Rosa Davis Skinner
1898-1995
Famous Soloist; Dedicated Member of Paradise Baptist Church
This 1995 black-and-white portrait of Rosa Davis Skinner is displayed in the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C.
Credit: National Museum of African American History and Culture.
Rosa Rodgers was born to parents Will and Annie Rodgers on November 6, 1898, in Bonham, Texas. Though the town was known for its agriculture and cotton industry, and the newly opened Bonham Cotton Mill in 1901, jobs were likely hard to come by for Black men. The 1900 census revealed that Rosa’s father was a day laborer like his father before him. If job insecurity was not enough to drive the Rodger family from the area, the lack of community institutions was. Rosa later shared that her father relocated the family because he could not stay “where was there no church and no school.”[1]
The family settled in Bristow, Oklahoma, where they helped build a church with white residents. Soon, the family once again made their living as farmers. Following the discovery of oil and gas in 1914–15, the town shifted from one dominated by the cotton industry to one that revolved around oil and gas. The shift led to more jobs and better living conditions that lasted until a bust in the oil industry around 1925. Little is known about the Rodgers ‘ life in Bristow, but Rosa, who was the youngest of the four children, attended school as their parents wanted. Rosa stopped in the eighth grade, which she repeated twice, because the far distance meant that she missed many days. Rosa (whose nickname was Rosie) soon grew tired of the country. To fill her time, she often visited her older sisters, Annie and Lelia, who were twelve and six years old, respectively, and residing in Tulsa. Most likely, the sisters moved to the district because of its employment and entertainment options. Rosa, too, found Greenwood exciting and moved there, taking on a job as a domestic. On March 17, 1918, at age 20, she married Thomas Davis (T.R.), who was born in Texas in 1882. Before settling in Tulsa, he had lived in various places in Oklahoma and Texas.
The couple made their home at 519 West Latimer St., roughly two miles from the famous Greenwood Avenue. T.R. held down different jobs, working as a teamster (truck driver) and at a sporting house (an inn that catered to gamblers and sportsmen). The business must have employed women as waitstaff (or perhaps sex workers) since Rosa made money doing the laundry for two female employees. The women, she remembered, wore “nothin’ but the finest, expensive silk things.”[2]
During the first year of their union, the couple placed membership at Paradise Baptist Church, a cornerstone of the Greenwood community. The church, which had been organized in December 1912 by M.J. Latham and twelve committed worshippers in the Gurley Hills addition of Tulsa, played a significant role in the spiritual and social life of the community. Later, it moved into the “The Old Roadhouse” at approximately 822 North Greenwood. It took a while, but the congregation slowly gathered the funds and materials needed for their building. It purchased land at the corner of Bryant and Frankfort Streets and, for the next two years, erected a building with a basement. The building was made of “rusty” tin, had a sawdust floor, and offered seats made from 1′ x 4′ planks. The church continued to approve its edifice. In early 1921, it added a second story.
Paradise Baptist Church celebrated its centennial in 2012. Credit: Tulsa News on 6
The church and the Davises were deeply impacted by the Tulsa Race Massacre, which occurred just a few months later. On the night of May 31, 1921, T.R. stood and shared his vision about “some kind of destruction” with participants in Paradise Baptist’s Training Union. The meetings were Bible study classes designed to equip attendees with Christian principles for daily living, and their participation in these classes reflects their commitment to their faith and community.[i] Rosa recalled that he told the congregation, “I don’t know what is going to be, but it’s going to be some kind of destruction.” The response in the room was mixed. Some grew to believe him the more he insisted. Others teased him about whether the vision was from him or God. Before departing that night, Thomas warned, “We’ll see.”[ii]
Later that night, after the couple returned home, Rosa went to bed, but T.R., unable to sleep, woke her shortly after midnight. The trouble and destruction had arrived. A man had just run by their home, shouting, “Brothers, get your guns, get your guns, a riot has broke[n] out.”[iii]
Upon leaving their home, the Davises took off running, trying to save themselves not just from the white mobs but also the National Guard, who they heard were engaged in killing Black Tulsans. Upon arriving in Greenwood, they joined a more significant exodus of fleers from bullets, including those fired by machine guns. In the crowd was one of Thomas’s best friends and his wife, who had just given birth. Her child had not survived, so she had carefully placed the infant in a shoebox with a plan to do a burial the following day. Rosa recalled that during the melee, everybody was “just runnin’ and pushin’ and shovin’” and that po’ little baby got lost.”[i]
Rosa was also hurt to learn that among the dead was the elderly gentleman who was known throughout the district for pushing his cart. She credits him for helping save her life during the chaos. When the National Guard rounded up Black Tulsans, reportedly for their protection, they separated men from the women. Many among the former were taken to churches and the Convention Center, while the latter were taken to the fairgrounds. There, Rose found that not only were the women “scared to death,” but they were also hungry, thirsty, and irritated. When food arrived—bread and sweet milk, the latter of which Rosa despised—she consumed it quickly and without complaint. After a difficult night, many couples, including Rosa and Thomas, were reunited the following day when the guards brought the men to the fairgrounds. They were able to leave when Thomas’s white employer vouched for him.
Upon Davis’s arrival at their home, they found their house ransacked but not burned. In an interview with Eddie Faye Gates in 1994, Rosa recalled that the “Door was standing wide open,” and the clothes she carefully washed and hung were thrown into a pile. She rehung all the items, took them to the ladies, and demanded her pay. Defiantly, Rosa held, “The riot wasn’t no fault of mine, was it? I’d done my job washin’ those things, so I felt I deserved my pay.”[i]
Rosa also shared her story with the Tulsa World. In this account, some aspects are different. This time, she recalled that T.R. had gone out earlier that night because he had heard of the trouble and had returned home at midnight. The chaos from the mob drove the couple out of their home around 4 AM, and as they ran, T.R. warned her and others to stay in the light so they could avoid being shot by attackers in airplanes. She said that her husband’s best friend, who had been raising a horse, was shot, and that the woman who suffered the loss of the baby in the shoebox was her friend rather than the wife of T.R.’s friend. She also said that she and her husband were taken to Mohawk Park and given milk and sandwiches before being carted off to separate churches. Finally, when the couple returned home, she said that she found the laundry of the two white women strewn about the street and her personal items, including clothing from inside dressers, stolen.[ii]Rosa’s descriptions of chaos, all-consuming fear, and machine guns were consistent in both accounts. In both, she returned to the harrowing tale of the lost infant.
In the wake of the Massacre, the Davises rebuilt their lives. They had her first child, Mildred Davis, in 1923. Rosa then gave birth to nine more children, eight of whom survived, with the youngest, Sandra, born in 1942. The couple were among the dedicated members who helped to rebuild Paradise. A new building was erected in 1926, and a parsonage was added in 1927. Rosa served as a Sunday School teacher and a church clerk for over 70 years.
Photo taken by co-author Hannah DePonte, November 2024
Rosa and her children were also critical to Paradise’s strong reputation for its musical department. The Davis children were in the choir, and Rosa was a soloist. Gates reported that Rosa’s voice was so beautiful that many in Greenwood called her the “Mahalia Jackson of Tulsa, one of the greatest Gospel singers in the 20th century.”[i] She was mainly known for her rendition of “Silent Night” during the Christmas services.
In addition to their church work, Rosa and T.R. did whatever they could to support their growing family during the Great Depression. Rosa often washed neighbors’ clothes for money, and T.R. worked as a city watchman at a city park (security guard). T.R. Davis passed away at the age of 65 in August 1947. After his passing, Rosa carried the Davis name for the remainder of her life.
After her husband’s death, Rosa remained active in religious and educational circles. She was a member of the Oklahoma Creek District Baptist Association and the National Baptist Congress of Christian Education. In the 1950s, she was a member of the Parent-Teacher Association at Carver Middle School and president of the same for Charles S. Johnson Elementary School from 1951-1954, where Opal Long Dargan, who is covered in another WBWS biography, worked as a first-grade teacher. Rosa soon became the Northeast District of Oklahoma Congress president in the Parent Teacher Association.
Rosa likely met her second husband, Claude C. Skinner (C.C.), in her activities at Paradise. Skinner was born around 1985 in Clarksville, Tennessee. Author Hannibal B. Johnson shares that C.C. moved to Tulsa around 1920 to become the musical director at Paradise Baptist Church, a post he held for 30 years. In 1975, he founded the Tulsa North Singing Convention, an initiative he directed for 10 years. He frequently taught many aspiring musicians in Tulsa and across the country. C.C. also composed original pieces such as “Jesus in My Heart” and “Working for the Lord.” While fulfilling his passion, he was also employed as a welder and a mechanic.
As evidenced by Rosa’s 75th birthday celebration, she and C.C. were married by 1973. Together, they served the North Tulsa community. At Paradise, Rosa chaired the True and Tried Missionary Circle. In 1972, she founded the Golden Age Group. The purpose of the latter club was to “help [retirees] out as we retire [and] to not let the old rocking chair get us.”[i] In 1981, they founded the “New Trust Block Club” together, a club that fought to keep the neighborhood streets and alleyways clean in the wake of increasing neglect by the city of Tulsa. C.C. passed away in Tulsa on September 22, 1989. The year following his death, he was inducted into the Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame and memorialized as one of Tulsa’s most influential gospel singers.
Widowed once again, Rosa busied herself with service work. In the community, she was a member of the Excelsior Federated Civic and Arts Club, comprised of retired women who spent their days conducting community service, fundraising for local students, and rewarding them with scholarships. She continued in this club and others until her death in August 1995.
Credit: Find a Grave.com
Rosa’s legacy, particularly in music, education, and religion, lives on through her family. Her oldest son, Elmer Lee Davis, Sr., was music director at Tulsa Public Schools and was inducted into the Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame in 1993. His son and Rosa’s grandson, Elmer Lee Davis, Jr., was the band director at Booker T. Washington High School for over 30 years. The August 1958 Oklahoma Eagle did a story of the Davis family that performed a concert to benefit the 1960 rebuilding of Paradise. The article proclaimed that the Davis family was known in Tulsa and throughout the state for their musical abilities.
Rosa’s love for education is especially evident in her second son, James Harold Davis, who obtained a doctorate in ministry from Central American University and later became Vice Chancellor of this institution. In 2022, Rosa’s granddaughter, Jeana Dossey, was recognized by Tulsa Public Schools for her steadfast dedication as a Carver Middle School educator. At Paradise, Rosa’s granddaughter, Pamela Vickers, currently serves as the church historian, recording church history and keeping the history of the Tulsa Race Massacre alive.
[1] Don Thompson and Eddie Faye Gates, North Tulsa Oral History Project Interviews by Eddie Faye Gates of Judge Bryant, Roscoe Cartwright, Jr., Frank Lyon, Alfred Stanley Dennie, Norman Leshie Dennie and Rosa Davis Skinner, Archive Item: 5327.1828, Eddie Faye Gates Tulsa Race Massacre Collection, Gilcrease Museum, Tulsa, Oklahoma.
[2] “Rosa Davis Skinner,” in Eddie Faye Gates, They Came Searching: How Blacks Sought Promised Land in Tulsa (Austin, Texas: Eakin Press, 1997), 168.
[3] “Rosa Davis Skinner,” in They Came Searching, 165.
[4] “Rosa Davis Skinner,” in They Came Searching, 167.
[5] Rosa Davis Skinner Interview in the “North Tulsa Oral History Project.”
[6] “Rosa Davis Skinner,” in They Came Searching, 167.
[7] “Rosa Davis Skinner,” in They Came Searching, 168.
[8] Margarett Zulpo, “Remembering When the Sky Rained Death,” Tulsa World, 18 May 1954.
[9] Rosa Davis Skinner Interview in the “North Tulsa Oral History Project.”
[10] “Paradise Golden Age Club Celebrates 10th Anniversary”, Oklahoma Eagle, 11 November 1982.
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Citation: Hannah DePonte, Connor Lyons, and Camden Bussati, “Rosa Davis Skinner,” in Brandy Thomas Wells, Ed. Women of Black Wall Street, 2024 (2021), https://blackwallstreetwomen.com/rosa-d-skinner/(Access date).
Any use of images on the website must be attributed to the original site/copyright holder.
Sources:
Eddie Faye Gates, “Rosa Davis Skinner,” They Came Searching: How Blacks Sought Promised Land in Tulsa (Austin, Texas: Eakin Press, 1997), 165-168.
US Federal Census, 1900 [Bonham Texas], accessed via Ancestry.com.
US Federal Census, 1900 [Chickasaw Nation, Indian Territory], accessed via Ancestry.com.
US Federal Census, 1920 [Tulsa Oklahoma], accessed via Ancestry.com.
“Marriage Licenses,” Tulsa Daily Legal News, 16 March 1918.
“Rosa Davis-Skinner Services to be Later Today,” Tulsa World, 22 August 1995.
Paradise Baptist Church, “Our Story,” December 13, 2024, Internet Archive.
“Rosa Davis Skinner,” in Eddie Faye Gates, They Came Searching: How Blacks Sought Promised Land in Tulsa (Austin, Texas: Eakin Press, 1997), 165-168.
Margarett Zulpo, “Remembering When the Sky Rained Death,” Tulsa World, 18 May 1954.
US Federal Census, 1940 [Tulsa Oklahoma], accessed via Ancestry.com.
“Family Reunion to Highlight Benefit Concert for Paradise,” Oklahoma Eagle (Tulsa, Oklahoma), 7 August 1958.
US Federal Census, 1930 [Tulsa Oklahoma], accessed via Ancestry.com.
“Deaths,” Oklahoma Eagle (Tulsa, Oklahoma), 14 August 1947.
Rosa Davis-Skinner Services to be later today,” Tulsa World, 22 August 1995.
“Carver,” Oklahoma Eagle (Tulsa, Oklahoma), 25 November 1951.
“500 Parents a Back to School Night Program,” Oklahoma Eagle (Tulsa, Oklahoma), 22 November 1951.
“Schools News: Charles S. Johnson,” Oklahoma Eagle (Tulsa, Oklahoma), 25 October 1951.
Hannibal B. Johnson, Black Wall Street: From Riot to Renaissance in Tulsa’s Historic Greenwood District (Austin Texas: Eakin Press, 1998), 155-156.
“Mrs. Rosa Davis Surprised with Birthday Party,” Oklahoma Eagle (Tulsa, Oklahoma), 15 November 1973.
“Paradise Golden Age Club Celebrates 10th Anniversary,” Oklahoma Eagle (Tulsa, Oklahoma), 11 November 1982.
“City Neglects Alleys in Northside Historic Area,” The Oklahoma Eagle (Tulsa, Oklahoma), 8 December 1983.
Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame, “C.C. Skinner, 1990.
“Former Tulsan Returns,” Oklahoma Eagle (Tulsa, Oklahoma), 27 October 1983.
Fred L. Jones, Jr. “Jeana Dorsey selected as G.W. Carver Middle School Teacher of the Year,” Oklahoma Eagle (Tulsa, Oklahoma), 2 January 2017.