RED SUMMER

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The Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921, one of the worst acts of racial violence in U.S. history. But two years prior to the carnage in Tulsa, another violent wave of hate took hold in the country.

A view of two young boys outside a home with broken windows and debris in the front yard, which had been vandalized during a race riot in Chicago, in the summer of 1919. The events in Chicago were just one of a number of violent confrontations, grouped as the "Red Summer" events that occurred that year in the United States as a result of post-war economics, labor unrest, and racial tensions stoked by white supremacist groups. During the war, industries that typically segregated Black people allowed them to work for their companies due to labor shortages. Both in Chicago and during another riot in Washington, D.C., McWhirter, who authored, “Red Summer: The Summer of 1919 and the Awakening of Black America,” noted that white rioters set up barricades to protect their neighborhoods and had marksmen with rifles on rooftops. AdIf there is a legacy of the “Red Summer,” it has been credited as being among the first series of race riots in which Black people fought back against white attackers, in the process, setting a precedent for future civil rights battles.

Over the next few days, white mobs stormed the streets attacking blacks indiscriminately. Scores of black men and women were killed that year in racial violence. "Overwhelmingly, it was whites attacking blacks," Krugler told CNN. "The Red Summer doesn't fit into the stories we tell ourselves about US history," Krugler says. Blacks across the country set up armed self-defense patrols to protect the communities the police failed to protect, Krugler says.

"It doesn't fit into the neat stories we tell ourselves," said David Krugler, author of "1919, The Year of Racial Violence: How African Americans Fought Back." In Elaine, Arkansas, poor black sharecroppers who had dared to join a union were attacked, and at least 200 African Americans were killed. Returning black soldiers from World War I led the charge, using skills they refined in Europe. The NAACP gained about 100,000 members that year, said McWhirter, author of "Red Summer: The Summer of 1919 and the Awakening of Black America." ___EDITOR'S NOTE: Hundreds of African Americans died at the hands of white mobs during "Red Summer."