Two years before the Tulsa Race Massacre in 1921, one of the bloodiest racial slaughters in American history occurred in Phillips County, Arkansas. This week marks the 107th anniversary of the tragedy, when hundreds of Black sharecroppers gathered to organize for fair cotton prices. For that simple demand, they were met with a state-sanctioned manhunt that history class conveniently forgot to mention.
Following World War I, Black sharecroppers in the Arkansas Delta were trapped in extreme economic exploitation by white landowners who controlled the economy and sold cotton on their own schedule.
To fight back, Robert L. Hill, a Black farmer from Winchester, Arkansas, founded the Progressive Farmers and Household Union of America to secure fair prices for disenfranchised Black farmers’ cotton crops, and break free from predatory contracts, the Smithsonian reported.
On the evening of September 30, 1919, approximately 100 Black sharecroppers—with armed guards posted outside to prevent disruptions and intelligence gathering by white opponents—attended a union meeting at a church three miles north of Elaine, according to NPR. Then, the first gunshot rang out, igniting a bloody massacre that changed the course of history forever.
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