Whether he is surviving on the streets of  Vinita, OK, or thriving on Tulsa's Black Wall Street, "Diamond Dick" Rowland is the charmer with a knack for endearing himself to his audience. Unfortunately for him, his charisma has met his match with the mob of angry men outside the Tulsa courthouse. 

Dick has been arrested for the alleged assault of Sarah Page, an elevator operator, and a young white woman; a claim both The Tulsa World newspaper and the Tulsa police force find dubious. Richard Lloyd Jones, editor in chief of the Tulsa Tribune, writes an article calling for the citizens of Tulsa to "Nab" Dick from the courthouse to enact some vigilante justice; a practice popularized by the ressurgent Ku Klux Klan.  

His arrest comes just one year after a KKK mob lynched a white man named Roy Belton. His life is in the balance and all Dick can do is wait in his cell and pray just like his Aunt Damie taught him. With the white community willing to lynch one of their own, what fresh horrors await Dick Rowland and the rest of Black Wall Street?

Damie Rowland is a God-fearing businesswoman with a big heart. Shortly after meeting and adopting a young orphan boy named Jimmie Jones, she packed up shop and migrated to the "Negro Promised Land" of Tulsa, OK. 

While trying to realize the American Dream, Damie is also challenged with raising a young black boy in the Jim Crow era. Jimmie is coming into his own; taking on the moniker of "Diamond Dick" Rowland and embracing the "New Negro" philosophies of black empowerment. As this shift is further solidified, Damie's ability to steer Dick away from the fast-talking, vain lifestyle of his peers is waning. 

Her worst nightmare as a black mother comes true when Dick is implicated in assaulting Sarah Page, a white woman, in an elevator and is subsequently arrested. With the Klan violence at a fever pitch, Damie is no longer able to protect her son from the harsh realities of being a black man in Jim Crow America.

When thinking of Greenwood success stories you can look no further than the Williams family and its chief entrepreneurial architect, Loula Williams. She leveraged her husband's talent for fixing automobile engines into "The Land of Popcorn and Sugar;" a string of business operations that include an automobile garage, a confectionery, and the famous Dreamland Theater. The Williams Confectionery is the home base for Negro social life in Tulsa and the central hub for the Thursday night Promenade; the weekly day off for the Black working class where the Greenwood residents get gussied up, strut their stuff, and circulate their hard-earned dollars throughout the Black community. Loula is a shrewd businesswoman with an empire to protect but she is also a black woman and understands the need to take a stand against oppressive forces of the time which is why it is so fitting that the Greenwood Gentry chooses to congregate at one of her businesses to debate the next moves of the community.. 

As the First Negro Businessman of Greenwood, O.W. Gurley has seen many trends come and go but fewer businessmen knew more about buying something for a dollar and selling it for two. His dapper appearance betrays that he's a man of means with an expensive taste. Despite conducting business solely on the "other side of the tracks", Gurley has ingratiated himself to the elite white business class of Tulsa through his instincts and ruthlessness. When Dick Rowland is arrested and a mob forms to lynch him, Gurley views the situation as a business proposition. Too many legacies have been built by the black people of Greenwood. If white people are able to lynch one of their own, they are liable to do worse to a black man and his community. To satiate the blood-lust of the mob and to save the hard-earned money generated by the Greenwood Gentry, the practical choice is to appease the mob by handing over the boy. A great debate ensues within the Greenwood Gentry. What seems like a shrewd business decision to Gurley is far more complex than meets the eye.

During The Great War, O.B. Mann witnessed firsthand the moral failings of humanity. Despite fighting for the United States, he was still relegated to second-class status by his white peers in his own country. His social standing is made worse when juxtaposed with the humane treatment he received from the citizens and soldiers from foreign lands. After returning from the war and starting his own grocery business, O.B. Mann's mind is still plagued by this cognitive dissonance.  In addition to the lynching of Roy Belton, the 2 years anniversary of "The Red Summer" of 1919 is quickly approaching; a summer in which there were over 50 race massacres where white mobs descended onto black communities and burned them to the ground for little more than flimsy rumors. With the arrest of Dick Rowland and the accumulation of a white crowd outside of the Tulsa courthouse, Mann sees the writing on the wall for the Greenwood community and vows to do whatever it takes to protect his community and his people. 

“The end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom." - John Locke

After presiding over the hanging of an innocent black boy, Sheriff McCullough vowed never to allow mob rule to circumvent the judicial process. Despite the Ku, Klux, Klan's growing political and economic influence, McCullough is unwavering in his resolve. The Good Sheriff puts his credibility and safety on the line by rebuffing the Kleagles' request to hand over Dick Rowland and instead transported him to the 4th floor of the courthouse, disabling the elevator so that only he could provide access to the top floor, and personally watching over him. To McCullough, the law is about preventing the dregs of society from dragging the rest of the world down with them. In the immortal words of John Locke: "For in all the states of created beings capable of law, where there is no law, there is no freedom.” 

Richard Lloyd-Jones has some large shoes to fill.  His father, Jenkin Lloyd-Jones, was a Civil War veteran, Founder of the All Souls Unitarian Church in Chicago, and a progressive voice during deep social unrest. With the popularity of his father's sermons in the Chicago Tribune, it makes sense that his son Richard would follow in his footsteps and get into publishing. But even after purchasing Abraham Lincoln's childhood home to preserve as a historical landmark or buying a newspaper and becoming editor-in-chief of the Tulsa Tribune, Richard still cannot garner the same levels of esteem as his father. As a Renaissance man, Richard Lloyd Jones knows when to change direction. Ever since D.W. Griffith's epic film Birth of a Nation, The Ku Klux Klan has been fomenting racial violence and gaining political power. He sees that the times are changing and that messages of peace and unity between the races wouldn't sell papers nor would it curry any favor with the growing political force that is the Klan. After finding out about the arrest of Dick Rowland from his source at the courthouse it only made sense for him to write an editorial that called for the good citizens of Tulsa to "Nab the negro." Even though Richard couldn't move people to give their life to Christ at a camp meeting he could mobilize them to channel their anger at a common enemy to the benefit of the Klan. 

At a time when women have just won the right to participate in the civil process, Amy Comstock is also rising fast in the male dominated career of journalism.  She has found a mentor in the firebrand that is Richard Lloyd-Jones. With his tutelage and hands on approach to guidance, Amy is given access to the upper echelons of professional society and political power; a position that would have been unheard of in previous generations. As the person who dictated Jones' "Nab the negro" editorial she had a direct hand in shaping the lives of countless people of any color and gender in Tulsa, OK. 

The once-maligned Ku, Klux, Klan has seen a resurgence after D.W. Griffith's Birth of A Nation film premiered in 1915. With the added notoriety from the film, there has been a concerted effort from the Klan to recruit more followers for this Christian Nationalist organization and there is no greater recruiting phenomenon for the Klan than a race riot. After hearing of the outrage building up after the Tulsa Tribune article calling to "Nab the negro" for assaulting a white woman in an elevator, the Klan sends 3 kleagles, or recruiters, to fan the flames of outrage in the white community and to procure the young Dick Rowland for a lynching. When Sheriff McCullough rejects their requests for the boy, the kleagles flex their influence over the crowd by increasing the temperature to unmanageable levels.  

This choir represents the people of Greenwood who moved to Tulsa, OK in search of better economic prospects. 

This choir represents the white citizenry of Tulsa, OK.