WEBVTT - Special Series: The Election Day Massacre. Part 3. 0:00:06.480 --> 0:00:10.320 I'm Sean Braswell. Welcome to Flashback. We're doing something a 0:00:10.320 --> 0:00:13.520 little different in this episode. We're running a special series 0:00:13.520 --> 0:00:16.880 about the worst incident of election violence in American history, 0:00:17.239 --> 0:00:20.360 an event that is almost forgotten today. It happened a 0:00:20.400 --> 0:00:24.439 century ago on Election Day nine and the town of 0:00:24.440 --> 0:00:28.280 a Koe, Florida. The victims were hundreds of black residents. 0:00:28.640 --> 0:00:32.280 The perpetrators were their white neighbors. And the reason was 0:00:32.360 --> 0:00:35.200 that black citizens had gone to the polls and tried 0:00:35.240 --> 0:00:54.520 to vote. They said that you lack parish house was burned. 0:00:54.600 --> 0:00:58.400 I'm shore it was. This oral history was recorded a 0:00:58.440 --> 0:01:01.960 few years ago with the late Mildred Board. We're hearing 0:01:01.960 --> 0:01:05.360 a courtesy of the Orange County Regional History Center. As 0:01:05.360 --> 0:01:07.840 a little girl, Mrs Board lived a few miles from 0:01:07.840 --> 0:01:12.640 a Koe, Florida. The morning after election Day, hundreds of 0:01:12.680 --> 0:01:17.080 black families fled the town. She remembered one woman in particular. 0:01:17.480 --> 0:01:20.800 I talked about how they got on the railroad track 0:01:22.720 --> 0:01:27.080 and walked the railroad track. They walked so far and 0:01:27.120 --> 0:01:31.160 then maybe they had a truck haws and blugget and 0:01:31.360 --> 0:01:35.039 they would pick them up along the railroad track and 0:01:35.080 --> 0:01:39.680 bring them here. Almost every surviving black resident fled a 0:01:39.760 --> 0:01:43.560 Koe after a night of horrifying attacks by white vigilantes. 0:01:44.280 --> 0:01:47.480 Their homes and churches were set on fire. The leader 0:01:47.480 --> 0:01:52.160 of the community, July Perry, was lynched. Other neighbors were shot. 0:01:52.480 --> 0:01:55.200 Estimates of the number of black people murdered that night 0:01:55.640 --> 0:01:59.680 ranged from four to sixty. The reason for the massacre 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:15.160 m Coe's black residents had attempted to vote. I'm Eugenus Robinson. 0:02:15.600 --> 0:02:31.880 You're listening to the election day massacre from Ozzie Media. 0:02:33.480 --> 0:02:37.720 Cohe was a national and international story. And if you 0:02:37.760 --> 0:02:43.280 look at any newspaper in around election Day, you can't 0:02:43.280 --> 0:02:47.840 miss a cooee. Historian Paul Ortiz the University of Florida. 0:02:48.240 --> 0:02:49.919 The stories in the New York Times, is in the 0:02:50.000 --> 0:02:53.360 Chicago tribunits, in the European press, it's an the Latin 0:02:53.360 --> 0:02:56.440 American press. Um, it's an international story. In other words, 0:02:57.080 --> 0:03:02.040 newspapers called it the Cooe horror. But Florida's election day 0:03:02.160 --> 0:03:05.360 violence wasn't limited to a Koe. So there was a 0:03:05.440 --> 0:03:09.800 statewide reactionary movement against the black struggle to regain right 0:03:09.840 --> 0:03:14.000 to vote, and there was violence all over the state. UM. 0:03:14.040 --> 0:03:18.520 There were gun battles you know, their assassinations. As far 0:03:18.560 --> 0:03:23.080 as I can tell in my research, the worst violence, 0:03:23.720 --> 0:03:26.760 the most sustained anti black violence you know, appear to 0:03:26.800 --> 0:03:31.680 happen at Choe. They call for able bodied ex servicemen 0:03:31.760 --> 0:03:35.000 to come and create a perimeter around a Koe. Pamela Schwartz, 0:03:35.080 --> 0:03:38.360 chief curator of the Orange County Regional History Center, put 0:03:38.400 --> 0:03:41.800 together an exhibition on the Echoe massacre. Now they say 0:03:41.840 --> 0:03:45.400 that's to lock down the crime scene, but it also 0:03:45.440 --> 0:03:49.440 means black families can't go find their loved ones, get 0:03:49.480 --> 0:03:53.080 to their possessions, see what's going on. Then a CP 0:03:53.320 --> 0:03:57.320 sent in an investigator, Walter Francis White, later president of 0:03:57.360 --> 0:04:02.080 the organization Heat Travel the US, investigating lynchings and other 0:04:02.160 --> 0:04:05.840 acts of violence against Black Americans. At the time that 0:04:05.880 --> 0:04:09.440 I visited O'koe, the last colored family of Okoe was 0:04:09.520 --> 0:04:11.960 leaving with their good It's piled high on a motor 0:04:12.040 --> 0:04:16.320 truck with six colored children on top. White children stood 0:04:16.320 --> 0:04:19.680 around and g the Negroes who were leaving, threatened them 0:04:19.680 --> 0:04:21.880 with burned if they did not hurry up and get away. 0:04:22.240 --> 0:04:25.120 These children thought it a huge joke that some Negroes 0:04:25.160 --> 0:04:29.520 had been burned alive. Walter white comes down. Uh, he's 0:04:29.560 --> 0:04:34.200 a very light skinned black man. He can pass for white. Uh. 0:04:34.200 --> 0:04:37.719 He uses the subject usure being a white man interested 0:04:37.760 --> 0:04:40.719 in buying orange grows in western Orange County. And he 0:04:40.760 --> 0:04:43.760 starts talking to white people about the mask, and they 0:04:43.839 --> 0:04:47.400 tell him all sorts of details that I personally killed 0:04:47.480 --> 0:04:50.080 or I know how many Negroes were killed. And he 0:04:50.120 --> 0:04:53.040 finds that white people are very proud about what they 0:04:53.040 --> 0:04:57.559 did on election Day. One man told him I shot 0:04:57.680 --> 0:05:02.719 seventeen Negroes. He shot seventeen himself when he was bragging 0:05:02.760 --> 0:05:05.919 about it. Pamela Grady isn't a COOEE resident and the 0:05:05.960 --> 0:05:09.440 executive director of the July Perry Foundation. There was an 0:05:09.520 --> 0:05:12.760 article in a newspaper that said, We're gonna have a 0:05:12.800 --> 0:05:15.440 banquet for everyone who came, and we want we want 0:05:15.440 --> 0:05:18.240 to reward you. The one is shot the most Negroes, 0:05:18.839 --> 0:05:20.960 the one is shot the most is going to get 0:05:20.960 --> 0:05:24.560 a reward. The reason that Koe Horror made headlines is 0:05:24.600 --> 0:05:27.680 not that dozens of black people were murdered and hundreds 0:05:27.680 --> 0:05:30.840 of black families were made homeless. It was because two 0:05:30.880 --> 0:05:33.479 white members of the mob that lynch July Perry were 0:05:33.560 --> 0:05:37.000 killed during a shootout there was the Corners in quest 0:05:37.040 --> 0:05:40.320 which happens November three and four, and what is found 0:05:40.400 --> 0:05:45.400 is no unknown parties killed the white individuals. Unknown parties 0:05:45.440 --> 0:05:50.160 killed July Perry, which was a common report leading at dimensions. 0:05:50.320 --> 0:05:53.200 We had a black victim who was in police custody, 0:05:53.320 --> 0:05:57.000 and all ways the result was killed that persons unknown. 0:05:57.720 --> 0:06:01.040 Marvin Dunn is the author of a history of Florida 0:06:01.400 --> 0:06:05.680 through Black Eyes. When those white men took to lay 0:06:05.800 --> 0:06:08.680 from that jail, those jailers knew what every man who 0:06:08.720 --> 0:06:12.320 was in that group. Oh, Cooy was a very small town. 0:06:12.400 --> 0:06:15.880 Everybody knew everybody else. Prosecutors called a grand jury in 0:06:15.920 --> 0:06:20.920 Orange County, there was always a grand jury convened. There 0:06:21.000 --> 0:06:23.400 was always a grand jo have convened. And who were 0:06:23.400 --> 0:06:27.160 the members of the grand jury? They would have been 0:06:27.160 --> 0:06:31.320 all white men. So the convening of the grand jury 0:06:31.320 --> 0:06:36.560 meant nothing. Historian Paul Ortiz, people will say, well, according 0:06:36.600 --> 0:06:40.280 to this testimony, July Perry did this with a loaded weapon, 0:06:41.240 --> 0:06:44.679 you know, and and did that in this and I say, 0:06:44.680 --> 0:06:49.680 excuse me, whose testimony? And number one is a testimonies hearsay, 0:06:50.080 --> 0:06:53.720 who's hearsay? Are you? Are you? Depending upon were they 0:06:53.760 --> 0:07:02.040 white oh yes, well, come on, now, come please. One 0:07:02.080 --> 0:07:04.120 of the biggest mysteries is that a grand jury was 0:07:04.160 --> 0:07:07.920 conducted and there was some thirteen or fourteen witnesses, only 0:07:07.960 --> 0:07:12.800 one black man thirteen or fourteen witnesses, and that's missing. 0:07:13.920 --> 0:07:17.760 It's not in anybody's files anywhere. So there's a lot 0:07:17.840 --> 0:07:19.800 of things, a lot of records that should have been 0:07:19.880 --> 0:07:24.240 kept that weren't. The grand jury found quote no evidence 0:07:24.280 --> 0:07:27.960 against any one or group of individuals as to who 0:07:28.000 --> 0:07:32.600 perpetrated the fatalities. Again, I want us to be cautious 0:07:32.640 --> 0:07:39.560 about relying on the words of white leaders, be they 0:07:39.560 --> 0:07:43.120 in the Chamber of Commerce or political officials or whatever, 0:07:43.760 --> 0:07:49.239 because they have a vested interest in jerrymandering the story 0:07:49.320 --> 0:07:51.520 to make it appear as if July period is this 0:07:51.640 --> 0:07:54.320 crazy negro, and that's how they that's how they referred 0:07:54.320 --> 0:07:56.760 to him. Things would have been fine if it wasn't 0:07:56.800 --> 0:08:01.040 for this crazy negro. The grand jury did exonerate the 0:08:01.040 --> 0:08:05.120 only people who were imprisoned after election day, July Perry's 0:08:05.160 --> 0:08:13.360 wife and daughter, Estelle and Caretha. Walter White concluded that 0:08:13.440 --> 0:08:16.720 more than thirty black residents of Okoe were murdered on 0:08:16.760 --> 0:08:21.560 election day. Other estimates put that number as high as sixty. 0:08:22.000 --> 0:08:24.880 The n Double A CP sent White's damning report to 0:08:24.960 --> 0:08:28.560 Congress when the CP goes before the House Census Committee, 0:08:29.320 --> 0:08:34.840 when Congress convenes in you know, Florida is case number one. 0:08:35.360 --> 0:08:40.920 Walter White had gathered affidavits, statistics, photographs, and witness testimony. 0:08:41.240 --> 0:08:44.760 And so the Double AC Preventment presents all this amazing 0:08:44.800 --> 0:08:50.440 evidence before the Census Committee about fraud and corruption and 0:08:50.520 --> 0:08:54.280 anti black violence, including a COE. This is not merely 0:08:54.320 --> 0:08:58.520 a question of the Negro by any means. James Weldon Johnson, 0:08:58.760 --> 0:09:02.200 Double A CPS execut the Secretary, was a Floridian born 0:09:02.240 --> 0:09:05.600 in Jacksonville. He too would one day be president of 0:09:05.640 --> 0:09:09.000 the A c P. He was an attorney and also 0:09:09.080 --> 0:09:10.960 the poet who wrote the lyrics to Lift of Your 0:09:11.040 --> 0:09:14.400 Voice and Sing. He told the committee that the suppression 0:09:14.400 --> 0:09:18.120 of black voters in the South undermined democracy across the 0:09:18.400 --> 0:09:22.320 entire nation. It is a question of republican government and 0:09:22.360 --> 0:09:25.840 the fundamentals of American democracy. It is a question which 0:09:25.880 --> 0:09:28.000 is either going to come to this Congress or to 0:09:28.120 --> 0:09:30.920 some other Congress in the future, and with increasing force 0:09:31.120 --> 0:09:33.840 every time it comes up, and it seems to me 0:09:33.880 --> 0:09:36.040 it is better to pass on the question fairly and 0:09:36.080 --> 0:09:40.880 squarely and justly today and not wait until some unknown tomorrow. 0:09:43.600 --> 0:09:47.800 But wait is exactly what Congress did, Northern Congressman or 0:09:47.840 --> 0:09:49.719 and then the committee, they're like, well, I mean I 0:09:49.760 --> 0:09:53.720 don't support negro suffrage. Do you talking to their colleague? 0:09:53.800 --> 0:09:57.000 You know, Negroes don't go where I where I am. 0:09:57.080 --> 0:09:59.200 Why should they have to do that in Florida, we 0:09:59.200 --> 0:10:03.720 wouldn't put up at the Bureau of Investigation later named 0:10:03.880 --> 0:10:08.280 the FBI launched an inquiry into Koe, but it was limited. 0:10:09.160 --> 0:10:14.120 Was the state local governments suppressing black voters. That is 0:10:14.160 --> 0:10:18.920 what the thing is about. Not about murder, not about terror, 0:10:19.200 --> 0:10:22.840 not about our sin. It is about election broad The 0:10:22.920 --> 0:10:26.680 Bureau of Investigation found that there was quote no attempt 0:10:26.800 --> 0:10:30.439 to intimidate any Negroes in the casting of their ballots, 0:10:30.480 --> 0:10:32.760 and that there was no interference with the voting of 0:10:32.880 --> 0:10:37.040 qualified Negroes. Walter White is not able as much research 0:10:37.080 --> 0:10:38.760 and work as he does, and he puts his own 0:10:38.760 --> 0:10:41.120 life on the line time and again in Central Florida 0:10:41.440 --> 0:10:45.280 to try to bring visibility to these um these stories 0:10:45.800 --> 0:10:50.439 and these these events, and ultimately really doesn't get much 0:10:50.440 --> 0:10:53.120 of anywhere with them. I mean basically, you know, white 0:10:53.160 --> 0:10:57.840 supremacy against another four decades um of life. That's really 0:10:57.880 --> 0:11:02.199 the most important, you know, kind of outcome. Uh. Politically speaking, 0:11:02.840 --> 0:11:06.040 it's believed that not a single black citizen of Orange 0:11:06.040 --> 0:11:10.960 County voted for nearly two decades after the massacre, and 0:11:11.040 --> 0:11:14.320 not a single white person was ever charged with the crime. 0:11:14.840 --> 0:11:18.240 Nobody's ever held responsible in any way, shape or form 0:11:18.280 --> 0:11:38.320 for what happens out of Koe. Black residents continued to 0:11:38.400 --> 0:11:41.679 flee a Koe in the months and years that followed 0:11:41.800 --> 0:11:44.840 the massacre. July Perry's brother in law a year later, 0:11:45.679 --> 0:11:48.240 they find him the next day, beaten with an announce 0:11:48.280 --> 0:11:50.880 of his life, stripped painted red and white stripe, with 0:11:50.920 --> 0:11:54.120 a bag over his head tied to a poll. He survives. 0:11:54.880 --> 0:11:58.439 He says that the aggressors told him he had been 0:11:58.440 --> 0:12:01.040 talking a little bit too much about what had happened 0:12:01.040 --> 0:12:05.400 at a Koe. Last November. Cents is listed two d 0:12:05.559 --> 0:12:10.760 and fifty five black residents of a Koe by There 0:12:10.800 --> 0:12:15.839 were only two, both house servants. A lot of total 0:12:15.840 --> 0:12:17.719 loss of topics because it didn't they went there to 0:12:17.760 --> 0:12:21.440 be taxes. Historian Marvin Dunn so a lot of the 0:12:21.800 --> 0:12:24.200 grooves that were on that Blacks were taken over in 0:12:24.280 --> 0:12:27.880 that way. Within two weeks of the election day massacre, 0:12:28.280 --> 0:12:33.559 there are advertisements in Orlando and Miami newspapers orange groves 0:12:33.640 --> 0:12:38.520 for sale in a Koe, including July Perry's. It says, 0:12:39.000 --> 0:12:41.840 beautiful little groves of the negroes who just fled a Koe. 0:12:42.280 --> 0:12:45.280 That's what I said in the newspaper, Beautiful little groves 0:12:45.320 --> 0:12:48.360 of the negroes who just fled a Kobe. That was 0:12:48.400 --> 0:12:51.600 supposed to be attractive to people. The ad was placed 0:12:51.720 --> 0:12:55.320 by Blueford Sims, one of the founders of the town 0:12:55.440 --> 0:12:58.800 of a Koe. He was appointed by a local court 0:12:58.920 --> 0:13:02.880 to execute the state of July Perry. A Black of 0:13:02.960 --> 0:13:06.880 Koe resident, Mrs J. H. Hammelder wrote to a friend 0:13:06.880 --> 0:13:10.480 a few weeks later, the people in the south of 0:13:10.520 --> 0:13:13.040 town are being threatened that they must sell out and leave, 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:16.200 or they will be shot and burned as the others 0:13:16.200 --> 0:13:20.640 have been. It seems to have been a prearranged affair 0:13:21.800 --> 0:13:24.520 to kill and drive the colored people from their homes, 0:13:24.760 --> 0:13:28.199 as they were more prosperous than the white folks. So 0:13:28.240 --> 0:13:31.840 they are hoping to get their homes for nothing. Naked 0:13:31.880 --> 0:13:35.920 on the conditions were often an underlying tractor in race riots. 0:13:36.120 --> 0:13:38.640 I don't know about race riot that took place in 0:13:38.679 --> 0:13:43.440 the poor black area during this period. Before nineteen twenty, 0:13:43.600 --> 0:13:47.720 the black community and a KOE was thriving. July Perry 0:13:47.720 --> 0:13:49.960 and his friend Mose Norman, who had tried to vote 0:13:50.000 --> 0:13:53.760 an election day, were prosperous citizens, and there were jealous 0:13:53.760 --> 0:13:57.840 among wits about about some of that, and particularly how 0:13:58.720 --> 0:14:02.480 Perry and most normal so their wealth as con cars 0:14:02.760 --> 0:14:05.800 and land at nice homes, and that really led some 0:14:06.120 --> 0:14:09.760 white and KOE Leading up to this event, the exhibition 0:14:10.080 --> 0:14:13.959 at the Orange County Regional History Center mapped the growth 0:14:14.000 --> 0:14:18.800 of black land ownership around the KOE and then it's disappearance. 0:14:19.240 --> 0:14:22.320 So you see this thirty years, slow rise and prosperity. 0:14:22.520 --> 0:14:26.080 Then as you scroll away from November you come up 0:14:26.120 --> 0:14:30.600 to nine thirty by all the properties have gone back 0:14:30.600 --> 0:14:33.480 to white ownership. So thirty years you see this like 0:14:33.560 --> 0:14:36.480 popping up prosperity, and then in just six years it's 0:14:36.520 --> 0:14:41.200 wiped out. Many black of Koe residents, including the Perry family, 0:14:41.280 --> 0:14:45.240 tried for years to get their property back. The Perry's 0:14:45.280 --> 0:14:50.360 discovered that the deed had been restricted no black person 0:14:50.400 --> 0:14:56.000 could buy the land in Stella and Karisa and family. 0:14:56.440 --> 0:14:59.280 Sue said, well, they asked the courts. They say, we 0:14:59.280 --> 0:15:02.040 need an account. You know what happened here, Like where 0:15:02.080 --> 0:15:05.640 is the money? It's it's been four years at the end, 0:15:05.800 --> 0:15:09.680 when all of said and done, twelve years later, twelve 0:15:10.040 --> 0:15:15.600 years later, the seven or so descendants of July Perry 0:15:15.680 --> 0:15:18.440 received one hundred and roughly a hundred and twenty six 0:15:18.480 --> 0:15:22.400 dollars each for over thirty acres of land, all of 0:15:22.400 --> 0:15:27.080 their personal property and the death of their patriarch. That 0:15:27.320 --> 0:15:30.120 twelve years they fight to get a hundred and twenty 0:15:30.120 --> 0:15:33.920 six dollars each. And the properties that changed hands weren't 0:15:34.000 --> 0:15:38.120 scrub land or gravel patches. There orange groves and farming 0:15:38.200 --> 0:15:41.800 lands and lakeside property just a dozen miles from the 0:15:41.920 --> 0:15:48.480 spot where decades later a new resort would stand Disney World. 0:15:49.360 --> 0:15:52.200 All of the land that had been owned by black 0:15:52.280 --> 0:15:55.600 landowners at the time of the massacre that was taken 0:15:55.840 --> 0:15:58.240 over the next six to seven years. It wasn't immediate, 0:15:58.280 --> 0:15:59.760 like the story has always gone, but over the next 0:15:59.760 --> 0:16:03.760 six years is worth well over nine million dollars today. 0:16:04.520 --> 0:16:08.240 And to tell a descendant who should have inherited those lands, 0:16:08.280 --> 0:16:11.560 could have inherited those lands. That that's they could have 0:16:11.600 --> 0:16:16.680 been millionaires is a really, really difficult thing. What these 0:16:16.760 --> 0:16:20.200 massacres and and and p grams are all about is 0:16:20.360 --> 0:16:26.760 that the attempt among white business supremacy to roll back 0:16:27.800 --> 0:16:35.360 black economic social political games, it's redistribution of black wealth 0:16:35.480 --> 0:16:39.440 into white hands, is really what happens. And this is 0:16:39.440 --> 0:16:44.600 what makes a Cooe um almost a mundane story because 0:16:44.640 --> 0:16:48.080 it is happening everywhere. One of the most disturbing aspects 0:16:48.080 --> 0:16:51.000 of the Echoe massacre is that it was not an 0:16:51.040 --> 0:16:55.560 isolated event. In the next few years, Akoe became a 0:16:55.600 --> 0:17:01.000 template for horrendous violence other white communities arise their black 0:17:01.040 --> 0:17:05.639 neighbors and then stole their properties again and again. We 0:17:05.760 --> 0:17:08.920 know that there continues to be violence and an type 0:17:08.960 --> 0:17:14.480 like lynching in adjacent counties, kind of secondary effects of 0:17:14.560 --> 0:17:20.720 the Echoing massacre. There's a notorious lynching case in Cassemree, 0:17:20.920 --> 0:17:23.439 which which we think is connected to to the Echoing 0:17:23.440 --> 0:17:27.320 massacre in some ways. And it happens in Tulsa, happens 0:17:27.320 --> 0:17:31.520 in St. Louis, it happens in Chicago, happens along the Texas. 0:17:31.640 --> 0:17:35.080 It later it happens in Rosewood. And that's another theme 0:17:35.200 --> 0:17:38.879 which ties a coe to today, this question of you 0:17:38.880 --> 0:17:41.560 know where did that black land go? You know, in 0:17:41.640 --> 0:17:45.000 many cases black people were driven out by terror tactics. 0:17:45.160 --> 0:17:49.439 The terror continues and continues and continues until it drives 0:17:49.480 --> 0:17:52.560 the black community out. For a half of a century, 0:17:53.200 --> 0:17:59.160 from until around nineteen seventy six, there are no documented 0:17:59.200 --> 0:18:04.080 that we're aware of black individuals living and residing in Kobe. 0:18:04.359 --> 0:18:07.560 You know, where did everybody go? Pamela Greedy? And then 0:18:07.600 --> 0:18:09.359 you look for the families and the histories and you 0:18:09.440 --> 0:18:11.359 try to find where they are today, and you can't 0:18:11.400 --> 0:18:14.159 find people. You can't find it. I'm I'm still doing research. 0:18:14.400 --> 0:18:18.119 You can't find them. They just lost and gone. Marvin Dunn, 0:18:18.440 --> 0:18:21.960 author of a History of Florida through Black Eyes. It 0:18:22.119 --> 0:18:24.760 was buried, It was not talked about. It was not 0:18:24.840 --> 0:18:27.080 in the newspapers after the event was over. It was 0:18:27.080 --> 0:18:30.080 certainly not in textbooks. So, like many of the race 0:18:30.119 --> 0:18:33.080 wise in massacres in the South and in Florida, once 0:18:33.119 --> 0:18:37.080 the events left the front page of the newspapers, uh, 0:18:37.119 --> 0:18:40.000 they were there, people didn't talk about them. We know 0:18:40.840 --> 0:18:44.359 that there was an ongoing attempt to cover up this event, 0:18:44.440 --> 0:18:47.119 to quiet this event, to get people to stop talking 0:18:47.160 --> 0:18:49.800 about what had happened. Because what happens when people talk 0:18:51.080 --> 0:18:54.120 the truth, the facts start to come out and become known. 0:18:56.560 --> 0:18:59.960 For decades, black folks in central Florida knew that something 0:19:00.359 --> 0:19:03.800 very bad it happened in the Koe, not just that 0:19:03.840 --> 0:19:06.240 it was a sundown town where they were not welcome 0:19:06.320 --> 0:19:10.040 after dark, but that there were other grave reasons to 0:19:10.080 --> 0:19:14.520 stay away. Then descendants of the victims began trying to 0:19:14.600 --> 0:19:18.600 learn more about the terrible stories handed down in their families. 0:19:19.280 --> 0:19:23.879 Students did research. Over the decades, groups of Orange County 0:19:24.000 --> 0:19:29.879 residents investigated the rumors and conducted oral histories. Today's event 0:19:29.960 --> 0:19:34.120 will not be possible without the decades of community work 0:19:34.440 --> 0:19:38.720 by such grassroots groups as a Democracy Forum and the 0:19:38.760 --> 0:19:45.159 West Orange Reconciliation Task Force, which began to excavate the 0:19:45.320 --> 0:19:51.040 history in nineteen seven. The Democracy Forum, the West Orange 0:19:51.040 --> 0:19:55.840 Reconciliation Task Force, the July Perry Foundation all piece the 0:19:55.840 --> 0:19:59.119 story together. We have a d research team and we 0:19:59.200 --> 0:20:01.639 are uncovered, you know, where a lot of land is at. 0:20:01.680 --> 0:20:03.919 It's just a tedious process because you have to go 0:20:04.040 --> 0:20:06.199 bit by bit and undercover, you know, you gotta go 0:20:06.280 --> 0:20:09.760 through obituaries and estates and sales and all that. People 0:20:09.880 --> 0:20:12.560 die and you can't have a wonder where would these 0:20:12.600 --> 0:20:16.199 families be had they had had this generational wealth that 0:20:16.359 --> 0:20:20.480 was stripped from them. In two thousand and two, July 0:20:20.640 --> 0:20:24.439 Perry's body was located in an unmarked grave. It was 0:20:24.480 --> 0:20:29.320 discovered in Orlando at a cemetery there July Perry's great grandson, 0:20:29.480 --> 0:20:33.920 Pastor Stephen Nunn, And so we went back my mom, 0:20:33.920 --> 0:20:38.040 my dad and I and we um they had a 0:20:38.080 --> 0:20:43.080 memorial service there at the grave site. Eight decades after 0:20:43.160 --> 0:20:47.760 July Perry was lynched, his grandchildren and great grandchildren returned 0:20:47.760 --> 0:20:50.960 to a koe. Yeah. When we finally started taking certain 0:20:51.000 --> 0:20:55.080 turns in certain streets to finally get into the area 0:20:55.320 --> 0:21:00.000 where we uh later ended up, quickly, I was like, wow, 0:21:00.280 --> 0:21:04.879 this is not Disney World. It's definitely a Disney World. Um. 0:21:04.920 --> 0:21:09.040 And then it hit It was like wow, So now 0:21:09.320 --> 0:21:12.480 in my head I could see white sheets, I could 0:21:12.560 --> 0:21:18.119 see guns, I could see extreme racism. I could see 0:21:18.280 --> 0:21:23.919 area that still had a boy Mr kind of mindset 0:21:24.000 --> 0:21:26.440 and some of the spirited people. It was crystal clear 0:21:26.480 --> 0:21:29.280 to me at that point, just a few yards away 0:21:29.280 --> 0:21:32.879 from July Perry's grave in Orlando's Greenwood Cemetery lies the 0:21:32.920 --> 0:21:36.600 grave of Sam Salisbury, the man who led the mob 0:21:36.640 --> 0:21:41.160 to Perry's house. Salisbury's grave is topped by a monument 0:21:41.640 --> 0:21:44.680 and surrounded by the graves of his family and descendants. 0:21:45.520 --> 0:21:55.879 July Perry's grave stands alone. Good morning, Orlando community, Welcome 0:21:55.920 --> 0:22:01.520 to the historical marking unveiling for July Perry. It has 0:22:01.560 --> 0:22:03.640 been a long road to this day to get here. 0:22:04.520 --> 0:22:08.480 It took almost a century for a public remembrance of 0:22:08.560 --> 0:22:13.120 July Perry. The sacrifice of Mr Perry so that African 0:22:13.119 --> 0:22:18.000 Americans could vote is a dark and deadly part of 0:22:18.040 --> 0:22:23.159 our history and one that will not be forgotten. Jerry 0:22:23.200 --> 0:22:26.760 Demmings is the first black mayor of Orange County. His wife, 0:22:26.880 --> 0:22:30.080 Val Demmings, is a member of the United States Congress. 0:22:30.840 --> 0:22:34.919 But I want to be clear this morning that I 0:22:35.000 --> 0:22:40.399 have no illusions, our delusions that anything that we do 0:22:40.560 --> 0:22:46.119 here today will right the wrongs of a racist pass. 0:22:49.640 --> 0:22:54.200 But what we can do. What we can do is 0:22:54.320 --> 0:23:03.320 respect the attempt. What's interesting is so many of my 0:23:03.400 --> 0:23:06.760 colleagues have never even heard of the story. State Senator 0:23:06.840 --> 0:23:11.320 Randolph Bracy's district includes central and northwest Orange County. He 0:23:11.359 --> 0:23:14.480 introduced the bill in the Florida legislature to require that 0:23:14.560 --> 0:23:19.280 schools teach children about the Echoe massacre. A version passed, 0:23:20.119 --> 0:23:23.840 minus a provision to pay reparations to the descendants of 0:23:23.880 --> 0:23:27.199 the victims. As we moved the bill forward and it 0:23:27.359 --> 0:23:31.440 was talked about, debated, and um, they gained support for it. 0:23:32.560 --> 0:23:34.399 There were some colleagues of mine and say, hey, I 0:23:34.400 --> 0:23:39.560 think we should look at reparations, even on the Republican side. 0:23:39.640 --> 0:23:43.800 So I think there is an opportunity to look at 0:23:43.840 --> 0:23:46.800 that again, and it's something I'll be pushing. Some of 0:23:46.840 --> 0:23:50.520 the descendants of the Echoe victims are also fighting for reparations. 0:23:51.160 --> 0:23:54.760 Janice Nelson is July Perry's great granddaughter and vice president 0:23:54.760 --> 0:23:58.840 of the July Perry Foundation. The scripture says thou shalt 0:23:58.880 --> 0:24:02.480 not steal. They stole it, and they need to give 0:24:02.520 --> 0:24:10.359 it back. A century after a Cooe massacre, in another 0:24:10.440 --> 0:24:14.800 presidential election year, the Cooe descendants and activists and historians 0:24:14.800 --> 0:24:18.240 are thinking about what still hasn't changed. We're back at 0:24:18.240 --> 0:24:21.720 this moment where a Coe becomes more important than ever. 0:24:22.160 --> 0:24:25.720 Historian Paul Ortiz. Black people are still trying to register 0:24:25.880 --> 0:24:28.720 to vote. Light authorities are trying to find different ways 0:24:28.760 --> 0:24:33.159 to keep them from voting. Supervisors of Elections, Secretaries of 0:24:33.240 --> 0:24:36.399 state scheming on a way is to try to prevent 0:24:36.480 --> 0:24:41.720 them from participating in the democratic system. Florida is still 0:24:42.200 --> 0:24:47.439 actively involved and vote of suppression. Historian Marvin Dunn overwhelming 0:24:47.480 --> 0:24:51.040 majority of Pavillians, white and black, voted for excellence to 0:24:51.080 --> 0:24:54.920 be able to vote. The Florida State Legislature comes back 0:24:55.119 --> 0:24:58.639 immediately and passed the law that says all these excellence 0:24:58.720 --> 0:25:01.840 must pay all the risk of ocean and court costs 0:25:02.080 --> 0:25:05.920 before they can vote. So they were immediately read disenfranchised. 0:25:06.440 --> 0:25:09.879 Pamela Grady of the July Perry Foundation, I look at 0:25:09.960 --> 0:25:11.440 right now, at the times and were in right now, 0:25:11.480 --> 0:25:13.480 and how important it is to vote, you know, and 0:25:13.520 --> 0:25:16.760 how important how much went in for you know, us 0:25:16.800 --> 0:25:20.440 to have that right to vote. We take it so lightly. 0:25:26.119 --> 0:25:29.520 The town of a Koe is a modern, diverse community, 0:25:30.400 --> 0:25:33.159 but there are remnants of the past. None of the 0:25:33.240 --> 0:25:36.159 main streets in town is named for Blueford Sims, the 0:25:36.200 --> 0:25:40.080 white man who sold July Perry's land after he was lynched. 0:25:40.800 --> 0:25:44.920 But in the anniversary year of his death. Another road 0:25:44.960 --> 0:25:48.359 in a koe A State highway is being renamed the 0:25:48.440 --> 0:25:53.640 Julius July Perry Memorial Highway. I think he's a hero, 0:25:53.840 --> 0:25:59.000 absolutely absolutely. Obviously he was overcome and lynched, but we're 0:25:59.040 --> 0:26:02.960 still talking about my few years later. So I think 0:26:04.000 --> 0:26:07.040 in that context, in that time period, the life that 0:26:07.119 --> 0:26:11.000 he lived, the businessman that he was, and to have 0:26:11.080 --> 0:26:15.280 the boldness to do what he did, I think it 0:26:14.760 --> 0:26:19.160 it's heroic. It's really it really is. So July Perry 0:26:19.240 --> 0:26:21.720 had to be and had to have been awesome man. 0:26:22.080 --> 0:26:24.240 And I still constill your tear up thinking about it. 0:26:24.400 --> 0:26:27.520 How what an amazing man this was, that was that 0:26:27.640 --> 0:26:31.960 was gunned down, lynch drug and tortured, all for having 0:26:32.000 --> 0:26:35.800 the courage, the courage to stand up and fight for 0:26:35.840 --> 0:26:38.520 a cause, and and and and to put others first. 0:26:38.840 --> 0:26:42.000 You know, so do My Parry deserves to be honest, 0:26:42.000 --> 0:26:45.760 The legacy of him conserves to be um always remembered 0:26:45.800 --> 0:26:50.000 throughout the rest of time. Our children need to know 0:26:50.200 --> 0:26:55.679 this rich history. I grand children need to know. Okay, 0:26:55.720 --> 0:27:01.480 good morning, good morning, til dren h. This morning we 0:27:01.520 --> 0:27:06.399 will start our program with a musical solo of the 0:27:06.480 --> 0:27:19.359 National Black anthem. Mm hmm. We must not forget the 0:27:19.440 --> 0:27:24.000 sacrifice of July Period, his family, and other African Americans 0:27:24.119 --> 0:27:28.400 killed in this horrific massacre as we stand here today 0:27:28.840 --> 0:27:33.879 to honor their memory. I think it's important to knowledge 0:27:34.760 --> 0:27:38.000 the history and the legacy of July Perry be celebrated 0:27:38.520 --> 0:27:41.600 for for the risk that he took, because we're still 0:27:41.600 --> 0:27:43.680 finding the same fight and he was bold enough to 0:27:43.680 --> 0:28:16.560 to try to make changes years ago. This episode of 0:28:16.600 --> 0:28:20.040 Flashback the Election Day Massacre was written by Sean Braswell 0:28:20.080 --> 0:28:23.800