After launching a fundraising effort in February to remove a controversial statue in Owen Park, James Taylor with the Tulsa nonprofit Kitty Gang Family Foundation asked the Tulsa Park and Recreation Board to develop a petition process for residents who want monuments to be reviewed for controversial material.
Taylor recently spoke with the Flyer about his nonprofit’s effort to raise funds to remove the Tulsa Association of Pioneers monument from Owen Park. The statue features the names of two known members of the Ku Klux Klan, among a list of many of Tulsa’s founders.
“This monument is often described as a neutral historical record, and it is not,” Taylor said to the board at its March 3 meeting. “It functions as what historian Kristi Williams has described as a Klan trophy, an object placed in public space, not simply to record history, but to signal power, dominance and belonging to some, while warning or excluding others.”…