Portland State University PDXScholar Dissertations and Theses Dissertations and Theses Summer 9-18-2018 "The Battling Ground": Memory, Violence, and Resistance in Greenwood, North Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1907-1980 Greta Katherine Smith Portland State University Follow this and additional works at: https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/open_access_etds Part of the History Commons Let us know how access to this document benefits ou.y Recommended Citation Smith, Greta Katherine, ""The Battling Ground": Memory, Violence, and Resistance in Greenwood, North Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1907-1980" (2018). Dissertations and Theses. Paper 4559. https://doi.org/10.15760/etd.6444 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations and Theses by an authorized administrator of PDXScholar. Please contact us if we can make this document more accessible:
[email protected]. “The Battling Ground”: Memory, Violence, and Resistance in Greenwood, North Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1907-1980. by Greta Katherine Smith A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in History Thesis Committee: Katrine Barber, Chair Catherine McNeur David Johnson Karen Gibson Portland State University 2018 © 2018 Greta Katherine Smith Abstract Tulsa, Oklahoma's historically African American neighborhood of Greenwood in North Tulsa has long been contested terrain. Built by black settlers beginning in the late nineteenth-century, the neighborhood evolved into a vibrant community challenged by waves of violence—segregation at statehood in 1907, the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921, ongoing disinvestment, and processes of urban renewal beginning in the late 1950s—that contributed to the erosion of the neighborhood and the eventual displacement of many area residents into remote housing projects further into North Tulsa.