American History Tellers - Encore: Tulsa Race Massacre | The Powder Keg | 2

Episode Date: June 2, 2021

As Black teenager Dick Rowland sat in a jail cell at the Tulsa courthouse, news of his arrest flew through the town. Egged on by rumors about his alleged rape of white teenager Sarah Page, a white mob bent on a lynching Rowland began assembling outside the courthouse. By that evening, the crowd had swelled to thousands. Meanwhile, some young African American veterans of the recent world war were determined to defend Rowland, with their lives if necessary. When they arrived at the courthouse Tuesday night, they found themselves thrust into a situation far more volatile than they were prepared for.This episode originally aired in 2019.Listen to new episodes 1 week early and to all episodes ad free with Wondery+. Join Wondery+ for exclusives, binges, early access, and ad free listening. Available in the Wondery App https://wondery.app.link/historytellers.Support us by supporting our sponsors!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge new seasons of American History Tellers early and ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Imagine it's early evening on Tuesday, May 31st, 1921. It's hot here on the top floor of the Tulsa County Courthouse, but the metal bars of Dick Rowland's jail cell door are cool in your hands as you swing it shut. You pull a heavy key ring from your pocket, flip through it, and finding the right key, lock the teenager in the cell. Something in his terrified eyes gets to you.

You okay? You didn't eat. I guess. I didn't eat. I guess. I didn't do anything, Sheriff. When can I get out of here? I don't know, boy. You just hang on tight tonight. No telling what'll happen in court, but you're safer up here than you would be out there. As you turn to leave, you nod at one of the young guards positioned nearby.

You step into the creaky elevator and head down to your office. Your head is pounding, and the muscles in your neck are so tight they feel like they could snap. You rub your temples, hoping to relieve the tension. The elevator rumbles down slowly, but you hear someone yelling before the doors even open.

Sheriff! You there! Sheriff! A man is charging towards you down the hallway. And behind him are two other men. They're all carrying guns, and they smell like they've been drinking. You tense up. What can I help you with, sir? It's awful late to be at the courthouse. I think you know exactly what we want, Sheriff.

We're looking for that boy. The one the Tribune calls Diamond Dick. I don't know what you're talking about, sir. And it's time for you to leave my courthouse. All of you. No, we don't have no intention of leaving without that boy. You leave or I'll have you locked up. You're all strangers to me and you haven't any business here at this time of night. I know there's been some talk of lynching a Negro here tonight, but there won't be anything doing. Now get out of here.

The three men glare defiantly, but they turn around, open the courthouse door, and saunter down the front steps. Following them, you're startled to see so many onlookers. Why, there could be 700, 800 people here. The three ringleaders cross the street

and get into a car and just sit there. That's it. Enough is enough. You stride to the car and lean in. Your anger is at a high pitch. Now, boys, there isn't going to be a lynching here tonight if that's what you're looking for. You just as well go on home. Get away from here and stop this excitement. You turn and head back to the courthouse steps,

one hand prominently on the gun in your holster. You turn to the crowd to the courthouse steps, one hand prominently on the gun in your holster. You turn to the crowd. All right, all right. Now there's one thing you need to know and you need to hear it loud and clear. I will kill the next man who enters this courthouse. Now, it would be an easy matter for you boys to kill me, but you still wouldn't get any further. My deputies are on instruction to kill any man who tries to get near the prisoner. Now go home, all of you, before there's trouble. The crowd murmurs. Some turn and begin to walk away.

Others stay, looking restive and angry. But you've said your piece and you mean it. You walk back up the courthouse steps into the limestone building, pulling the huge door shut behind you. It's going to be a long night. and entrepreneurs get 90 seconds to pitch to an audience of potential customers. If the audience liked the product, if it gets them in front of our panel of experts, Gwyneth Paltrow, Anthony Anderson,

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early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus. From Wondery, I'm Lindsey Graham, and this is American History Tellers. Our history. Your story. On Monday, May 30th, the day before an angry mob showed up at the Tulsa courthouse, 19-year-old Dick Rowland had stepped into an elevator operated by a young white woman named Sarah Page. What happened next is unclear, but Page screamed, and Rowland fled the scene. As soon as Page cried out, Rowland would have known he was in danger. Ever since Oklahoma became a state in 1907, lynching of black residents had become more common.

By 1930, 41 victims would be tortured and murdered in Oklahoma, most of them African American. And those were just the lynchings to enter the official record. Many more went unreported. One of the leading justifications for hanging African Americans was rape. Accusations that a black man had assaulted a white woman so inflamed emotions that the evidence didn't matter. An accusation alone was enough for a black man to find himself hounded by a mob, beaten, burned, and then swinging from a tree limb. Rape was also a convenient story when white men wanted to make

an example of a black man. And in Greenwood, that was likely the case. Attracted by the opportunity to make a living in the oil fields, thousands of white workers had flooded into Tulsa, swelling the population. But now, following World War I, many of those newer residents found themselves unemployed, aimless, and resentful of their prosperous black neighbors. And everywhere, the Ku Klux Klan had been stoking white rage, blaming white joblessness on African Americans. In Tulsa, that envy and resentment was coming to a head.

When the crowd finally snapped, they would head to the heart of Greenwood, to its thriving neighborhood businesses and the homes of its 10,000 residents with only one thing in mind, run the Negroes out of town. This is episode two of our four-part series on the Tulsa Race Massacre, The Powder Keg. After he fled the Drexel building Monday afternoon, Dick Rowland had raced home from downtown Tulsa to Greenwood. In the meantime, police questioned Sarah Page, who initially claimed that Roland had assaulted her. The next morning, police had no trouble finding Roland on Greenwood Avenue, arresting him and bringing him to the city jail. When questioned,

Roland told police that he had tripped while entering the elevator and fell against Page, possibly stepping on her foot. She panicked and screamed. Later that same day, Paige corroborated his account and admitted that she had overreacted, but Roland was not released. The news of the young man's arrest traveled fast and it caused a stir. Over the next several hours, tensions grew. At about four o'clock on Tuesday afternoon, Tulsa County Sheriff Willard McCullough received a phone call warning him that a lynch mob was out to get Roland. Police decided to transfer Roland from the city jail to the courthouse, saying he'd be safer there since the county jail was on the top floor and harder to access. With this transfer, Roland and the growing mob became McCullough's problem.

Sheriff Bill McCullough was a former cowboy with an elegant handlebar mustache and a determined manner. He'd been sheriff off and on since 1910, three years after statehood, but he'd only returned to the office six months before Rowland's arrest. He'd taken over from the previous sheriff, Jim Woolley. Woolley lost his re-election bid to McCullough after failing to protect accused murderer Roy Belton, a white man from being lynched nine months earlier in late August 1920. Then, a gang of thugs had grabbed Belton out of the courthouse, from the very cell where Rowland was now being held, and hanged him in front of a rowdy crowd. Though McCullough was a veteran lawman with his portal-handled.45 caliber pistol, he had a reputation for preferring

to talk, not shoot, his way out of trouble. More than a decade earlier, in his previous stint as sheriff, he'd had to execute a convicted black man by hanging. It was, about the worst job I ever had to do, he said later. And on this night, Tuesday, May 31st, 1921, McCullough had no intention of losing his job over Rowland, nor of letting anyone harm the young man. To prevent the crowd from getting to the prisoner, he assigned six deputies to remain upstairs with Rowland, with orders to shoot to kill if any outsiders came close. McCullough also disabled the elevator, one more measure to prevent anyone from grabbing Rowland. Later, McCullough

would identify his biggest mistake that night. I should have killed those three men, he would say. To him, making an example of them could have made all the difference. Instead, the crowd of hundreds swelled into a mob of thousands, which stayed outside the courthouse for hours. As rumors that Roland had raped Sarah Page flew around both white and black Tulsa, the two communities responded in dramatically different ways. On the white side of town, Tulsa Tribune editor Richard Lloyd-Jones reacted with vigor. The son of a prominent Unitarian minister, Jones had a flair for the dramatic.

At the turn of the century, he'd been a Broadway actor, a short story writer, and later the editor of Cosmopolitan magazine. In 1919, at 46 years old, Jones had come to town from Wisconsin and purchased the Tulsa Democrat from a wealthy friend. He changed its name to the Tribune and set about to do everything he could to increase circulation. Jones transformed the paper into a tabloid that ran a constant stream of stories about carjackings, murders, and lynchings. Because of Tulsa's lawlessness, there was no shortage of crime news to seize on. By 1921, there were some 6,000 cases waiting to be heard at the county courthouse.

And at the time of Dick Rowland's arrest, Jones had been running a string of editorials castigating the mayor and the police for failing to clean up crime and so-called immorality. The word immorality was a loaded term, one that the Klan had co-opted to mean everything from jazz-age relaxation of sexual mores to women's independence and the mixing of races. To the Klan, relationships between black and white people were the worst offenses, because the Klan believed in the purity of white blood. Anything that hinted of sex between a black man and a white woman implied that pure white blood would be tainted.

The KKK's presence in Tulsa wasn't widely known, though, although Klan recruiters had set up shop in a downtown Tulsa office building. But the Klan's philosophies were embraced by a sizable number in the white community, including Tulsa Tribune editor Richard Lloyd-Jones. As the head of the Tulsa Tribune, he echoed this kind of coded language, and his sensational headlines and shrill editorials would rapidly amp up the Tribune's circulation and would make him a wealthy man. It was no surprise then that on Tuesday, May 31, 1921,

Jones seized on the arrest of Dick Rowland, quickly producing a story for the afternoon paper. According to one eyewitness, newsboys hawked the paper on downtown corners using provocative language, emphasizing the lurid story of a Negro assaulting a white girl. White passers-by quickly scooped up the paper. The article, a blend of fact and fiction, spared no melodrama. The story said Roland had looked up and down the hall to make sure he was alone before getting on the elevator. The account of the alleged attack itself, which had no witnesses,

was woven out of whole cloth. The article read, He entered the elevator, she claimed, and attacked her, scratching her hands and face and tearing her clothes. The Tribune also played on the sympathies of white readers by claiming, without evidence, that Rowland was a playboy who went by the nickname of Diamond Dick, and that the young, vulnerable Sarah Page was an orphan, working as an elevator operator to pay her way through business college.

But that wasn't all. Many readers said they also saw an editorial in the Tribune headlined To Lynch a Negro Tonight, but the op-ed hasn't survived. Before that issue of the paper could be preserved, someone destroyed the editorial pages of every existing copy. Within an hour after the Tribune rolled off the presses, there was talk of a lynching on the streets of Tulsa. At four o'clock, the phone on Police Commissioner J.M. Atkinson's desk rang. An anonymous voice came across the line, We're going to lynch that Negro, that black devil who assaulted that girl. By Tuesday afternoon, anxiety pervaded Greenwood.

It centered in the offices of the Tulsa Star, one of two newspapers, along with the Tulsa Eagle, that served Tulsa's black residents. The news of Roland's plight had quickly reached A.J. Smitherman, owner and editor of the Star. At about four o'clock, Sheriff McCullough called the Star office to say he expected an attack on the courthouse that night. Word went out that McCullough might need help protecting Roland from the mob.

So a group of men gathered at the Star offices on Greenwood Street to hash out what to do. It would be an excruciating decision. They would have to balance courage, caution, and pride. Older members of the group felt a careful strategy was needed, and they feared the consequences of an unthinking, instinctive response to the threat. Imagine it's late Tuesday afternoon on May 31st, 1921, at the headquarters of the Tulsa Star in Greenwood. You've shed your coat and are in white shirt sleeves and vest.

There's still a newspaper to print, and you, as editor, have a lot of work to do. But a crisis is at hand. Your office is filled with community leaders, former soldiers, fathers, laborers, and young friends of Dick Rowland's. They're all perched on every available chair and the edges of messy desks. Okay, okay, settle down, everyone.

We've known this day would come. It is imperative that we keep cool heads about us. As you begin to speak, you eye Barney Cleaver in the corner. He's one of the only two black sheriff deputies in Tulsa, and he looks worried. I believe we must defend the young man. As I have long said, we cannot let any Tulsa citizen become a lynching victim. Cleaver, the deputy sheriff, stands up. No, no, no.

You've got an outsized idea of what we can do against these white folks. Barney, we can do this in a measured, calm way. But we must have a plan. If they'll let a white man get lynched, I don't trust Chief Gustafson, McCullough, or any of them to protect a black man against a mob. They have more people than we do, more firepower, and will stop at nothing. Now, Barney, we have appeased for far too long, and look where it has gotten us.

You have five kids, A.J. What about Ollie? What would your wife do if you were killed? We all have families, A.J. Yeah, we do all have families. And many of us have sons just like Dick. Barney, McCulloch called to let us know what could happen. He needs our help and is admitting as much.

We need to send men to the courthouse, not in violence, but in aid. We need to protect that young man from the mob. Around you, some of the younger men, the veterans of the war, are getting fired up. They're starting to gather the things, get ready to leave. The deputy sheriff looks around, alarmed. I see many of you have made up your minds. I'll do what I can to keep the peace, but frankly, if you show up at that courthouse, I fear for your lives and mine.

Andrew Jackson Smitherman, or A.J. as he was known, was a publisher, father, and husband, and an affluent, highly respected leader in Greenwood. He also held strong opinions. Under his leadership, the star urged dignity, respect, and equal rights for Tulsa's Black citizens. Smitherman took a stance that some considered even militant, that the black community should defend its people against white brutality with force, and if necessary, with their lives. Smitherman was a study in contrasts. Both eloquent and elegant, he was small in stature, but he was as tough as he was articulate. Born in 1883 in Alabama,

he moved with his parents to the Indian Territory in 1890. At one point, he worked in a coal mine, but he followed that labor with extensive education. He attended the University of Kansas and Northwestern University and got a law degree at Philadelphia's LaSalle University. He moved to Tulsa in 1913 and started The Star. He was also active politically, at one point serving as the Justice of the Peace for Tulsa County. When Rowland was arrested, Smitherman feared the teenager sitting in jail was in grave danger. White jailers were known to aid lynch mobs, as in the lynching of Roy Belton just eight months earlier had proved. To Smitherman, that incident showed that no one was safe in the hands of Tulsa's white officials, let alone a black man. And he hadn't had to wait

long for proof. Only a day after the Belton lynching, an angry white mob in Oklahoma City, just 100 miles from Tulsa, had easily stolen a black prisoner named Claude Chandler out of a local jail and lynched him. Furthermore, a thousand black Oklahoma City residents had turned out to defend Chandler, but obeyed police when they were turned away. An outraged Smitherman felt they'd failed a moral cause. He penned an editorial writing that it was the duty of lawful citizens to march to the jail, tell the jailer the purpose of their visit, and take life if they need to, to uphold the law and protect the prisoner. The Chandler event indicated to Smitherman

that white leaders couldn't be trusted to protect black prisoners. But it also proved something else, that violence against black people would continue unless men of color fought back. He had reason for hope because he'd seen this strategy work before. In 1918, when he was Justice of the Peace, Smitherman had been summoned to Bristow, Oklahoma, to help protect a black man named Edward Bohannon from lynching. He sent a telegram to the governor, requesting help. A race riot is imminent, he stated. Kindly act at once. But before Smitherman got to Bristow, 200 black farmers had gathered, determined to defend Bohannon from an even larger mob.

The Bristow police chief warned the white crowd that he would shoot to kill anyone who dared harm Bohannon. He then safely took Bohannon out of town, averting the lynching. Smitherman and his followers were convinced that appeasing lynch mobs was folly. Not only was it humiliating, but it only served to show whites that they could get away with torture and murder over and over again, without end. Smitherman, a talented poet, summed

up his philosophy with this verse, they are trying to lynch our comrade, without cause in law defy. Get your guns and defend him. Let's protect him, win or die. At the same time, Smitherman was a highly respected leader of the community. He believed in self-defense, but was aware of the danger of simply reacting without a strategy. Rather than rushing toward the mob, weapons in hand, he wanted to hear what Sheriff McCullough had to say. Other Greenwood leaders, J.B. Stratford and O.W. Gurley, would also weigh in.

Like Smitherman, Stratford was angry. He had achieved enormous success and had no intention of acting subservient to whites. Moreover, he had always stood up for civil rights. Back in 1912, he'd sued a railroad when he became the target of a Jim Crow law that forced him to leave his first-class railroad seat and move to a black-only car. And it was widely known that he'd almost beaten a white delivery man to death when the man insulted the color of Stratford's skin. But Stratford had sunk his life savings into the magnificent Stratford Hotel, and he also owned a great deal of other property in Greenwood. Now, in his early 60s, he was one of the richest men in Greenwood.

He had a lot to lose. He struggled with these contradictions in the Tulsa Star office, first urging a reasoned defense, but then saying, if anything were to happen to Roland, I will go single-handed and empty my automatic into the mob, and then resign myself to my fate. Amidst the debate, the conflict intensified. O.W. Gurley, who along with Stratford had founded Greenwood, was almost as wealthy. So Gurley had a lot at stake too, and he had done business with

White Tulsans. In the discussions, he urged calm and offered to walk to the courthouse and carefully offer Greenwood's assistance, wanting to avoid using force. But some of the younger men were far too upset to buy their time. Their growing pride, belief in equality, and conviction in the morality of self-defense overtook the calmer, older voices in Greenwood. One of them, O.B. Mann, a World War I veteran who owned a nearby grocery store, was bristling with rage. He'd had enough talk. At six foot five and still as powerful as he'd been in the war, he was a natural, fearsome leader.

And so he stormed out onto the street, and a handful of fellow soldiers were right behind him. A storm was gathering. In a quiet suburb, a community is shattered by the death of a beloved wife and mother. But this tragic loss of life quickly turns into something even darker. Her husband had tried to hire a hitman on the dark web to kill her. And she wasn't the only target. Because buried in the depths of the internet is The Kill List, a cache of chilling documents containing names, photos, addresses,

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Stream free on Freeview and Prime Video. It was 7 o'clock, not yet dusk, when an initial small group of 30 men intent on defending Roland arrived at the courthouse. These were Greenwood neighbors who hadn't attended the meeting at the Star. The feelings that defending Roland was the right thing to do had rippled throughout the neighborhood. And this group, also mostly veterans, had donned their uniforms, grabbed their guns, and driven across town to offer help to Sheriff McCullough. When they arrived, there were at least 700 whites, men, women, and children at the courthouse, jeering McCullough, who was trying vainly to disperse the crowd. O.W. Gurley had already made it to the courthouse.

There, McCullough had urged him to go home and calm down the Greenwood residents and persuade them to stay away from the courthouse. But it was too late. Gurley couldn't turn back the waves of men from Greenwood. Barney Cleaver had also made it over to the courthouse. The African-American deputy sheriff hurried over to the Greenwood vets. Boys, you are not doing this right, he said according to later court testimony. There isn't anybody going to get that boy tonight. He's perfectly safe here. You shouldn't have done this thing, for it only stirs up race trouble. Go on home and behave yourselves.

Uneasily, the veterans did as Cleaver told. Maybe, despite appearances, the sheriff did have the situation under control. So they returned over the Frisco tracks and into Greenwood, back to their homes and families. But the trouble had only just begun. The Greenwood men were not organized, and they were angry. As the first group returned home, other groups were just arriving at the courthouse. Had they realized the situation they would encounter, they might have had second thoughts. It was almost dark, and the white mob had grown from hundreds to thousands. Like Tulsa itself, the group was economically mixed. By then,

Tulsa was home to some 400 oil companies, seven banks, luxurious hotels, an opera company, four train lines and restaurants and shops for miles. It was a playground of the newly wealthy, awash in oil money. But it was also home to thousands of poor people who had flooded into the city from all over the South and Southwest, chasing work in the oil fields. With the First World War over, demand for oil fell, and many people newly settled in Tulsa were out of work and resentful. Throughout the country, the Klan played on these fears, blaming white unemployment on black economic self-sufficiency. And nowhere was that contrast greater in Tulsa, where poor white people envied the wealth and success so apparent in Greenwood.

This resentment was also fueled by moonshine. Although alcohol had been illegal in Oklahoma even before the ratification of the 19th Amendment, it was still everywhere. The crowd had attracted rough oil workers and many unemployed, poor white people barely hanging on. By sundown at the courthouse, many were drunk. Some held open bottles in one hand and weapons in the other. Others were unarmed, but they wouldn't remain so for long. The situation was quickly growing more dangerous. On both sides of the tracks, men were roaming the streets, some urging fighting, others attempting to calm things down. In the latter group was a young Greenwood resident named Columbus F. Gabe. Gabe was heading from the courthouse to

the safety of his home when he ran into some African-American veterans, three carloads of men, including some who had been at the meeting at the Tulsa Star. Gabe, who after the massacre would become a Tulsa police officer, jumped into the street to block their way. He threw his hands up in the air, urging them to turn around. But one of the Greenwood men pointed his gun at Gabe and ordered him out of the street. Gabe stepped away from the car, his eye on the gun, and they drove on. Back at the courthouse, a white man was also urging restraint, trying desperately to control the huge mob. He pleaded for the crowd to back down because the black community could and would fight back. He told them, falsely, that African Americans were riding around downtown with revolvers and rifles.

Rumors were flying that night, and it's possible the man believed what he said, or that he exaggerated the threat to disperse the crowd. Either way, some whites were preparing to leave. But before they could, the three carloads of black veterans Gabe had tried to stop pulled up, armed and in military uniform. They marched, single file, armed and in military uniform. They marched, single file, toward the courthouse. At six foot five, Grocer O.B. Mann, who was leading the group, posed a formidable presence. But along with him were Peg Legg Taylor, Will Robinson, Bud Bassett,

Jack Scott, and many others, including those known only by their nicknames, Fatty, Chummy, and Big Fred. They met another 35 black men marching alongside the courthouse, and Sheriff McCullough was trying to reason with all of them. He would later testify that some said they would go if he would assure them that he would not let the mob take the Roland boy. But just as one wave of black men would turn to leave, another group would appear, and McCullough found himself surrounded by Greenwood residents, all talking and arguing at once. And, as in the white mob, some of the black men had been drinking.

Imagine it's 9.30 Tuesday night. You've just pulled up outside the courthouse in your Model T with a posse of men from Greenwood. Your plan is to reason with Sheriff McCullough, but you're ready to pull a trigger if you need to. You got used to that in France, and you also got accustomed to being respected by the French citizens and soldiers, but it's been starkly different since you returned home from the war. You're tall enough so that you can see above the enormous crowd. And what you see alarms you. Not just the size, but the fury, the weapons, and the open bottles of booze. It's a powder keg.

Come on, boys. Let's go talk to the sheriff. You lead your group through small crowds of your neighbors and friends toward Sheriff McCullough, the only white face in a sea of dark ones still a fair bit from you. You want to make your case that he needs the protection you soldiers can give to keep Dick Rowland safe. If you could just get over to the sheriff to talk. But suddenly, a white man, about five foot six, appears in front of you and plants his feet.

He's not going anywhere. You're a foot taller than he is, much stronger. But that doesn't stop him from addressing you in an old, familiar way. Where are you going with that weapon, boy? I'll use it if I have to. Like hell you will. Give it to me. He reaches for your pistol. You jerk it away. He grabs your arm. The crowd seems to crush in on you.

A man's eyes, intent and furious. You'll think back on this moment for the rest of your life, and you're still not sure what happened. But you know for sure what happened next. Sheriff McCullough would testify later that the sound of the gunshot was just like throwing a match in the powder can. Near him, black veterans began shooting. Surrounded by African-American men offering their help in protecting Roland, McCullough's first thought was that the white mob would immediately begin shooting back toward the black crowd he was in, so he dove for the sidewalk.

When he got up, the streets had cleared, the crowds having fled the gunfire. But a body lay dying near the courthouse, under a billboard of smiling movie star Mary Pickford. Chaos followed the initial killing, with people shooting and running throughout downtown. In short order, a dozen people lay dead on the streets near the courthouse. Though many were armed, hundreds in the white mob didn't have guns, but wanted them.

Earlier in the evening, about 400 whites had tried to break into the National Guard Armory, but Major Jason Bell had stopped them, stationing guards around the building and one on the roof. Without access to the armory's weapons, the white mob now ransacked downtown pawn shops, hardware, and sporting goods stores looking for firearms. The sound of breaking glass shattered the night as they destroyed store windows. Some stores, trying to avoid the destruction, voluntarily opened their

doors to the mob. The white rioters, including hundreds who had been drinking all night, quickly grabbed every gun and box of ammunition in town, forgetting Dick Rowland, still secure in his county jail cell, and now turning to fight what they believed was a Negro uprising. When the shooting began, it seemed to be everywhere at once. The police force was wholly unprepared. For some reason, there were few police officers on the street that night. The normal patrols were missing. That lapse was part of a broader pattern of actions, either intentional or due to incompetence, that would eventually see Police Chief John Gustafson convicted for neglect of duty. Gustafson had just been appointed to his position the previous year. He had a

dubious history. Sheriff McCullough despised him. Shortly after Gustafson's appointment, McCullough complained to the city commissioner about the new police chief's decades long involvement with snitches and crooks. McCullough direly predicted that Gufferson would be counted on to hire that same class of people as his new police officers. And McCullough was right. Only two weeks before Rowland was arrested, the city had concluded an investigation into the force, prompted by numerous complaints of ineptitude, sexual abuse of female prisoners, and corruption. Officers were known to confiscate illegal alcohol and either use it themselves or sell it, sometimes to their prisoners. The investigation went nowhere, though, and a Tulsa World newspaper

headline in May had reported, Impeachment of Police Falls Flat. But perhaps Gustafson's worst violation of law and order had come earlier when Roy Belton was lynched. A line of hundreds of cars had followed the mob out to the remote location where Belton was to be hanged. Rather than trying to stop the vigilantes and save Belton, Gustafson had directed traffic. After the murder, Gustafson said he didn't condone mob law, but he added, It is my honest opinion that the lynching of Belton will prove of real benefit to Tulsa and vicinity. At the courthouse on the night of May 31st, Gustafson checked in a few times. When the shooting started, he didn't question the mob's

conclusion. A black uprising was happening and it had to be quashed. Gustafson deputized approximately 500 white men on the spot. They were given badges and arms. Chief Gustafson relied upon his gut feeling and little else to choose his new deputies. He would later say, I talked to the men, and those I thought would remain cool-headed, I commissioned. Notably, all of his emergency commissions were given to white men. As NAACP Executive Secretary Walter White later said in a report about the riot, they could have been thugs, murderers, escaped felons, or a member of the mob itself. The police did refuse to commission at least one man, a 26-year-old white bricklayer named Laurel Buck.

They didn't give him a badge, but they did give him instructions. Get yourself a gun and get busy and try to get a Negro. This is the emergency broadcast system. A ballistic missile threat has been detected inbound to your area. Your phone buzzes and you look down to find this alert. What do you do next? Maybe you're at the grocery store. Or maybe you're with your secret lover.

Or maybe you're robbing a bank. Based on the real-life false alarm that terrified Hawaii in 2018, Incoming, a brand-new fiction podcast exclusively on Wondery Plus, follows the journey of a variety of characters as they confront the unimaginable. The missiles are coming. What am I supposed to do? Featuring incredible performances from Tracy Letts, Mary Lou Henner, Mary Elizabeth Ellis, Paul Edelstein, and many, many more, Incoming is a hilariously thrilling podcast that will leave you wondering, how would you spend your last few minutes on Earth?

You can binge Incoming exclusively in ad-free and Wondery+. Join Wondery+, in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. In the Pacific Ocean, halfway between Peru and New Zealand, lies a tiny volcanic island. It's a little-known British territory called Pitcairn, and it harboured a deep, dark scandal. There wouldn't be a girl on Pitcairn once they reach the age of 10 that would still a virgin. It just happens to all of us. I'm journalist Luke Jones and for almost two years I've been investigating a shocking story that has left deep scars on generations of women and girls from Pitcairn. When there's nobody watching, nobody going to report it, people will get away

with what they can get away with. In the Pitcairn Trials, I'll be uncovering a story of abuse and the fight for justice that has brought a unique, lonely Pacific island to the brink of extinction. Listen to the Pitcairn Trials exclusively on Wondery+. Join Wondery in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Imagine it's about dusk on Tuesday, May 31st. You turn away from your bedroom door and gaze at your stunning new prom dress lying on your bed. It's silk, the first evening dress you've ever owned.

Made custom for you by Betty Williams, the best seamstress in Greenwood. It has a tight bodice and a huge taffeta skirt. You love how it rustles when you walk in it. Mama, it's time to start getting ready. I'm going to need a hand with all these buttons. You can just imagine how the dress will move when you and Verby dance together tonight, and not in some old high school gym, no, the Stratford Hotel, one of the finest hotels in the whole country, right here in Greenwood. Your mother appears at the door, balancing your little brother Willie on her hip. Vinice, you don't want to get in that dress right now. You'll get it all sweaty. Fix your face first, get your stockings on, and your jewelry. You step lightly over to your

dresser and pick up a length of pearls. Oh, Mama, I haven't shown you yet. I just picked these up from Betty. She lent them to me for tonight. Aren't they stunning? They are, but you have to be careful with those. They need to go right back to her in the morning. Mama, of course I will, but look at the way... You freeze in shock, dropping the pearls. Mama, what is that? Oh, Lord, honey, I don't know. Your mother shrinks away from the window and covers Willie's head as best she can. Something bad is happening. You leave that dress there and come with me. But Mama, now, baby, now.

You follow your mother downstairs to the kitchen. Your younger siblings come running too, clutching at you and your mother. Willie has begun wailing, and your mother instinctively hushes him. Through the doorway into the parlor, you see your father grab his gun from over the mantle. You bound out the back door. Where is he going?

Quiet, baby. You need to be quiet. Outside, you hear running, yelling, and gunshots. It sounds like a war. You pick up four-year-old Lily and squeeze her tight as your heart races. After a long two minutes, the door opens again. It's your father. There's a race ride. It's time to go. It takes you a minute to grasp what he's saying,

that you have to leave your home and flee Greenwood to escape the dangerous white men outside. But no one moves until the sounds of the yelling fade. It seems they have moved on. Now it's time to run. Vanice Sims and her family dashed into her father's black Ford and drove north out of town, in a line behind many other cars also escaping the violence. The perfect dress, shoes, and shiny pearls had to

stay behind, along with her dreams of dancing in the grandeur of the Stratford Hotel. In the back seat, with Willie perched on her lap, Denise Sims wept. The Sims family was able to get out of town to safety that night, but that wasn't the case for many Greenwood residents. Some, who had been watching a movie at the Dreamland Theater, walked out into the street when the film ended and found themselves inexplicably being shot at. But only some of the white mob had come to Greenwood. Others had run back to their homes from the courthouse to pick up weapons. Others were scrounging guns from downtown Tulsa hardware stores, pawn shops, and even the police station. In downtown Tulsa, in Greenwood's business district,

and here and there on residential streets throughout Greenwood, it was chaos. Shortly after the pistol shot at the courthouse that marked the beginning of the rioting, Columbus Gabe, the soon-to-be Tulsa police officer, had gone back out onto the streets to see what was happening. He wanted to do whatever he could to keep the peace. He soon realized how impossible that was. Hearing a shot, Gabe saw a man fall. Terrified to be out in the open, he began running as fast as he could. Several Greenwood residents were taking cover in a big metal boiler, and Gabe hid behind it. Armed white men were hunkered down in the Frisco train depot on the border between the white and black sections of town. A white person would shoot toward Greenwood and someone hiding in the boiler

would shoot back. Soon the ting of bullets hitting metal was coming often. Intermittently, Gabe heard someone yell, run out from the depot or the boiler and pick up an injured man. In the midst of this standoff, Gabe saw one white woman lean out of the window of a car, point a weapon at an unarmed black man in the street, and shoot him. Having enough, Gabe ran toward his home. As he did, he saw white men on Boston Street in Greenwood, holding lighted torches aloft. They were heading toward two vacant shacks that sat near the train tracks and set them on fire. Later, Gabe would realize that this was just the beginning of the burning. At midnight, the fire department arrived to put out the fires, but the white mob, guns drawn, wouldn't let them.

The firefighters left and came back an hour later. By then, the first shack had burnt to the ground, but the second was still standing. Once again, the mob threatened the firefighters away from the fire and the roaring flames continued to burn. In the deep Greenwood business district, three to four hundred black men were roaming around, armed with whatever they could get, guns, sticks, stones. People, mostly black, began following the street, dying where they lay. But soon, some order began to be imposed, as the black veterans realized they were in a war, a battle that felt familiar.

As they had in France, they took up defensive positions in buildings along the railroad tracks, in the belfry of the just-completed Mount Zion Baptist Church in their homes. More former soldiers donned their uniforms, even their helmets, and they pulled out weapons they brought home from the war, aiming their long-range Winchesters at

the rioters. They were fighting fiercely, giving as good as they got. They would later say that until the events of the following day, they were winning. Still, as the night wore on, Greenwood men were driven back into their neighborhood, until finally the fighting was confined there. By midnight, a new intention of the armed mob became clear, to trap black Tulsans in their neighborhood and kill as many as they could. And not just men, but women, children, old people. Sixty to seventy white drivers fell into an organized line that began driving slowly and menacingly around the circumference of Greenwood. And as May 31st ended and the new day began, the sound of gunfire rattled through the streets. Some of Greenwood's And as May 31st ended and the new day began, the sound of gunfire rattled through

the streets. Some of Greenwood's men continued to defend their neighborhood, even as others and their families fled to the small towns to the north, some grabbing whatever possessions they could, others leaving barefoot with nothing. They'd all assumed they'd come back, probably within hours or days. Some were right, others never returned. Next on American History Tellers, former soldiers try to defend Greenwood against white Tulsans armed with torches, machine guns, and airplanes. The life of the best black surgeon in the country is threatened, and thousands of African Americans are sent to internment camps while city leaders

plan their next moves. From Wondery, in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. And before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery.com slash survey. American History Tellers is hosted, edited, and produced by me, Lindsey Graham for Airship. Sound design by Derek Behrens. This episode is written by Elaine Appleton Grant, edited by Dorian Marina, edited and produced by Jenny Lauer Beckman.

Our executive producer is Marshall Louis, created by Hernán López for Wondery. Dracula, the ancient vampire who terrorizes Victorian London. Blood and garlic, bats and crucifixes. Even if you haven't read the book, you think you know the story. One of the incredible things about Dracula is that not only is it this wonderful snapshot of the 19th century, but it also has so much resonance today. The vampire doesn't cast a reflection in a mirror. So when we look in the

mirror, the only thing we see is our own monstrous abilities. From the host and producer of American History Tellers and History Daily comes the new podcast, The Real History of Dracula. We'll reveal how author Bram Stoker raided ancient folklore, exploited Victorian fears around sex, science, and religion, and how even today we remain enthralled to his strange creatures of the night. You can binge

all episodes of The Real History of Dracula exclusively with Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus and The Wondery App, Apple Podcasts,

or Spotify.