It was the middle of summer in 1967 and tensions were high between African Americans and white power structures – leading many to the streets in protest of the discrimination they were experiencing.
“These riots all stemmed around the same issue, whether you were in New York, or Grand Rapids. One: police brutality, two: high unemployment and underemployment in the Black communities.”
That is local historian Randall Jelks in an interview with George Bayard from the Grand Rapids African American Museum and Archives. In the last two years, Bayard has been interviewing local African Americans to provide the community a broader perspective of the race riots of 1967.
“They wanted to know who was to blame, and who was not to blame, where did they live, what were their family’s conditions, did they have a police record. To us that was kind of disingenuous because they never talked to one African American about the riots in this particular report.”
Here, Bayard is referring to the report the City of Grand Rapids created in late 1967 after the riots took place. The report is titled the “Anatomy of a Riot.” Here is an interview with long-time resident Michael Booker.
“I remember waking up, hearing gunshots and we got up in the street and our friends in the street said “hey, they were rioting down on Division Street and they were rioting down on Lafayette Street.” They were breaking into businesses and some of these businesses were black owned and some of our people even set fires to these buildings, and basically they were upset with landlords and I know that some of the properties that were vandalized were owned by landlords who were taking advantage of black people back then.”
The reports and interviews can be found at the Grand Rapids African American Museum and Archives. The museum plans to move to the area where the riots took place – along the south Division corridor – an area that once was home to the many African American owned businesses.
Michelle Jokisch Polo, WGVU News.
