[AFRICAN-AMERICANA] ["BLACK WALL STREET"] Business card for Black-owned Hotel Small in the "Black Wall Street" neighborhood of Tulsa, Oklahoma

[SMALL, W. H., Owner-Manager]

Published by [Hotel SMall], [Tulsa], 1950

About this Item

Trade card, or large business card, measuring about 4" x 2.5." Old glue residue to the blank verso, else in near fine condition. The card is for the "Hotel Small" on 615 E. Archer, in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The card boasts: "The most complete colored hotel in the Southwest. 77 rooms - 50 rooms with connecting bath - fans and telephones in all rooms." The address places this hotel at the very center of Tulsa's Greenwood neighborhood, which was once known as "Black Wall Street." It was infamous for the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, one of the most extraordinary acts of racist brutality, in which a white mob nearly destroyed the entire neighborhood. THe number of deaths is disputed, as fires no doubt consumed a number of bodies, but estimates range from a few dozen to a few hundred fatalities, and there were hundreds of injuries and thousands of lives destroyed. Though we are unable to date this card exactly, Scott Ellsworth's 2021 book "The Ground Breaking: An American City and its Search for Justice," which studies the massacre and its aftermath in vivid detail, mentions the Hotel Small in the context of the rebuilt neighborhood in the decades following the massacre. He writes, "By the 1940s, Greenwood's commercial district was even bigger than before.[B]y 1941, Greenwood could boast of the Hotel Small, with seventy-seven rooms, a dining service, and a telephone in every suite." As such, this trade card represents the resilience of the Black community in Tulsa in the wake of one of the worst pogroms in American history. Seller Inventory # 11032

Bibliographic Details

Title: [AFRICAN-AMERICANA] ["BLACK WALL STREET"] ...

Publisher: [Hotel SMall], [Tulsa]

Publication Date: 1950

Condition: Very good