Community Leader
Andrew J. Smitherman
1883 – 1961
Tulsa Star (newspaper)
Newspaper publisher, civil rights advocate
Publisher of the Tulsa Star, the most influential Black newspaper in Oklahoma, A.J. Smitherman was a fierce editorial voice against lynching and a co-founder of the Western Negro Press Association. Like Stradford, he was indicted after the massacre and fled — eventually to Buffalo, New York, where he continued publishing newspapers until his death. He was exonerated by Oklahoma in 2007.