Tulsa massacre spent most of last century unremembered

FILE - This photo provided by the Department of Special Collections, McFarlin Library, The University of Tulsa shows the ruins of Dunbar Elementary School and the Masonic Hall in the aftermath of the June 1, 1921, Tulsa Race Massacre in Tulsa, Okla. (Department of Special Collections, McFarlin Library, The University of Tulsa via AP, File)

TULSA, Okla. (AP) — The toll from the 1921 massacre in Tulsa, Oklahoma, was horrific. A thriving Black community was gutted by a white mob.

The nightmare cried out for attention, but the horror and violence visited upon Tulsa’s Black community didn’t become part of the American story. Instead, it was pushed down, unremembered and untaught until efforts decades later started bringing it into the light.

U.S. history is filled with dark events that haven’t been made part of the national fabric. They often involve racism and racial violence. Historians say Americans not knowing their own history makes it harder to understand the present and how those events have impacted the socioeconomic conditions in which people are living today.