Tulsa Race Massacre survivor Viola Fletcher is pictured waving as she leaves the closing ceremony for the Black Wall St. Legacy Festival.

OKLAHOMA CITY — Viola Fletcher, the oldest living survivor of the Tulsa Race Massacre, died on Monday, Nov. 24, at the age of 111, the city's mayor said.

"Today, our city mourns the loss of Mother Viola Fletcher — a survivor of one of the darkest chapters in our city's history," Tulsa Mayor Monroe Nichols wrote on social media. "Mother Fletcher endured more than anyone should, yet she spent her life lighting a path forward with purpose."

Fletcher was born in Comanche, Oklahoma, just south of Oklahoma City, and moved to Tulsa with her family during her childhood, where she witnessed the atrocity of the Tulsa Race Massacre in 1921. A white mob killed an estimated 300 Black people during the tragedy and destroyed Greenwood, a thriving Black community in Tulsa.

Fletcher filled her days advocating for reparations for the massacre's victims and their descendants, and fiercely loved her family, Oklahoma state Rep. Ron Stewart said.

"Any time you would find Mother Fletcher, and she was surrounded by her family, her smile," Stewart remembered. "She had a beautiful smile."

She was one of the two last known living survivors of the race massacre. Lessie Benningfield Randle, the last known survivor, is 110 years old. Fletcher's brother, Hughes Van Ellis, who also survived the massacre, died in 2023 at the age of 102.

'She would not want her passing to be the end of the fight'

For nearly a century, the massacre was mostly forgotten. Fletcher helped to change that. She drew national attention to the massacre, supported a lawsuit for reparations, and published a memoir about her experience.

"Mother Fletcher was just, you know, we talk about 111 years of legacy and a living memorial, walking history is how she was revered, and she earned the title of Mother Fletcher," Stewart said.

Attorney Damario Solomon-Simmons, who led an ultimately unsuccessful suit for reparations, called on Tulsans to continue Fletcher's fight.

"She would not want her passing to be the end of the fight," Solomon-Simmons said in a statement. "She would want it to light a fire under all of us."

No one ever faced any legal repercussions for the Tulsa Race Massacre.

The white mob at the time destroyed more than 35 city blocks and an estimated 191 buildings, and displaced about 10,000 Black people from their homes.

"Mother Fletcher endured more than anyone should, yet she spent her life lighting a path forward with purpose," Nichols said in his statement.

'I live through the massacre every day'

In 2021, during testimony before the U.S. Congress, Fletcher recalled the violence she witnessed the night of the attacks, saying she could still see bodies in the street and smell the smoke nearly 100 years later.

"I still see Black businesses being burned. I still hear airplanes flying overhead," she said. "I hear the screams. I live through the massacre every day."

Fletcher, Van Ellis, and Benningfield Randle sued Tulsa in 2020 for reparations, including a 99-year tax holiday for residents who are descendants of victims of the massacre. Oklahoma's Supreme Court dismissed the case.

In June, Tulsa announced a $105 million trust to address the enduring impacts of the massacre.

Former President Joe Biden met with Fletcher, Van Ellis, and Benningfield Randle during a 2021 visit to Tulsa to mark the 100th anniversary of the massacre.

"We should know the good, the bad, everything," Biden said in a speech during that visit. "That's what great nations do. They come to terms with their dark sides. And we're a great nation."

Contributing: Reuters

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Viola Fletcher, one of the last Tulsa Race Massacre survivors, dies

Reporting by Alex Gladden, USA TODAY NETWORK / Oklahoman

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