3"7S A/8U Yvo

3"7S A/8U yvo. "THEY HAVE GONE FROM SHERMAN": THE COURTHOUSE RIOT OF 1930 AND ITS IMPACT ON THE BLACK PROFESSIONAL CLASS DISSERTATION Presented to the Graduate Council of the University of North Texas in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY By Donna J. Kumler, B.A., M.A, Denton, Texas December, 1995 3"7S A/8U yvo. "THEY HAVE GONE FROM SHERMAN": THE COURTHOUSE RIOT OF 1930 AND ITS IMPACT ON THE BLACK PROFESSIONAL CLASS DISSERTATION Presented to the Graduate Council of the University of North Texas in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY By Donna J. Kumler, B.A., M.A, Denton, Texas December, 1995 Kumler, Donna J., "They Have Gone From Sherman": The Courthouse Riot of 1930 and Its Impact on the Black Professional Class. Doctor of Philosophy (History), December, 1995, 213 pp., references, 152 titles. In 1930, Sherman, county seat of Grayson County in North Texas, enjoyed a long-standing reputation as the "Athens of Texas" because of its educational institutions and cultural activity. The community was also known for its churches and favorable business environment. Sherman's residents esteemed southern values and maintained perceptions regarding race usually associated with the South more than any other region of the nation. Although racial violence had occurred in the county in the early 1900s, race relations in the community during the decade prior to 1930 were neither tense nor particularly poor. The lack of racial hostility contributed to the development of a thriving black professional community that in 1930 included four physicians, a dentist, and a lawyer, W.J. Durham, who would later achieve prominence as a noted civil rights attorney. Considering the size of the town and the small number of black professionals in Texas, Sherman had a relatively large number of black professionals. The "Athens of Texas" was stunned on May 9, 1930, when a mob interrupted the trial of a black man charged with the rape of a local white woman. To gain possession of the accused, the rioters burned the courthouse, killing the accused. They lynched and burned his corpse and then destroyed the entire black business district. Most black residents fled Sherman, returning only after Governor Dan Moody imposed martial law. Riot exclusion clauses in insurance coverage and the economic distress of the 1930s prevented the rebuilding of the black business district. Additionally, fear of a recurrence of such violence hindered efforts to attract new professionals to the area and thus restore the black professional community. Only in the 1980s did the situation begin to change slightly, and in 1995, Sherman is still viewed by some as unfriendly to blacks and other minorities. This study describes the development of the black business and professional community with emphasis on the period from 1920 to 1930, the riot itself, and the impact of the episode on the local black community. It utilizes traditional historical research methods, county records, contemporary newspapers, and oral history. Copyright by Donna J. Kumler 1995 1X1 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS There are several individuals who have contributed significantly to the completion of this project. I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to my major professor, Dr. Randolph B. Campbell, whose counsel, expertise, and expectations never failed to inspire me even when I was the most laggard of students. Dr. D. Harland Hagler and Dr. Ronald E. Marcello offered several suggestions which improved my work. My colleagues at Grayson County College have been a constant source of encouragement. Tanja Rhodes of the Sherman Public Library Staff frequently exceeded the call of duty, and Linda Kay Allen typed and edited while doggedly overcoming glitches in modern technology. I am also deeply grateful to Rev. and Mrs. Charles Glass, Vernon and Lucille Kumler, and Tamra Bragg whose faith in me never wavered all along the way. My heartfelt appreciation goes to my husband Ronald and our children who have made many sacrifices so that I might pursue my goals. I am forever in their debt. IV TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS iv INTRODUCTION 1 Brief History of Lynching Efforts to Abolish Lynching The Lynchings of 1930 Significance of the Sherman Courthouse Riot of 1930 Purposes of the Study Chapter 1. GRAYSON COUNTY AND SHERMAN: FOUNDING TO 1930 15 Brief History of Grayson County and Sherman to 1930 Factors Contributing to the Growth of Grayson County and Sherman to 1930 Characteristics of the County and its County Seat 2. THE BLACK COMMUNITY IN GRAYSON COUNTY AND SHERMAN TO 1930 48 Brief History of the Black Community to 1930 Prominent Clergymen in Sherman Brief History of the Fred Douglass School and Prominent Educators in Sherman Fraternal Orders in Sherman Prominent Medical Professionals "Juneteenth" Celebrations Local Associations and Their Activities Sketch of Attorney W.J. Durham 3. RACE RELATIONS IN SHERMAN AND GRAYSON COUNTY DURING THE 1920S 103 Interracial Activities Analysis of the Racial Climate Activities of the Ku Klux Klan 4. THE LYNCHING: MAY 9 INTO MAY 10, 1930 118 Circumstances Surrounding the Alleged Crime v Chronology of Events Leading Up To the Lynching Official Responses 5. THE IMMEDIATE AFTERMATH AND THE SPRING OF 1930 ... 148 Challenges for the Local Black and White Communities Arrests, Indictments, Trial, and Release of Rioters Community Efforts to Recover 6. HOW DID IT HAPPEN? 165 Attempts to Explain the Episodes Analysis of Official Response Analysis of "Typical Lynching County" Idea Examination of Contributing Factors EPILOGUE 190 Impact of the Riot on the Local Black Community From 1930 to Present Current Efforts of Community of Sherman to Improve Race Relations WORKS CITED 203 VI INTRODUCTION The peculiarly American practice of lynching had its origins in the Revolutionary era when a Virginia planter, Colonel Charles Lynch, and his vigilante organization punished outlaws and Loyalists in the absence of a local judicial system. Subsequently, the terms "lynch," "lynch- law," and "Judge Lynch" came to refer to vigilante justice. However, in the years prior to the Civil War era, lynching generally entailed only such punishments as flogging, tarring and feathering, or the driving of individuals from a community.1 As the United States expanded westward, lynching came to mean death by hanging, a practice used to mete out justice on a frequently lawless and violent frontier. Murderers, robbers, or livestock thieves often met their deaths at the hands of a mob which acted in the absence of a judicial system or when certain members of the community regarded legal provisions for punishment as unsatisfactory. Such vigilantism, at this time suffered primarily by white victims, became an acceptable way to maintain order in a frontier society. 2 In the antebellum South, the fear of slave revolts prompted white southerners to take drastic measures on occasion to preserve the institution of slavery and to impress upon the bondsmen the futility of resistance. Among other examples, the abortive revolts led by the slave Gabriel in 1800 and by Denmark Vesey in South Carolina twenty-two years later resulted in the public hangings of approximately seventy blacks implicated in the plots.3 As sectional tensions heightened in the period immediately prior to the Civil War, violence toward blacks, frequently in the form of lynching, became increasingly prevalent, especially in Texas and Louisiana. For example, in 1860, after "suspicious" fires caused extensive damage in Dallas, Denton, and other areas of North Texas, rumors of a slave insurrection organized by "abolitionist emissaries" resulted in the hangings and burnings of numerous blacks. By one account, as many as sixty-five perished, although the exact number cannot be determined.4 Such public executions of blacks according to one historian, "...set a bloody precedent for racial lynchings."5 During the Civil War and the subsequent Reconstruction era, widespread violence continued to be directed toward blacks, and lynching became increasingly associated with the South. With the end of Reconstruction, southern whites employed a program of fear and intimidation to control the freedmen and maintain white supremacy. Although Jim Crow laws ultimately provided effective mechanisms for racial control, the lynching and burning of black men and, on occasion, black women became a particularly lethal and sadistic part of the program. By the 1890s, lynching had become an acceptable method of punishment for blacks whom southern whites perceived as transgressors either of the law or social tradition. Unlike the lynchings of the frontier, these occurred in areas of the South where the local governmental machinery was fully intact and operational. In some cases, local officials participated in the lynchings or, at the very least, enabled them.6 The lynching practices of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries evolved into brutal, sadistic exhibitions, which included such primal activities as manhunt, torture, burning at the stake, community viewing, newspaper advertisement of the "program," and dismemberment of the victim for souvenirs distributed among the onlookers. As one historian noted, lynching was "transformed into a recreational spectacle...." Eventually, individuals and organizations, appalled at the savagery and the carnival atmosphere in which many lynchings transpired, initiated campaigns to abolish the practice. The Tuskegee Institute in Alabama was one of the first to attack the lynching issue in America.7 Established by the Alabama legislature in 1881, the Tuskegee Institute, headed at the time by Booker T. Washington, began in the next year to tabulate and publish information about lynchings. These lynching records, as they came to be called, compiled for the years from 1882 until 1968, included the number of lynchings reported each year, the causes of the lynchings, and lynching frequency by state .s The records revealed that the practice of lynching in these years was primarily a racial and southern phenomenon.

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