Oklahoma Voices:
Oklahoma’s Black History (Dec 02, 2007)
As Oklahoma celebrates its one hundredth birthday, we’ve spent the past several months looking back at its rich history. In previous weeks we’ve examined the roles and experiences of women, Latinos and gays and lesbians in the Sooner state over the past century, and we aired a discussion on portrayals of Oklahomans in film. Today we hear about Oklahoma’s early, black history from attorney and author Hannibal Johnson and Tonnia Anderson, Assistant Professor in the University of Oklahoma’s African and African American Studies department. Then, Richard Brown, Alma Posey Washington, Calvin Luper and Willy Johnson, Jr. (pictured above) discuss their involvement in the Oklahoma City sit-ins of the late 1950s and early 1960s, which played an important role in the national Civil Rights movement.

WEB EXTRAS:
Learn more about E.P. McCabe, the politician and booster who promoted the idea of making Oklahoma an all-black state

Read more about the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921

Listen to a 2005 KGOU report on the campaign for riot reparations

Read a brief history of the Civil Rights Movement in Oklahoma


Listen
« back