Friday, February 17, 2012

Dr. Olivia Hooker Advocates Equality Through Respect - White Plains, NY Patch

Dr. Olivia Hooker Advocates Equality Through Respect - White Plains, NY Patch: An angry mob of white men charged into her house while her mother was cooking breakfast. They robbed the house and tossed out the freshly made meal after burning down a clothesline where her doll clothes hung. Dr. Olivia Hooker first experienced discrimination at the age of 6, while hiding under a table with her siblings for of fear of being shot.

“They didn’t break the [family’s] old rugged cross,” said Hooker, who has lived in White Plains [Greenburgh] for the last 59 years. “In a sense, they gave us a message about what they thought was appropriate for us.”

The mostly black Oklahoma neighborhood was burned to the ground that day in 1921 during the Tulsa Race Riots—according the New York Times, 300 people died that day while 8,000 were rendered homeless. Some reported that airplanes were flying over Tulsa that day dropping incendiary bombs, but Hooker says that’s not what children read about in history books.