Join us for an important conversation between Sidley partner Patrick Michel and Hannibal B. Johnson, attorney, professor, and author of Black Wall Street 100: An American City Grapples With Its Historical Racial Trauma, as they discuss the events that led to the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre and the destruction of the predominantly Black Greenwood neighborhood of Tulsa, Oklahoma. They will also discuss the historical significance of June 19 or Juneteenth, the oldest nationally celebrated commemoration of the end of slavery in the United States.
SPEAKERS
Hannibal B. Johnson
Author, Attorney, and Consultant
Patrick Michel
Partner, Sidley
Black Wall Street 100: An American City Grapples With Its Historical Racial Trauma is a window into what distinguishes the Tulsa of today from the Tulsa of a century ago. Before peering through that porthole, we must first reflect on Tulsa’s Historic Greenwood District in all its splendor and squalor, from the prodigious entrepreneurial spirit that pervaded it to the carnage that characterized the 1921 massacre to the post-massacre rebound and rebuilding that raised the District to new heights to the mid-twentieth-century decline that proved to be a second near-fatal blow to the current recalibration and rebranding of a resurgent, but differently configured, community. Tulsa’s trajectory may be instructive for other communities similarly seeking to address their own histories of racial trauma. Conversely, Tulsa may benefit from learning more about the paths taken by other communities. Through sharing and synergy, we stand a better chance of doing the work necessary to spur healing and move farther toward the reconciliation of which we so often speak.