Hundreds gather at historic Tulsa church’s prayer wall
May 31, 2021 10:41PM EDT
TULSA, Okla. (AP) — Hundreds have gathered for an interfaith service dedicating a prayer wall outside historic Vernon African Methodist Episcopal Church in Tulsa’s Greenwood neighborhood. Monday’s event comes on the centennial of the first day of one of the deadliest racist massacres in the nation. Civil rights leaders, including the Revs. Jesse Jackson and William Barber, joined multiple local faith leaders offering prayers and remarks outside the church. The building was under construction and largely destroyed when a white mob descended on the prosperous Black neighborhood in 1921, burning, killing, looting and leveling a 35-square-block area. Estimates of the death toll range from dozens to 300.