You are standing at 112 North Greenwood. This is where the commercial part of the Greenwood District started. It is where a boarding house that would eventually become the Gurley Hotel once stood. It was owned by and named after the visionary founder of Black Wall Street, Ottawa Gurley, better known as simply “O.W.” Gurley.

O.W. Gurley was a man with a vision and a plan. His strategy involved creating a place where Black citizens could support each other, live without fear, and pursue their social, political, and economic dreams.

Realizing early the potential of a boomtown like Tulsa, O.W. purchased land north of the Frisco railroad tracks, including part of what would become the “Deep Greenwood” commercial district. In 1906, he built a boarding house at this location along with a grocery store at the corner of Greenwood and Archer. And with that, the “Negro Wall Street of America” — later simply “Black Wall Street” — was born.

Along with fellow businessman J. B. Stradford, Gurley would not just be a founder of Black Wall Street, but one of the architects of its phenomenal success.

Gurley and Stradford purchased and plotted land in the immediate neighborhood to sell or lease it to Black residents and business owners. This commitment was what made a dedicated Black district possible. Their strategic partnership rested on the belief that best chance for the Black Americans’ to succeed was to pool their resources together.

As the local population boomed, Gurley would become a serial entrepreneur on a grand scale, with other ventures that included textile, tapestry, and furniture enterprises. Unwilling to keep all the opportunity for himself, Gurley personally provided loans to other Black entrepreneurs to help them get started — an extremely important gesture since access to capital was and remains a challenge for Black entrepreneurs and business persons. This commitment to take risks and help other entrepreneurs get their start catalyzed the exponential growth of the area.

It was right here, at the entrance to his hotel on the morning of June 1, 1921, that O.W. Gurley would see the faces and hear the threats of those who would destroy all he had built.

He would testify under oath after the massacre that white rioters appeared at his hotel that morning all wearing khaki suits. They saw me standing there and they said, "You better get out of that hotel because we are going to burn all of this God damn stuff. You better get all your guests out." The mob banged on the doors of the hotel’s pool hall and restaurant and people began to flee, leaving their possessions behind. He recounted that "...there was a deal of shooting going on from the grain elevator or the mill, somebody was over there with a machine gun and shooting down Greenwood Avenue," Gurley said. The people got on the stairway going down to the street, and they stampeded.

He would lose a fortune that day and never recover it. The hotel and the buildings he owned in Deep Greenwood would all be destroyed. He and his wife would be forced to hide in the basement of their home as it was torched. All told, Gurley, by his own calculations, lost $200,000 that day — a fortune by any standard in 1921.

Gurley chose not to rebuild. He spent the last chapter of his life in obscurity in Los Angeles. Before leaving Tulsa, he fought one more battle for Black Wall Street, this time illegal and deceitful transfer of property deeds following the massacre. He pushed back against white land speculators and encouraged Greenwood District landowners. In large part because of his efforts, it became a matter of pride in the Greenwood District to hold out in the face of the white grifters looking to take advantage of the situation. Black Wall Street re-emerged and thrived once again as an owned and operated Black space.