The USL Championship’s FC Tulsa recently announced a “Greenwood Night” promotion for this Saturday with a one-off shirt design to go with it. If the name doesn’t sound familiar, it’s referring to the Greenwood District, one of the richest Black neighborhoods in the country in its time — even referred to as “Black Wall Street” — that was destroyed during the Tulsa race massacre in 1921. This promotion falls on the date of the start of the massacre. It’s probably one of the heaviest non-cancer topics that a sports uniform can address, but the idea behind the shirt is less that and more how the neighborhood rebuilt itself afterwards and still exists today. In fact, FC Tulsa’s stadium is in Greenwood, very close to the namesake Greenwood Avenue.
You probably wouldn’t guess what the shirt is about from looking at it, as it’s primarily orange with a tiny bit of black at the bottom and on the sleeves. Black is also FC Tulsa’s primary color, but it serves a stated purpose here: representing the “the ashes left behind” after the massacre. There appear to be gold pinstripes most noticeable at the bottom of the front where orange fades to black, but they are actually made up of a very nice touch: the names of businesses destroyed back in 1921.
On the top of the back is also a “Greenwood Ave.” script.
On the sleeve are the logos of United Black Players and Black Players for Change, both organizations of Black players in various leagues of American soccer.
Finally, FC Tulsa will be crossing over promotions this weekend: this month, coaching and technical staff have been wearing 988 pins, the number of the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline in the US, for Mental Health Awareness Month. The team says there will be some sort of unspecified mental health presence on Saturday.
Read more from FC Tulsa here.
I am by no means a soccer jersey fan (because you know, ads…), but these are so well done. Just enough symbolism to be meaningful and not over the top. I spend a good deal of my time an hour east of Tulsa and am familiar with the Greenwood District and the Tulsa Race Massacre from a local news station – you did a lovely writeup, Jamie.
Thanks!
I agree! Before I clicked on the link Jamie wrote, the uniforms without the context are beautiful. Then reading gave them even more depth.
I have to say that I am a little surprised that there is no discussion or mention of the potential leak of the All Star Game caps that came out yesterday in Yankees, Mets and Dodgers designs and seem to have the official on field tagging.
link
I’m not sure those are official. I just checked Fanatics (which usually has them as soon as they’re available) and nothing (yet).
Doesn’t mean these aren’t legit, but I can’t confirm it either. Will definitely have a piece once they’re released.
This is an example of the sort of storytelling I can get behind. It’s not over the top, pays remembrance to those lost during a particularly galling chapter of American genocide, and probably informs a few casual fans who had no idea this happened because it’s a story conveniently removed from American history textbooks.
Incredibly well-executed memorial here. The 1921 Tulsa race massacre is a sad stain on the history of our country and it is rarely talked about.
Kudos to FC Tulsa…
So, GREENwood’s kits are orange?
You’re doing it on purpose now.
The team name is Tulsa FC. The area is named after Charles W. Greene. But something tells me you don’t actually care about any of that.
Jamie should have quoted a bit more from the FC Tulsa press release, which says the orange jersey color symbolizes the flames of the arson surrounding the massacre.
Absolutely love that they are paying tribute to a part of American history that is swept under the rug. Unfortunately, just due to the nature of minor league soccer uniforms, all it really looks like is a shirt with a bunch of ads on it. The quality tribute design details are barely noticeable compared to the black on orange ads.
I find it difficult to evaluate soccer jerseys for that reason. I usually try to imagine them without the ads, in which case all of them would look better, and many of them would be quite wearable. I think these would look awesome without the energy company logo.
On the other hand, the ads are attention-grabbing by definition, so it’s both difficult and silly to evaluate something while ignoring its most central feature.
Nice job, Jamie. Thanks for including a link to the Wiki page for the historical event. Growing up in a small, Midwestern, white town this event was news to me a few years ago. Reading the book, The Nation Must Awake- My Witness to the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921 by Mary E. Jones Parrish was enlightening and includes firsthand accounts of the violence.
They’ve done a pretty nice job with these. You can’t really see it in these photographs, but FC Tulsa has a cool crest with the flycatcher logo so it’s a bit of a shame that the main sponsor logo takes over so much. Unfortunately for us, that’s just how it goes with club soccer. They’d look awesome, albeit very Dutch, without the main ad.
They also have a cool GW monogram on some of the merch on their website, but that doesn’t seem to have made it onto the shirt. That Greenwood script would look amazing on a baseball jersey, should the MiLB Tulsa Drillers decide to do something similar in the stadium they share.
The colors are striking, and this is an example of a good use of sublimation on a jersey. The very subtle yellowish details add a blazing vibrancy to the orange background, especially in contrast with the heavy black trim. The collar really anchors the design visually, and also looks sharp with the Sambas.
These are great and a powerful honoring of the neighborhood and massacre!
Also, hooray collars! More collared jerseys, please!