At one o’clock a.m. on June 1, 1921, rioters lit the first fire in Greenwood. The Tulsa Race Massacre had begun. By four a.m., an estimated two dozen businesses had been set ablaze, stoked by thousands of white armed vigilantes. Mass looting and destruction would follow as the day unfolded. By the time it was over, 200 Black-owned businesses would be destroyed.

On this corner, a powerful symbol of economic prosperity was vandalized: a metal safe. Rioters pulled the safe out into the street and pried it open. Its' contents were taken or cast aside. The safe remained on the corner for several days as the archive photos reveal. Each item taken held value, not just financially but personally. And yet this looted safe signifies something even bigger for this community. It visually represents everything that was lost in the massacre, a symbol of all that was robbed from this unique, thriving Tulsa community.

In financial terms, property damage of the Tulsa Race Massacre reached 1.5 million dollars, including over 1200 homes that were burned to the ground. Another 216 homes were looted and losses of personal property reached $750,000. In addition, unpaid financial claims amounted to 2.7 million dollars. In total, nearly five million dollars was lost and that's according to the dollar value of 1921. Today that would equal millions of more dollars, and yet, even that figure cannot measure the value of what was lost on June 1, 1921. More truthfully, an entire century of unfulfilled investment was also destroyed. One hundred years of enterprise and promise, of wealth-building from one generation to the next was wiped away.