Viola Ford Fletcher, survivor of 1921 Tulsa Massacre, dies age 111

Fletcher fought for greater designation of 1 of the deadliest incidents of contention unit successful US history.

Viola Ford Fletcher, 1 of the past survivors of Oklahoma’s 1921 Tulsa Massacre, has died astatine property 111.

Despite her precocious age, Fletcher was a well-known activistic acknowledgment to her enactment trying to triumph justness for the victims of 1 of the worst episodes of radical unit successful United States history.

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“Today, our metropolis mourns the nonaccomplishment of Mother Viola Fletcher. She was a subsister of 1 of the darkest chapters successful our city’s past and endured much than anyone should,” Tulsa Mayor Monroe Nichols wrote successful a Facebook post. “Mother Fletcher carried 111 years of truth, resilience, and grace and was a reminder of however acold we’ve travel and however acold we indispensable inactive go.”

Fletcher was 7 years aged astatine the clip of the Tulsa Massacre successful Oklahoma, a authorities surviving nether the Jim Crow strategy that segregated the US South from the extremity of the 1800s until the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s.

The massacre began connected May 31, 1921, erstwhile constabulary arrested 19-year-old Dick Rowland, a Black shoeshiner, implicit allegations that helium had assaulted a achromatic woman, according to a study by the US Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

As a subsister of the Tulsa Race Massacre, Viola Ford Fletcher bravely shared her communicative truthful that we’d ne'er hide this achy portion of our history. Michelle and I are grateful for her lifelong enactment to beforehand civilian rights, and nonstop our emotion to her family. https://t.co/km7RXnDKcW

— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) November 25, 2025

When a radical of achromatic men gathered astatine the courthouse calling for Rowland to beryllium lynched, a radical of Black men from a adjacent assemblage responded and tried to support him earlier “all hellhole broke out”, the study said.

Over the adjacent 2 days, vigilante groups and instrumentality enforcement looted and burned down 35 blocks of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, which was past location to 1 of the wealthiest Black communities successful the US. The Bureau of Labour Statistics successful 2024 estimated that the standard of the harm was astir $32.2m erstwhile adjusted for inflation.

As galore arsenic 300 residents of Tulsa were killed and different 700 injured, the study said, though the last tally is chartless due to the fact that galore were buried successful unmarked graves.

Survivors similar Fletcher and her household were forced to permission the area. Left destitute, her household became sharecroppers, a signifier of subsistence enactment wherever farmers springiness implicit astir each their harvest to their landlord.

Rowland was ne'er charged, aft Sarah Page, the assistance relation helium was accused of assaulting, said that she did not privation to prosecute the case.

Despite the standard of devastation, the Tulsa Massacre received constricted nationalist attraction until Oklahoma authorities launched an investigative committee successful 1997. Efforts to triumph compensation for victims successful 2001, however, failed owed to the statute of limitations.

On the centennial day of the massacre, Fletcher testified earlier the US Congress successful 2021 astir her experiences and co-authored a memoir, Don’t Let Them Bury My Story, with her grandson successful 2023.

Fletcher was mourned by US leaders similar erstwhile President Barack Obama.

“As a subsister of the Tulsa Race Massacre, Viola Ford Fletcher bravely shared her communicative truthful that we’d ne'er hide this achy portion of our history. Michelle and I are grateful for her lifelong enactment to beforehand civilian rights, and nonstop our emotion to her family,” Obama posted connected X.