Tulsa Race Massacre survivor Viola Fletcher is pictured waving as she leaves the closing ceremony for the Black Wall St. Legacy Festival.

OKLAHOMA CITY — Viola Fletcher endured the atrocity of the Tulsa Race Massacre when she was just a child. But what Oklahoma state Rep. Ron Stewart remembers about Fletcher, who died Monday, Nov. 24, is her smile.

Fletcher filled her days advocating for reparations for the massacre's victims and their descendants, and fiercely loved her family, the Oklahoma lawmaker said. Fletcher died at the age of 111, Tulsa Mayor Monroe Nichols confirmed in a statement.

“Any time you would find Mother Fletcher, and she was surrounded by her family, her smile," Stewart said. "She had a beautiful smile."

Fletcher witnessed the Tulsa Race Massacre in 1921 at age 7. A white mob killed an estimated 300 Black people during the tragedy and destroyed Greenwood, a thriving Black community in Tulsa.

She was one of the two last known living survivors of the race massacre. Lessie Benningfield Randle, the last known survivor, is 110 years old. Fletcher's brother, Hughes Van Ellis, who also survived the massacre, died in 2023 at the age of 102.

'She would not want her passing to be the end of the fight'

For nearly a century, the massacre was mostly forgotten. Fletcher helped to change that. She drew national attention to the massacre, supported a lawsuit for reparations, and published a memoir about her experience.

"Mother Fletcher was just, you know, we talk about 111 years of legacy and a living memorial, walking history is how she was revered, and she earned the title of Mother Fletcher," Stewart said.

Attorney Damario Solomon-Simmons, who led an ultimately unsuccessful suit for reparations, called on Tulsans to continue Fletcher's fight.

"She would not want her passing to be the end of the fight," Solomon-Simmons said in a statement. "She would want it to light a fire under all of us."

No one ever faced any legal repercussions for the Tulsa Race Massacre.

The white mob at the time destroyed more than 35 city blocks and an estimated 191 buildings, and displaced about 10,000 Black people from their homes.

"Mother Fletcher endured more than anyone should, yet she spent her life lighting a path forward with purpose," Nichols said in his statement.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Viola Fletcher, one of the last Tulsa Race Massacre survivors, dies

Reporting by Alex Gladden, USA TODAY NETWORK / Oklahoman

USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect