerma lay in a well-watered basin where Ethiopian nutrients desposited by the Nile supported the agricultural resources of the kingdom. They were rich in cattle for domestic use, sacrifice, and exported large numbers to Egypt. Prosperous and powerful, the kings of Kerma built a sprawling city with a white temple (deffufa) fortified by mud-brick walls and rectangular towers astride the ancient routes of trade from south to north and east to west. Their craftsmen produced exquisite black-topped pottery. The indigenous burials of their kings pre-date any Egyptian influence and were accompanied by ritual human and animal sacrifice. One Kerma royal turmulus records the slaughter of 4,00 cattle for the deceased.

-Burns, James McDonald. Africa, Sub-Saharan History. Cambridge University Press (United Kingdom), 2007. ISBN 0521867460.

At one point, Kerma came very close to conquering Egypt, with Egypt suffering a “humiliating defeat” by the hands of the Kushites. According to [the] head of the joint British Museum and Egyptian archaeological team, the attack was so devastating that, had the Kerma forces chosen to stay and occupy Egypt, they might have eliminated it for good and brought the great nation to extinction.

-“Nubia”. Wikipedia

Egyptian Domination

Egypt dominated parts of Nubia from about 1950 to 1000 BC. Forts, trading posts and Egyptian style temples were built in Kush, and the Nubian elite adopted the worship of Egyptian gods and even the Egyptian hieroglyphic writing system. The gold, ebony and ivory of Nubia contributed to the material wealth of Egypt, and many of the famed treasures of the Egyptian kings were made of products from Nubia.

The one factor that chiefly characterized Egypt’s relationship with Nubia through most of their history was exploitation. Nubia’s most important resource for Egypt was precious metal, including gold and electrum.

Nubia was also an important source of manpower and labor for the Egyptians. The Palermo Stone records that early in the 4th Dynasty, King Snefru led a military campaign into Nubia reputedly to crush a “revolt” there (the Egyptians considered all enemies, whether foreign or domestic, as “rebels” against the natural order). According to that text, he captured 200,000 head of cattle and 7,000 prisoners, all of whom were deported to Egypt as laborers on royal building projects.

-“Nubia History”. TourEgypt.net.

Napatan, Meroitic and Ballana Periods

The Napatan Period (about 700 - 300 BC) is named after the town Napata, where an Amun temple was built and where the kings were buried in small pyramids (the cemeteries are located not far at Nuri and el Kurru). Napata was the religious centre of the country.

In the visible record Napatan culture seems heavily influenced by the Egyptians. The kings were buried in small pyramids, with an Egyptian style funerary equipment (shabtis, sarcophagi with religious texts, canopic jars, funerary stelae). The Egyptian hieroglyphic script was used. The exact order of most kings of the Napatan period is still under discussion. There is a group of well attested rulers dating shortly after the the end of Napatan control of Egypt (for example: Senkamanisken and Aspelta). Some kings dating to about the 4th century BC are again well-known from long monumental inscriptions (Arikamaninote, Harsiotef).

-“Nubia: The Napatan Period”. Digital Egypt for Universities.

By 200 BC the capital had shifted yet farther south to Meroe, where the kings continued to be buried in pyramid tombs and to build temples to Nubian and Egyptian gods in a hybrid Egyptian Roman-African style. Roman historians record the skirmishes and treaties which marked the relation ship of Roman Egypt and Nubia.

By AD 250 the culture of Nubia changed radically, perhaps due to the immigration of new peoples into the Nile Valley. Pyramid tombs were replaced by the great tumulus burials of the kings of Ballana.

-“Nubia History”. TourEgypt.net.

Christian Period

Nubian Christianity developed in great isolation. Between 639 and 641, the Arabs conquered Egypt, and, from then on, Coptic Christians there were a diminishing minority in a country under Muslim rule. Despite this isolation, Nubian Christianity was to survive and, indeed, flourish for centuries.

Culturally, its Christianity was greatly influenced by Byzantium. The Nubians used the liturgy of St. Mark, and decorated the walls of their churches with murals that showed their royals dressed in Byzantine style. In 1961, Polish archaeologists excavated what appeared to be a mound of sand, and, within it, found Faras Cathedral, its walls decorated with 169 magnificent paintings of dark-skinned Nubian kings, queens and bishops, and biblical figures and saints.

The decline of Christianity in Nubia seems to have been mainly cased by a gradual process of Arab Muslim immigration. As time went on, the Nubian population became increasingly dominated by Arabs or Arabized Nubians. In 1315, the Muslim government of Egypt imposed a Nubian Muslim as the king of Makouria, and, in 1317, Dongola Cathedral officially became a mosque. However, the tiny Christian splinter kingdom of Dotawo survived in lower Nubia until the late 15th century.

-Isichei, Elizabath. A History of Christianity in Africa. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 1995. ISBN 0802808433.

The Black Pharaohs

The February 2008 edition of National Geographic has an interesting article on the Black Pharaohs of Egypt. Author Robert Draper describes the invasion and control of Egypt by the Nubians under Piye, who considered himself the true ruler of Egypt. It is recommended for reading by all (as are most National Geographic articles).

Read: “The Black Pharaohs”