One Hundred Year Anniversary of the Rosewood Destruction

In January 1923, a white mob of Floridian men burned a prosperous and peaceful African American town named Rosewood, to the ground. They were hunting for an escaped chain gang convict who had been accused of assaulting a white woman. There was no evidence to support the accusation nor was there an evidence that the escaped convict was in Rosewood, nonetheless, the mob tortured and murdered a crafsman who lived there trying to get him to tell them where the convict was. Then they killed 30 men women and children and burned the town down. The survivors fled via a train.

Recently people were made aware of the torching of the "Black Wall Street" of Oklahoma which took place in 1921 when another, much larger, very prosperous business and reidential center of Africa Americans, near Tulsa, was also burned to the ground and several hundred peope killed and buried in mass graves which are currently being excavated, bodies identified and given proper burial.

If you have been following the re-surgence of African American History, you have probably been aware of the Oklahoma massacre, but possibly not the one in Rosewood, Florida. You are probably also aware of the renewed attention to the history of lynching for racial intimidation that took place throughout the South. Several memorials and monuments have been erected to honor those murdered under these terrible circumstances. The National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama is the most recent and most renowned.

As most of us have agreed, the crimes of history must be remembered lest we repeat them, also so that we can understand the repercussions they leave behind. For this reason, a great deal of effort has been put into Holocaust History, and just in time, as in recent years, Holocaust deniers have spread their horrendous lies

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." This is a well known quote from philosopher George Santayana from his book The Life of Reason, 1905. At the very least we must remember and acknowledge the pain and suffering and make a vow to prevent the reocurrence of it.

The 1619 Project made the point that many of our current ills have their roots in our History of Slavery. HULU, a streaming video channel is currently hosting a documentary based on the bestselling book The 1619 Project which first appeared as a Sunday New York Times Magazine long article. I read it and was impressed and have since watched the first two episodes of the HULU series. It is shocking and mind expanding even to those of us who have made an attempt to educate ourselves about the Civil Rights struggle and Black History in general. I strongly urge anyone who has HULY to watch it. And if you are interested in finding out more about Florida's racial history, you can buy Historian/Educator Marvin Dunn's book, A History of Florida through Black Eyes in paperback for $30. I think it especially important at this contemporary moment as Governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis passes increasingly restrictive acts against teaching race history.

It is an interesting paralell to me that as, thanks to the Women's Rights Struggle, women were increasingly able to move up the educational ladder, they began to research and publish more of the 'lost' and forgotton history of Women in America, and similarly thanks to the Civil Rights Struggle, more and more Black scholars have been able to research and resurrect lost and hidden History of African American citizens. At the same time, I would like to thank all the devoted local historians both informal and formal, who have kept our history alive to be found and shared in the present and the future.

Jo Ann wrightj45@yahoo.com