John Washington Rogers, Jr., undated
name: label: Collection Creator
content: Turner, Reginald
setName: label: See more items in
content: Guide to 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre Oral History Collection
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: National Museum of African American History and Culture
identifier: label: Identifier
content: NMAAHC.A2014.240, Series 17
objectType: label: Type
content: Archival materials
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: John Washington Rogers, Jr. was born March 31, 1958. He is the great grandson of J.N. Stratford, owner of the Stratford Hotel in the Greenwood District of Tulsa. Stratford, a lawyer as well, was one of the chief architects of the Greenwood District. The hotel, the largest black-owned in America, was destroyed during the massacre. Rogers and his family fled to Kansas and then Chicago as the police blamed him as an agitator in the riot. Rogers mother, Jewel Lafontant was the first African American woman to graduate from the University of Chicago Law School and the first to argue in front of the Supreme Court. Roger's father, John Rogers Sr. was a Tuskegee airman during World War II. He went on to become a judge in Cook County. A family of firsts, Rogers formed and is the CEO of Ariel Capital Management, the first African American owned mutual fund firm in America. Rogers is devoted to sharing and teaching the history of the Tulsa Race Massacre. He was one of the principal financiers of the Before They Die! Documentary that includes the oral histories in this collection.