This entry includes information on the methods that have been used to exclude black residents and census records showing the white, black, Asian and Hispanic populations in the town from 1860 to the present. The mob pulled him up to hang him, but the rope broke, so they shot him repeatedly instead. I think it needs more flavor around here for sure, but everything needs to be more mixed, he said. James Loewen clearly set it up for us to do further investigation into our towns. When Loewen began his research in 1999, he thought hed find just a handful of sundown towns and recovering sundown towns, as he calls them, in Illinois. This includes publishing or syndicating our work on platforms or apps such as Apple News, Google News, etc. Not sure why everyone is interpreting your town being on this map as it being a Sundown Town. sundown town, also called sunset town, in U.S. history, a town that excluded nonwhite peoplemost frequently African Americansfrom remaining in town after sunset. Contact Logan by email and on Twitter. Privacy Policy. about sundown towns across Illinois. Yes, Sundown Towns Are Still A Problem For Black Travelers In The United States. Travel Noire, 28 July 2021, https://travelnoire.com/sundown-towns-2021. While that's largely gone by the wayside, the reputations earned by cities remain and still cast a pall over their locales. Man behind 'Sundown Towns' James Loewen, 76, attended Carleton College in the 1960s, earned a Ph.D. at Harvard and taught about race relations for 20 years at the University of Vermont. A couple towns in upstate new york, including the town I live in, are listed. Around 1980, Annas black population grew to about a few dozen residents. That (especially in the Northeast) has everything to do with immigration and climate, not racism. The sisters have a slew of similar stories. The term "sundown town" applies to places that, via policy, violence or both, barred black people from town after dark; as the book explains, the phrase is derived from "the signs that many. Anyone who knows the history of Anna-Jonesboro would never in a million years imagine something like this would ever happen. Yeah were do more black get killed were there are hundreds of thousand or fifty Perhaps a better explanation of the data would help to understand it. Anna is a city of a little more than 4,000 people located in the middle of Union County, where soybean fields and flatlands to the north give way to the forests and sandstone canyons of southern Illinois. The map does not speak for itself, it is a community project, albeit a bit slow to update considering the loss of James Loewen. I mean, at what point do we heal instead of coming back and going, Lets rip this wound open again? Theres got to be a solution, not just a revisiting of the problem. When he said this, he meant that everyone white people, black people, outsiders such as myself should focus on how to move forward. Darrel Dexter, a local historian who lives in Jonesboro and teaches high school social studies in nearby Tamms, said that many of his black students see Anna as a racist place. If people in Anna want their town to shed that reputation, he said, theyll have to reckon with the history of A-N-N-A. Ralph Smith, 30, has been employed there for two years. Your membership is the foundation of our sustainability and resilience. So that always bothered me, that that was their perception. Racism is not a problem in Anna, he said, at least no more than it is in the rest of the country. While sundown towns still effectively exist in the United States, a viral image used to illustrate that point came from a movie that was set in the 1960s. 1995 - 2023 by Snopes Media Group Inc. Im just sorry we have to talk about that. He added: That is not the Anna I know.. Independent sundown towns range in size from hamlets like Alix, Arkansas, population 185, to large cities like Appleton, Wisconsin, with 57,000 residents in 1970. Taylors latest book, Overground Railroad: The Green Book and the Roots of Black Travel in America," examines the historical role and the impact of the Green Book a travel guide printed from 1936 to 1967 to help Black Americans find safe places to stay, shop and eat on the road. Not surprising, but still horrifying nonetheless. Or simply tell me this: How do you want to engage with this issue? Illinois had almost 150 sundown towns in the state alone. I visited a grave in the Anna cemetery that belongs to the man deemed by a local newspaper in 1916 to be the only colored man who has ever lived in this city and I spent some time with one of the few black families (if not the only one) living in Anna today. The name derives from the posted and verbal warnings issued to Blacks that although they might be allowed to work or travel in a community . Michael Hunter leaned forward in his camouflage-printed office chair. The Sundown Towns interactive map uses the Sundown Towns Database to show the distribution and location of sundown towns across the United States. Like you know all these people commenting THIS ISNT TRUE are deff white and have had no racist experience happen to them in their lives. Thank you for your interest in republishing this story. On the first day of Amiyahs senior year at Anna-Jonesboro High, students gathered before class outside the school for impromptu group photos. But after hearing A-N-N-A said aloud that night, I realized my race made me a sort of insider, too. Smith, 38, moved to Anna in 2016 with her six children: Arieh, 19; Atarah, 18; Amiyah, 16; Arojae, 15; Asaiah, 12; and Aseana, 11. In fact, many of Annas earliest residents were from Tennessee, North Carolina and Virginia. Note: This story contains graphic descriptions of violence. Cairo has long been emblematic of a future that Anna fears: the decline of a once-thriving town. "Green Book" was inspired by the true story of a 1962 concert tour by African American pianist Don Shirley (played by Mahershala Ali). But it hurt. Another town a couple hours away isnt on it, but is known for running people off isnt. The sign can be seen in a scene where Shirley's driver, played by Viggo Mortensen, drives their car through a sundown town: While sundown town signs are no longer a prevalent feature on America's roadways, racial discrimination can still be an obstacle for Black drivers. Incorrigible people incapable of empathy or evolution. Yes there are racist areas but you should have to have something to prove this other then made up accusations. He now comes to town to go to Walmart and to get his car washed. The map above shows the paths of a dozen spy balloons as they travel across the United States. If one came here from a link, they expected a recent map, not historical data. For more information about canonical metadata, You cant edit our material, except to reflect relative changes in time, location and editorial style. The decision was in response to a bill designed to limit discrimination lawsuits by making changes to the Missouri Human Rights Act. He historically situates the rise of the sundown town movement in the years following the Civil War; describes the mechanisms of violence, threats . I don't think America is worth saving. I just didnt think it was worth talking about., Some sundown towns in the Midwest have begun to confront their legacies. Sundown towns re-entered the spotlight again in 2020 thanks to the HBO series Lovecraft Country. That is why the words 'colored people' are in quotation marks. The sundown town was really a way that the North and West patrolled and monitored race without having the dirty signs of saying 'colored only' or 'whites only,' she says. This is not helping. "Green Book" takes its title from a travel guide book published between 1936 and 1966 called "The Negro Motorist Green Book" that helped Black people avoid particularly hostile areas, such as sundown towns, as they drove through the country. How The Legacy Of Sundown Towns Affects Black Travelers. BuzzFeed News, https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/adeonibada/sundown-towns-racism-black-drivers-tiktok. Pekin's legacy includedKu Klux Klan activity and a high school's nickname abolished more than 30 years ago that was a racial slur used to refer to people of Chinese origin. Sign up for The Weekly Dispatch, a newsletter that spotlights wrongdoing around the country. The Gazette wrote that the only colored man who has ever lived in this city, died at his home Sunday night. Emily Sales died in Anna in 1932. Some posted. In 1865, a black man walking toward Anna along railroad tracks outside town was shot and killed in what the Chicago Tribune said was supposed to have been done by some Copperhead wretch Copperhead being slang for Northerners sympathetic to the Confederacy as the disposition of the tribe here is to kill or drive off all niggers., And in 1874, during Reconstruction, white residents in Anna were met with demands from what the Cairo Bulletin called ku-klux demonstrations that they fire any black people employed in the area and send the negroes out of the county or suffer the consequences., By the turn of the century, Anna at least according to the Jonesboro Gazette was grateful it wasnt wrapped up in what the newspaper deemed a race problem in places where the negro forms a considerable population; in Cairo, for example, about 40% of residents were black, and many of them were formerly enslaved people who sought new lives in supposedly free states such as Illinois. There are also uses of a derogatory racial term in documents and quotes cited in the story. Brown Media Archives and Peabody Awards Collection, WSB-TV newsfilm . Once known as a 'sundown town' and KKK stronghold, Pekin tries to move past racist history, 100-year-old Peorian recalls overcoming racism to start half-century teaching career, Your California Privacy Rights/Privacy Policy. As I remember, in order to prove to the Anna people that he had been lynched, I think they brought one of his legs back to Anna, Hindman recalled in the 1970s, as part of an oral history project at southern Illinois Shawnee Community College. Overcoming racism's legacy: 100-year-old Peorian recalls overcoming racism to start half-century teaching career. Annas historical resistance to black people is, and has long been, well known in the region. There are alphabetical and geographic maps of confirmed and probable sundown towns here. And until people are willing to at least acknowledge that its there, theres not going to be any change.. (617) 742-2100 | info@uua.org. The Union County Board of Commissioners is all white. Sign up to get ProPublica Illinois investigations delivered to your inbox. If you could adjust that, it would prove safer for travelers. If you use canonical metadata, please use the ProPublica URL. When I went to church with the family one morning, I watched a white woman touch Atarahs hair and tell her she was beautiful, like Beyonc., Arieh pointed out that, since theyve lived in Anna, his white friends here have taught him how to do things like catch fish, drive ATVs and shoot guns. Sundown towns in North Carolina (5 P) O. Sundown towns in Ohio (8 P) Sundown towns in Oklahoma (14 P) T. Sundown towns in Tennessee (3 P) In 1930, 44 out of the 89 counties that lined Route 66 were all-white communities known as "sundown towns"places that banned black people from entering city limits after dark. Nevertheless, three years after Smith moved to Anna, her family still has to deal with racist comments. ". Most people said they wished the A-N-N-A reputation would just go away and were quick to say Anna wasnt like that anymore. It was new since the last time I had been in town. Most people I met in Anna, Illinois, wish the racist lore behind the citys name would go away. So I went in, too. This material may not be reproduced without permission. Yet when Smith ran the idea by friends and school guidance counselors, just about everyone asked her the same thing: Dont you know what A-N-N-A stands for? He didnt go with her. There are hundreds of these communities in Illinois. [It looked] just like that, he added. @Anonymous I didn't use the term 'colored people'. I dont think Compton in Los Angeles is a sundown town. I worked nights for 13 years. Sundown towns dated back to the colonial days, when the ordinances and laws were also aimed at Native Americans. Growing up near Phoenix, Smith said her familys friends called them the Huxtables, a reference to the upper-middle class black family of The Cosby Show. She feels her parents, and the high standards they set, prepared her well for her current life: If anybody was going to come to Anna, God picked somebody that had the right credentials to be able to come here, she said. If you know of other similar efforts around Illinois, Id love to hear about those as well. Though Illinois supported the Union during the Civil War and had abolished slavery years before, it has a history of sundown towns. Being surrounded by water already gives this town an eerie and isolated feel. About 10 workers fled to the woods. Hi there, would like to start by saying I appreciate the concept. Ill be bookmarking and avoiding all of these towns, and passing the info onto friends, family, and social media. Thats for Aint No Niggers Allowed. He laughed, shook his head and took a sip of his beer. Patches of tiled sidewalk that once led into storefronts now faded into dirt. People just dont have enough education or just havent been around a lot, said Smith, who lives about 30 minutes outside Anna. A sundown town is a community that for decades kept non-whites from living in it and was thus "all-white" on purpose. Then, in a moment that would lodge itself in regional memory, a 23-year-old white woman from Anna was found dead in November 1909 in an alley in Cairo. 4500. And under it is another sign that looks just like it, a green sign with white letters. Or check out the most ghetto cities and the most dangerous cities in Illinois. They are so named because some marked their city limits with placards warning specific groups of people to stay away after the sun went down. Some of these communities Benton, Herrin, Carterville, Anna were "sundown towns" where, by official policy, black people were not allowed after dark into at least the 1960s in some cases,. Like many other small towns, Anna has lost industry. Even though it may never have been codified, I found references to the fact that black people werent allowed to live in Anna in newspaper articles from as early as 1903. NBC Universal, Inc. Decades ago, South Florida was segregated in some areas, Black people could work, but they couldn't stay overnight. However, ALL of the towns in Vermillion, Vigo (Terre Haute), and Parke counties should be on this map. This story is not subject to our Creative Commons license. Sign up for our newsletter to get weekly updates written by our journalists. Winds SSW at 10 to 15 mph.. But all of that stuff dont get me down. It was, from its founding up until 1968. While the assertion that sundown towns still exist in America is generally accurate, the above-displayed example does not show sign on display in the United States in 2022. You cant sell our material separately or syndicate it. So most people assume it was the South that was the problem, but that really wasn't the case.. We mourn the loss of our friend and colleague and remain committed to the work he began. Thank you for the list! But after a series of incidents that made her feel unsafe in Murphysboro, Smith said, she wanted out. Onibada, Ade. https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2021/08/26/sundown-towns-black-travel. But there aren't any "sundown" places, including the one's marked on the map near me, that I would tell someone to not visit because of the color of their skin. They expect factual data, not hearsay. In that particular reference, a woman from Anna who worked as a hotel maid in Indianapolis was quoted as saying, I never saw more than 10 negroes in all my life until I was 18 as a negro is not allowed to stop in our little village of Anna.. The green books exists because there were simply too many places BP could get beaten or lynched. There is a restriction against spending the night in your car but thats unrelated. For the most part, it was what they expected. A Anna, Illinois B Benton, Illinois C Calhoun County, Illinois Cicero, Illinois D De Land, Illinois Deerfield, Illinois E Effingham, Illinois Eldorado, Illinois G "A travel advisory has been issued to warn that any Black people in or traveling to San Antonio use increased caution when visiting the city due to the city's policing policies that put Black Lives in danger," wrote organizers in a press release. Years before, when she was new to Illinois and living in Murphysboro, about 25 miles north, she got lost driving somewhere on U.S. Highway 51 after dark and called her husband for directions. Some towns like Harrison, Arkansas, still display confederate flags and big, scary signs, she says. For whatever reason its just one of those towns, I guess, his co-worker added. Among his questions: "Do you think Forsyth is a county for whites only?" Courtesy of Walter J. In a way, though, it doesnt matter. . Weve got issues and are not shirking away from those issues, Mayor Tim Kabat, who is white, told the La Crosse Tribune. Watkins said he . Ashley Lockeproduced and edited this interview for broadcast withTinku Ray. Anna, Illinois in 2020 is trying to shed the reputation that it has of being a sundown town. When I called James Taylor, the man I had met at the Anna Walmart months before, he told me there was someone in Cairo I should meet. Its okay to put our stories on pages with ads, but not ads specifically sold against our stories. For years, he avoided Anna. Copyright 1996-2023 Unitarian Universalist Association.All Rights Reserved. One boy, Amiyah told Smith, yelled to her, Come on, blackie, and get in the photo. Amiyah looked at him, turned around and walked away. The more you talk about it, it just creates that issue more, Max Miller, Union Countys board chairman, told me. Still, Smith often thinks twice about simple decisions white people seldom give much thought to for example, which black friends she can invite to town, because shes not sure theyll all be received well. But he said he gets asked every so often about A-N-N-A by outsiders like me. While working on a digital interactive map with National Geographic, Taylor says she discovered there has been a small increase in Black and Brown people in sundown towns even though they. While the details of each incident are often vague or contradictory, newspaper accounts, oral history archives and other documents chronicle a narrative of Annas emerging reputation as A-N-N-A. Out of 5,000 people up there, you come up with one family? he said, laughing. Today, Emily and John share a small tombstone in the Anna cemetery. 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