Tulsa in ‘Shock’ After Black Wall Street Chamber President Found Dead in Her Home
The Black business community in the Tulsa, Oklahoma, area is reeling after the president and chief executive of the Black Wall Street Chamber of Commerce was found dead in her Bixby home on Wednesday.
Sherry Gamble Smith, 55, and her husband, Martin Everett Smith, 54, were discovered by police shortly after 8 a.m., Officer Bryan Toney, a spokesman for the Bixby Police Department, told The Daily Beast. Officers who responded to the home found Smith deceased and Martin badly wounded.
He was transported to a hospital, where he later died, according to Toney, who said the 911 call came from inside the house.
A suspect is not being actively sought in the investigation, said police, who have not yet released any details about how the pair died.
“What we can release now is that it is a death investigation,” said Toney, who said the Bixby PD is working jointly on the case with the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation.
Gamble Smith, who served as president of the Historic Greenwood Chamber of Commerce before taking her most recent position, was remembered fondly by Phil Armstrong, interim executive director of the Greenwood Rising Black Wall Street History Center, as “a fellow colleague and a personal friend.”
“She was an incredible person that constantly thought about putting others before herself,” Armstrong told The Daily Beast on Wednesday afternoon.
“She started an organization for women in business called Women Empowering Nations, that literally was a network for women that wanted to start their own businesses, and to give them inspiration and encouragement... She has also been the driving force behind the Juneteenth festival in Tulsa, as it has built up year after year.”
Armstrong called Gamble Smith’s shocking death “a tremendous loss,” and a “shock to the entire community.”
“I’ve received text messages from people from all over the city, from mom-and-pop-type of local individuals to people who run the Tulsa Regional Chamber of Commerce,” he said. “She was very, very, well-known and very highly regarded throughout the entire community.”
The Black Wall Street Chamber did not immediately comment publicly on the situation.
This story has been updated with the correct photo of Sherry Gamble Smith.
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