The Legacy Project

Every city carries its history in people.

In the families who came here, put down roots, raised children, practiced faith, worked hard, and built community where they were planted. In Bartlesville, many of those stories live in West Bartlesville and beyond, often passed down quietly or not at all.

The Legacy Project: Westside and Beyond is a storytelling initiative led by Westside Community Center to preserve the untold histories of Black, Indigenous, and immigrant families whose lives shaped the fabric of this city. These are stories of migration, settlement, labor, faith, resilience, and community. Stories that exist in photographs, memories, and lived experience, but are too often missing from the public record.

When people hear the word immigrant, they often think of distant places or modern headlines. But Bartlesville’s immigrant story is local. It is personal. It is intertwined with Black history, Indigenous history, and the everyday life of West Bartlesville.

My own family reflects this reality.

My great-grandfather immigrated from Madagascar, settled in Louisiana, and eventually made his way to Oklahoma. He married my great-grandmother, who was of Cherokee heritage and lived on the reservation. Together, they settled in Pryor Creek, raised animals, and reared eleven children. Five of those children would migrate to Bartlesville and call it home, which later became my home.

I look at old photographs of them sitting on the porch, dignified and protective, and I wonder about the parts of their lives I will never fully know. Their voices. Their laughter. Their fears. Their courage. I have images and fragments of stories, but not their lived experience. That absence is what The Legacy Project seeks to address.

West Bartlesville became home to many families like mine. Black families. Indigenous families. Immigrant families. Families from different backgrounds who came looking for opportunity and found work, stability, and community. Their stories are rarely centered, yet they are foundational to understanding who we are.

The Legacy Project: Westside and Beyond brings these stories to life through recorded oral histories, preserved photographs, and immersive cultural storytelling. This is not a museum. These are living exhibitions that honor people as more than names, more than jobs, more than dates on a timeline. They invite visitors to experience culture through the lives of those who lived it.

The urgency of this work became painfully clear when many learned only after her passing that Mrs. Viola Fletcher, one of the last living survivors of the Tulsa Race Massacre, made Bartlesville her home for much of her life. She was more than a survivor. She was a daughter of this city. Though efforts were made to honor her life beyond that single chapter, her story could not be captured by us through oral history before her death.

What if stories were captured while people could still be seen, heard, and honored in the fullness of their lives?

By preserving these stories now, we foster understanding, connection, and respect across generations. We offer future residents a fuller picture of Bartlesville, one rooted in resilience, sacrifice, and shared humanity.

We believe culture and history belong together. When they are honored together, communities grow stronger.

Support The Legacy Project: Westside and Beyond

You can help preserve these stories by supporting The Legacy Project through an online donation, requesting an invoice, or giving by cash or check.

Westside Community Center
501 S Bucy Ave
Bartlesville, OK 74003
info@wccbartlesville.org

Every contribution helps ensure these voices are not lost, but carried forward.