In the Hate of Dixie

[demmiblue]

Pulitzer Prize winner Cynthia Tucker grew up in Monroeville, Alabama, the hometown of the beloved author of "To Kill a Mockingbird," Harper Lee. What Tucker never heard about, growing up, were the 17 lynchings that happened in Monroe County.

Southern trees bear a strange fruit,
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
Black bodies swinging in the Southern breeze,
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.
— “Strange Fruit,” Abel Meeropol, 1939

MONROEVILLE, Alabama — Growing up here, I was steeped in the stories that ripple through To Kill a Mockingbird. This is Harper Lee’s hometown, and her narrative, though fictionalized, brilliantly portrayed its racial climate in the 1930s. She called on eccentric characters who were well-known in town and put to good use tales with which she was familiar. My late father, who grew up here, identified some of those characters and tales for me.

He and my mother also taught their children to negotiate the landscape of Jim Crow, a welter of oppressive codes and customs designed to legitimize white supremacy. Those codes were still in force in my childhood, so I attended segregated schools through elementary and much of high school. I followed the law that locked me out of “WHITES ONLY” restrooms, waiting rooms, and downstairs seats in the movie theater.

As a very small child, I had my own experience with running right into the wall — not always visible but substantial nevertheless — put in place to separate the races. My mother and I were traveling to Montgomery on a commercial bus operated under the banner of Trailways Bus Lines. We had taken seats near the front, but when we stopped in Hayneville, just south of Montgomery, more white travelers boarded. The driver ordered us to the back.

At the ripe old age of four, I objected, my mother remembers. Terrified, she dragged me to the back. When we arrived at our destination, she called my father and told him he would have to come to drive us home. She didn’t dare take me on another bus ride for fear my obstinance would bring trouble.

https://bittersoutherner.com/in-the-hate-of-dixie-monroe-county-lynchings/?rq=kelso&utm_source=The+Bitter+News&utm_campaign=bb3fed3368-song_without_words_2018_10_23&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_8269ec3593-bb3fed3368-91984949&goal=0_8269ec3593-bb3fed3368-91984949&mc_cid=bb3fed3368&mc_eid=bc2515f09d

[Aristus]

1. One of the many, many illogical things about Southern white supremacy:

If whites really were superior to black people,why would it be necessary to pass laws restricting where a black person could go, when they could go there, what they could say, and what professions they could hold? Wouldn't a natural supremacy, like the fabled free market, regulate and correct itself?

Just shows you how full of shit racists are...

[bobbieinok]

2. Wm Lindsay had several lengthy blog posts about the numerous lynchings in Arkansas

His blog is bilgrimage.blogspot.com.

He was born and grew up in the state and lives in Little Rock with his husband.

As I recall, he was surprised at the numbers and the unabashed descriptions about the lynchings in the papers.

Many horrific quotes.

[3Hotdogs]

3. When I was about 12, my family visited my uncle in Palatka. At that time, it was a small town, pop.

around 4,000 thousand. That was before Hudson Paper built their mill.

What I recall, was my aunt taking my cousin to register for kindergarten. We were inside the school district office. While we were there, a bell rang. A clerk went to a window on the side of the room and opened it so a black person standing outside could register her kid. They weren't allowed inside a public building.