The ground breaking : the Tulsa race massacre and an American city's search for justice / Scott Ellsworth.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 284-307) and index.

1921 -- After -- Awakenings -- Two summers -- Death in a promised land -- Where are the rest? -- The lady with a cane -- Tulsa calling -- Reparations and reprisals -- The steps to nowhere -- Rolexes and pickup trucks -- Reminding a city of her sins -- Breaking ground -- Bodies of evidence -- The dirt whisperers.

"The definitive, newsbreaking account of the ongoing investigation into the Tulsa race massacre. In the late spring of 1921, Tulsa, Oklahoma, erupted into the worst single incident of racial violence in American history. Over the course of sixteen hours, mobs of white men and women looted and burned to the ground a prosperous African American community, known today as Black Wall Street. More than one thousand homes and businesses were destroyed, and scores, possibly hundreds, of people lost their lives. Then, for nearly a half century, the story of the massacre was actively suppressed. Official records disappeared, history textbooks ignored the tragedy, and citizens were warned to keep silent. Now nearly one hundred years after that horrible day, historian Scott Ellsworth returns to his hometown to tell the untold story of how America's foremost hidden racial tragedy was finally brought to light, and the unlikely cast of characters that made it happen. Part true-crime saga, part archaeological puzzle, and part investigative journalism, The Ground Breaking weaves in and out of recent history, the distant past, and the modern day to tell a compelling story of a city-and a nation-struggling to come to terms with the dark corners of its past"--