Mayday Over Wichita by D. W. Carter

Author:D. W. Carter
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: The History Press
Published: 2013-09-11T04:00:00+00:00

RUMOR #1: IT CRASHED TO KILL “BLACK FOLKS”

A common assumption then, as it still is among some today, was that the KC-135 crashed at 20th and Piatt because it was a predominantly African American neighborhood. Wichita historian Craig Miner described how, over the years, rumors that the KC-135 “was aimed there [in the black neighborhood] after circling to avoid the rich eastern suburbs” began to spread.274 Theresa Johnson, a former member of the Wichita City Council, commented on the horrible rumors she had heard as a small child attending Mueller Elementary School:

Some pieces from the plane had landed on some of my classmates’ homes, so we discussed it a little. After that class, I overheard people saying it wasn’t a big deal because it was just a bunch of niggers that had been killed.275

The comments described by Miner and overheard by Ms. Johnson were not uncommon, nor were they isolated to any particular race. Malicious gossip about the plane striking the northeast section of Wichita propagated many unsubstantiated rumors, which were further exacerbated by the context of 1965 America. Blacks and whites in the Wichita community expressed that they thought the plane crashing in the African American neighborhood seemed in no way to be a coincidence. Many thought it was intentional. Sitting in the same house forty-seven years later, when asked about why she thought the plane crashed, Sonya House stated, “They said they were trying to kill a bunch of black folks in here; that was the rumor. Some people still feel like that was their motive.” But she disagreed. She went on to clarify, “If that had been their motive, they would not have failed…Instead of putting it in the ground, if they had slid with it, how far would it have gone? Central? 13th Street?” At the end, she stated, “I just don’t know why it crashed.”276

There are certain key points in the statement by Ms. House that reveal, not only how much bitterness has remained in the community even decades afterward, but also how common sense overrides such frivolous theories. The only reason, perhaps, that this theory has perpetuated for nearly five decades may be just one thing: residential segregation.

A 2010 study on the development of Wichita’s African American community by Deon Wolfenbarger of the National Park Service reiterated how racial boundaries, enforced by restrictive covenants, ran deep in Wichita during 1965.277 One such covenant provides the perfect example. It reads:

No persons of any race other than the Caucasian race shall use or occupy any building or lot, except that this covenant shall not prevent occupancy by domestic servants of a different race domiciled with an owner or tenant.278

It must be noted, however, that the practice of residential segregation was not isolated to Wichita, nor was Wichita’s the worst in terms of severity. For example, Levittown, New York, in the 1960s defined segregation. According to historian Mike Wright, in his book What They Didn’t Teach You About the ’60s, “Of the 82,000 who lived in Levittown, none was African American.

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