17X Emmy Nominated

What Happened to Black Wall Street? Featuring Dr. Olivia Hooker (2017 NY EMMY NOMINATED)

This NY Emmy-nominated documentary was produced by students from Xposure Foundation’s Xposure After School Network, where young people learn the fundamentals of journalism, storytelling, research, interviewing, and documentary filmmaking. Greenwood was once the most prosperous Black business district in America, home to banks, theaters, hotels, and newspapers built and owned by Black families. Its success earned it the name Black Wall Street. In June 1921, a white mob destroyed the community in less than 24 hours during what is now known as the Tulsa Race Massacre. For this powerful documentary, student journalists sat down with Dr. Olivia Hooker, one of the last survivors of the massacre. Dr. Hooker later became a pioneering psychologist, educator, and the first Black woman to serve on active duty in the U.S. Coast Guard. In recognition of her extraordinary life and service, the Coast Guard named multiple facilities in her honor, including a training facility in Washington, D.C., and a dining hall on Staten Island. (National Park Service) Through Dr. Hooker’s firsthand account, this Emmy-nominated film explores what was lost in Greenwood and what Juneteenth still asks us to remember today.