The race riots of 1919 in Washington D.C. had more White casualties than Black, but this story has been buried until BNC (Black News Channel) correspondent Bofta Yimam dug it up. The six-minute segment includes commentary from Port Of Harlem’s CR Gibbs.
Preceding the riot, were racially charged headlines that the NAACP asked the local media to stop printing. The press fueled anger in White men with stories about Black men assaulting White women in D.C. “They (the White press) didn’t pay attention. They were making money,” said Gibbs.
“The local leadership in DC started to tell gun stores to stop selling guns to African Americans in DC, so they then started getting guns from Baltimore,” added Lopez Matthews, Manager, Digital Production Center at Moorland–Spingarn Research Center, Howard University. Le Droit Park, a presitigous neighborhood south Howard Univeristy in the U Street area, was the epic center of the July 19, 1919 riot.