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Today in History, May 31st

On May 31, 1921, the Tulsa Race Massacre began in the Greenwood district. Plus the Johnstown Flood and Deep Throat revealed.

By Today in History Updated November 10, 2026 3 min read Sources checked

Published May 31, 2026 · Last updated November 10, 2026

May 31 is best known for 1921, when a white mob began its assault on Tulsa’s Greenwood district, the start of the Tulsa Race Massacre. The date also saw the Johnstown Flood in 1889 and the revelation of Watergate’s “Deep Throat” in 2005.

The big story: The Tulsa Race Massacre begins (1921)

Greenwood was the pride of Black Tulsa. The neighborhood held more than 300 Black-owned businesses, including doctors’ offices, pharmacies and two movie theaters, and it was known as “Black Wall Street.” The spark came from an elevator. On May 30, 1921, a 19-year-old Black shoe shiner named Dick Rowland was riding with Sarah Page, a 17-year-old white operator, when she screamed and he ran. He was arrested the next day, and a Tulsa Tribune story claiming he had attempted to assault her drew an angry white mob to the courthouse. That night, May 31, violence broke out and spread into Greenwood. Over about 24 hours, the mob burned some 35 blocks, including more than 1,200 homes, a school, a hospital and about a dozen churches. Historians believe as many as 300 people were killed. For decades, white Tulsa barely spoke of it. Oklahoma created a commission to study it in 1997.

More events on May 31

Year	What happened
1859	The great clock in the tower over the Houses of Parliament in London began keeping time. Its bell, the original “Big Ben,” was first heard that July.
1889	The neglected South Fork Dam in Pennsylvania collapsed after heavy rain, and the Johnstown Flood killed more than 2,000 people downstream.
1902	The Treaty of Vereeniging, signed in Pretoria, ended the Boer War in South Africa after about three and a half years.
1916	The Battle of Jutland began in the North Sea, the largest naval battle of World War I. Britain lost more ships, but kept control of the sea.
1921	The murder trial of Italian anarchists Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti began in Massachusetts. Their guilt is still debated, and both were executed in 1927.
1962	Adolf Eichmann, who organized the deportation of Jews to Nazi death camps, was hanged in Israel after a televised trial in Jerusalem.
1977	The BBC banned the Sex Pistols’ “God Save the Queen,” released to coincide with Queen Elizabeth II’s Silver Jubilee. It still climbed to No. 2 on the UK chart.
2005	Former FBI official W. Mark Felt was revealed as “Deep Throat,” the secret Watergate source, in a Vanity Fair article.

Born on May 31

1819: Walt Whitman, poet of Leaves of Grass, born in West Hills, Long Island, New York.
1930: Clint Eastwood, actor and Oscar-winning filmmaker, born in San Francisco.
1943: Joe Namath, “Broadway Joe,” the New York Jets quarterback who guaranteed and won Super Bowl III, born in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania.