Maybe the reason “no one seems to remember” them is that if you were 10 years old in 1919 you would be 104 years old today.
I don't know what happened in 1919 but I don't trust the authors version of events.
She’s kind of silly this author because while nobody remembers those riots (I never heard of them before and the article tells us nothing about them) pretty much everybody who has studied US History, and many people in NYC, remember the “Draft Riots” that took place there over the drafting of soldiers for the civil war. They were anti-black inasmuch as many black people were attacked and the grievance of the rioters, who were to a large extent Irish immigrants, was that they did not want to go to war to benefit black people since I guess they perceived the war WAS being fought to end slavery even if that was not a stated goal at the time.
Now, somebody smarter than me can come on and tell me how much I screwed up my re-telling of the story of the NYC Draft riots, and that’s OK. But that’s my “recollection” of them and they are quite well remembered in history. But just not our gentle authoress of this piece posted here.
I believe the last “white race riot” was in Cicero, IL in 1951.
Prior to WWII most race riots consisted primarily of whites attacking blacks. Since WWII they have been almost exclusively blacks attacking whites (mostly).
The author really ought to review this list, it might answer her question about why people assume any riots will be by blacks.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_riots#United_States
I wasn't alive in 1919 either, but I was aware of the race riot that occurred in Chicago that summer through my reading. (BTW, the then young Richard Daley, who would later become the archetypical big city 'Rat machine boss, played a significant role in the white rioting, which occurred in or near his neighborhood. My guess is that the large majority of the white rioters were or went on to become loyal Democrats.)
You don't have to have been alive when an event occurred to know real history and to take that historical knowledge into account in analyzing current events. Nothing wrong with talking about the racially motivated riots of 1919, except that the authoress of the posted article is off base in bringing them into the discussion of the George Zimmerman case. She brings up the 1919 riots as if to say or imply that if whites rioted against blacks at some point in history, it's just payback when and if blacks riot against whites now. Well, two wrongs don't make a right!