One of the last living survivors of the Tulsa Race Massacre, Viola Ford Fletcher, has died at the age of 111.
Despite being very old, Fletcher was known for her active efforts and hard work to get justice for the victims of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre in Oklahoma, one of the worst episodes of racial violence in United States history, Al Jazeera reported.
Tulsa Mayor Monroe Nichols announced the passing of the oldest living survivor of the massacre in a post on social media.
Nichols wrote in a Facebook post, “Today, our city mourns the loss of Mother Viola Fletcher. She was a survivor of one of the darkest chapters in our city’s history and endured more than anyone should. Mother Fletcher carried 111 years of truth, resilience, and grace and was a reminder of how far we’ve come and how far we must still go.”
Fletcher was just 7 years old when the Tulsa Massacre happened in Oklahoma when it was a state under the Jim Crow system that separated Black and white people.
Former US President Barack Obama also paid a heartfelt tribute to Fletcher and praised her for her civil rights efforts.
Obama wrote on X, “As a survivor of the Tulsa Race Massacre, Viola Ford Fletcher bravely shared her story so that we’d never forget this painful part of our history. Michelle and I are grateful for her lifelong work to advance civil rights and send our love to her family.”
During the two-day-long white supremacist terrorist massacre that began on May 31, 1921, in the Greenwood District in Tulsa, some of the white deputies attacked Black residents after police arrested 19-year-old Dick Rowland, a Black shoeshiner, for allegedly assaulting a white woman.
As per a report by the US Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, 300 residents are believed to have been killed and 700 others were injured in the massacre; however, the final and confirmed tally is unknown, as several people were buried in unmarked graves.
