Red Summer: When Racist Mobs Ruled
(click on link below bio to read the entire post)
On September 27, 1919, a mob of at least 10,000 white people stormed the courthouse in Omaha, Nebraska, demanding the sheriff turn over Will Brown, a 40-year-old Black man. They raided the building, scaled walls and smashed windows. When the mob’s initial demands were refused, they set fire to the courthouse, turning it into a seething furnace. Omaha Mayor Ed Smith tried to intervene, but the mob tried to lynch him. Smith escaped badly injured.
“THE JUDGE SAYS HE WILL GIVE UP NEGRO. BROWN. HE IS IN THE DUNGEON. THERE ARE TEN WHITE PRISONERS ON THE ROOF. SAVE THEM.”
The frenzied horde finally broke into the jail and dragged Brown out. They tortured him, dismembered him, tied a rope around his neck and hoisted him up on a pole on the south side of the courthouse. As his body dangled in agony, they shot him more than 100 times. After they were sure he was dead, they sliced the rope and Brown’s body dropped to the pavement. Then the frenzied mob, which the local newspaper referred to as a “lynching committee,” cursed, kicked and spat on the body of the Black man…
To read the article in it’s entirety; please click on the link below—
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/t-town-red-summer-racist-mobs/
KG Bethlehem 
Awful, and really disheartening what they did to him.
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Yes, yes it was
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Thank you, K! When I tried to add the 1919 riots into my walking tours back in 2010, no one wanted to know about the first race riots in the country, much less the DC neighborhoods were Black veterans fought back as their neighborhoods were invaded by white guys.
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Please keep on showcasing history that most try to not learn. You’re definitely keeping up the “good fight.”
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