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The co-op bookstore for avid readers
Built from the Fire: The Epic Story of Tulsa's Greenwood District, America's Black Wall Street
Reader Score
88%
88% of readers
recommend this book
Critic Reviews
Great
Based on 5 reviews on
"Ambitious . . . absorbing . . . By the end of Luckerson's outstanding book, the idea of building something new from the ashes of what has been destroyed becomes comprehensible, even hopeful."--Marcia Chatelain, The New York Times
WINNER: The Dayton Literary Peace Prize; The MAAH Stone Book Award; The SABEW Best in Business Book Award; The Lillian Smith Book Award; The Oklahoma Historical Society's E. E. Dale Award
FINALIST: The Hurston/Wright Legacy Award
A NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW AND WASHINGTON POST BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR
When Ed Goodwin moved with his parents to the Greenwood neighborhood in Tulsa, Oklahoma, his family joined a community soon to become the center of black life in the West. But just a few years later, on May 31, 1921, the teenaged Ed hid in a bathtub as a white mob descended on his neighborhood, laying waste to thirty-five blocks and murdering as many as three hundred people in one of the worst acts of racist violence in U.S. history.
The Goodwins and their neighbors soon rebuilt the district into "a Mecca," in Ed's words, where nightlife thrived and small businesses flourished. Ed bought a newspaper to chronicle Greenwood's resurgence and battles against white bigotry, and his son Jim, an attorney, embodied the family's hopes for the civil rights movement. But by the 1970s urban renewal policies had nearly emptied the neighborhood. Today the newspaper remains, and Ed's granddaughter Regina represents the neighborhood in the Oklahoma state legislature, working alongside a new generation of local activists to revive it once again.
In Built from the Fire, journalist Victor Luckerson tells the true story behind a potent national symbol of success and solidarity and weaves an epic tale about a neighborhood that refused, more than once, to be erased.
Book Details
- Publisher: Random House
- Publish Date: May 23rd, 2023
- Pages: 672
- Language: English
- Edition: undefined - undefined
- Dimensions: 9.49in - 6.39in - 1.64in - 2.15lb
- EAN: 9780593134375
- Categories: • African American & Black• Cultural & Ethnic Studies - American - African American & Bl• Civil Rights
More books to explore
About the Author
More books by Victor Luckerson
What people are saying
Jewel Wicker is an entertainment and culture reporter.
So excited for @VLuck's 'Built from the Fire: The Epic Story of Tulsa's Greenwood District, America's Black Wall Street'. https://t.co/zECp9f6RYH
All things books from The New York Times. You like reading, we do too.
In “Built From the Fire,” Victor Luckerson traces the history of Greenwood, Okla., and the aftermath of the 1921 race massacre that nearly destroyed it, showing how the massacre’s lingering effects continue to reverberate in the community today. https://t.co/gAn4cXnEso
Founded by abolitionists in 1865. Committed to progressive journalism. Subscribe: https://t.co/iJh9hpMCwv.
More than 100 years ago, a white mob burned down the Greenwood neighborhood in what became known as the Tulsa Race Massacre. Tulsa historian @thinking4achang interviews @VLuck about his new book on Greenwood, "Built from the Fire." https://t.co/6bjN1Y7cdc
Critics’ reviews
Praise for this book
"Exceptional . . . Luckerson's thoroughly researched and empathetically written account--anchored in the complex experiences of the Greenwood residents themselves--gives voice to a powerful, exquisitely multifaceted community that refuses to be silenced."--The Washington Post
"Cinematic . . . Built from the Fire offers a case study of how present-day Greenwood, and dozens of other struggling Black communities, got here. Luckerson reserves his final chapters for green shoots of hope."--The Star Tribune
"The scope, the elegance, and the power of Luckerson's tale is simply breathtaking and empowering."--Carol Anderson, author of White Rage
"Built from the Fire demonstrates how wealth is stripped away from black families whether at the hands of lawless white citizens, law enforcement personnel, or elected officials. It is also the story of black hope and the belief in the possibility of a brighter tomorrow."--Dorothy A. Brown, author of The Whiteness of Wealth
"Built from the Fire is a deeply researched chronicle of Tulsa's extraordinary African American community through decades of triumph and tragedy, heartbreak and determination. In telling the story of the life and times of the remarkable Goodwin clan, Victor Luckerson has provided us with a true American family saga."--Scott Ellsworth, author of The Ground Breaking: The Tulsa Race Massacre and An American City's Search for Justice
"Victor Luckerson has produced a dynamic, and propulsive chronicle of that episode in American history. Given the tenor of our present times, this is truly a necessary book--and one that marks the exciting arrival of a new literary talent."--Wil Haygood, author of Colorization: One Hundred Years of Black Films in a White World
"By dissecting the way we've all internalized the racial and economic structures that guide city-making (and city-destruction), Luckerson offers us hope that we can build communities that support us all."--Peter Moskowitz, author of How to Kill a City
"Built from the Fire is a sensitively rendered account of a family and community that persists."--Tiya Miles, National Book Award-winning author of All That She Carried
"This is a new addition to the canon of required readings on this nation's tortured racial history."--Jelani Cobb, author of The Substance of Hope
"A vital book . . . [Victor Luckerson] brings his considerable journalistic sensibilities to this sweeping and intimate portrait of racial violence, empowerment, and social action."--Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Luckerson fills every page with humanity distilled from his prodigious research."--BookPage (starred review)
What people are saying
Jewel Wicker is an entertainment and culture reporter.
So excited for @VLuck's 'Built from the Fire: The Epic Story of Tulsa's Greenwood District, America's Black Wall Street'. https://t.co/zECp9f6RYH
All things books from The New York Times. You like reading, we do too.
In “Built From the Fire,” Victor Luckerson traces the history of Greenwood, Okla., and the aftermath of the 1921 race massacre that nearly destroyed it, showing how the massacre’s lingering effects continue to reverberate in the community today. https://t.co/gAn4cXnEso
