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⚽️ Kansas Soccer Visits Greenwood Rising Museum

TULSA, Okla. — The University of Kansas women’s soccer team visited the Greenwood Rising Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma, this past Saturday, in between road contests at TCU and Oklahoma State. The team chose to visit the historic site as a part of the athletic department’s commitment to providing diversity and inclusion programming to its student-athletes, coaches and staff.

Greenwood, Tulsa was popularly known as “Black Wall Street” in the early 20th century. In 1921, the city was burned to the ground in the Tulsa Race Massacre. The museum is a site that explains the history of the Greenwood District as both an African American business mecca and site of racial violence.

“As part of our inclusivity program, we decided to utilize the time we had on our women’s soccer trip to compete against TCU and Oklahoma State to stay in downtown Tulsa,” said Associate Athletics Director for Inclusive Excellence Paul Pierce. “That allowed us the opportunity to visit Black Wall Street and the Greenwood District.”

The team watched a two-part documentary called “Tulsa Burning: The 1921 Race Massacre” before visiting the museum, and then had the opportunity to eat lunch at a black-owned Greenwood business following the museum tour.

The museum showcased how Black Wall Street was created and the formulation of it, along with learning about the Red Summer and how Black Wall Street was eradicated due to racial tensions.

“It was a great experience,” said head coach Mark Francis. “It’s surprising to me that something of this magnitude that happened is not really talked about or well known.”

Shelby Larson, Director of Soccer Operations, helped develop this experiential learning opportunity for the women’s soccer program as a way to support the athletic department’s implementation of the inclusive excellence framework.

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