November 2, 2020 • 25 mins
The worst incident of election violence in American history happened a century ago on Election Day, 1920 in the town of Ocoee, Florida. The victims were hundreds of Black residents. The perpetrators were their white neighbors. And the reason was that Black citizens had gone to the polls and tried to vote.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
I'm Sean Braswell. Welcome to Flashback. We're doing something a
little different in this episode. We're running a special series
about the worst incident of election violence in American history,
an event that is almost forgotten today. It happened a
century ago on Election Day ninety and the town of
a Kohe, Florida. The victims were hundreds of black residents.
(00:27):
The perpetrators were their white neighbors. And the reason was
that black citizens had gone to the polls and tried
to vote. One hundred years ago in the center of Florida,
just a few miles from where Disney World stands today,
(00:50):
there was an exodus. Hundreds of black families piled their
chilled and into wagons. They trudged all night along roads
and railroad tracks and through sugarcane fields. They barely escapped
with their lives. Dozens of their loved ones did not.
(01:10):
They were lynched, shot, burned to death in the wreckage
of their own homes. Today, this is forgotten, largely missing
from history books, handed down only as a secret memory
between generations of the families who escaped. But in ninety
(01:31):
that November nine, the town of Okoe, Florida, wasn't a secret.
It made headlines around the world. There was a grand
jury investigation, even a hearing before Congress, and Americans black
and white, knew exactly why it had happened. They knew
what it meant. This exodus was a warning Danny black
citizen who dared to try to vote. I'm Eugene S.
(02:03):
Robinson and this is the election day massacre from Ossie media.
In two thousand and twelve, Randolph Bracy became the first
representative from a new state House district in central Florida.
(02:26):
Less than one sixth of the members of the Florida
House were black. I I was looking for office space
after I won my election, and I had recently moved
to Koe, and I decided to put my office in
oh Koe. Koe is just a dozen miles from Disney World,
but it still has the feel of a small town.
(02:46):
It's a pretty lake, splash park for the kids, but
beloved ice cream stand, the perfect place to live and work.
And I remember it was an African American woman, older woman,
and she almost lost it when I thought I was
moving my office Koe. But she was from the age
where she the era where she remembered that it was
(03:07):
a sundown town where you couldn't be in Okoe unless
you had some business and you had to be going
before dark. Bracy, now, a Florida State Senator, was shocked,
but many people who live in the area longer are not.
Historian Marvin Dunn is Professor emeritus at Florida International University.
(03:28):
He grew up in central Florida. My father told us,
told me and my brothers about picking oranges in in
Okoe when they would leave to come back to the land,
so driver of the white drive at Landridge until almost dark,
they would walk out of Ocoe rather than be confident
after dark. Cooee is a diverse community today, and it
(03:50):
had a thriving black population long ago. But for half
a century of Coe had almost no black residents. But
this was in the ninety late nineties, and eight told me, please,
don't tell anyone now you're coming here, that we've invited
you here, that we're showing you where the black communities
used to be. Paul Ortiz is a professor of history
at the University of Florida. Don't tell anyone because it
(04:13):
could put your life in jeopardy. It could put us
in jeopardy. There are good reasons why no black person
wants to live there for so many years. A Koe
resident and community historian Pamela Grady, you can see that's
what happened there. You can feel that energy there. It's
still it's still alive and well. What happened in a
Koe a century ago remains the worst incident of election
(04:37):
day of violence in US history. What happened in a
Koe was not an altercation. It was more than a
lynching or shooting or riot. What happened in a Koe
was a massacre. And what happened is all too relevant today.
Florida is still active involved in Phota suppression. I didn't
(04:58):
even get why she is so scared for me, and
then I kind of learned the history, and I think
it's so appropriate to talk about it in this year
election because it is still to this date of bloody
It's day in American political history have an on a
presidential election. One hundred years ago, African Americans in Florida
(05:27):
were preparing for a historic election. Soldiers had come home
after serving their country in World War One, the local
economy was booming, women had earned the right to vote
the promise of America seemed closer than ever before, and
then in a night of unspeakable violence, everything changed. There
(05:50):
was no question who was in charge in central Florida
a century ago. Often at the time, many of law
enforcement and local politicians here were also members of the
Ku Klux Klan. Pamela Schwartz is the chief curator of
the Orange County Regional History Center in Orlando, Florida. One
prominent white citizen at the time estimated that about nine
(06:12):
of law enforcement officers, judges, and lawyers and their Coe
area were clan members. There's a new rise in the
Ku Klux Klan um. There's a resurgence of white supremacy. Uh,
there's an active movement for white supremacists to try to
disenfranchise black voters. In the days leading up to the
election in November ninety the k k k was especially active.
(06:38):
There are marches throughout the state of Florida, Jacksonville, Daytona,
Orlando of Ku Klux Klan sending that same message of
do you not get out to vote if you're black
or else. In Orlando, around five hundred hooded men paraded
behind three figures on horseback. They used megaphones to get
their message out. Paul Ortiz is, the author of Emancipation,
(07:01):
betrayed the hidden history of black organizing and white violence
in Florida, from reconstruction to the bloody election of ninety
in Daytona the night before election that they marched through
Mary mccloyd Bethune's campus, you know, and the municipal authority
um controlling the electricity actually kind of electricity, you know,
(07:22):
to Daytona industrial world school, so that the clan could
march through with their torches and terror tactics and and
accurately scary. It's just all of this stuff is boiling
and boiling, and the events of November two and third
send it over the top. This was an event hundreds
(07:43):
of years in the making, from the first enslavement here
up through black holes and Jim Crow laws and the
suppression of women, the suppression of black voters, the suppression
in all these different ways leading up to something like
this event erupting. Five hundred years ago, Florida was under
Spanish rule. It was a sanctuary if the slaves were
(08:06):
able to escape the British colonies. But after Florida came
unto the control of the United States. In eighteen nineteen,
President Thomas Jefferson sent the American troops to help capture
former slaves and returned them to their chains. Slavery ended
with the Civil War, but segregation and ideas of white
supremacy remained strong. Centta Florida was especially attractive to former Confederates.
(08:31):
Marvin Dunn is the author of a History of Florida
through Black Eyes. Center Florida was a was a magnet
for people who had lost the Civil War because keith A,
Florida was untouched by the war. Uh and Center Florida
the cattle. That said, the Confederate Army. So businessman in
Santa Florida made money during the war while other parts
(08:54):
of the South had being destimated by the war. By
nineteen twenty or this economy was booming. The citrus industry
was exploding, so a lot of black people were attracted
into some to Florida for that reason to work. The
town of a Koe, with its lush orange groves and
farms nestled along Stark Lake, was especially attractive a number
(09:17):
of black people, black men in particular, had managed to
get property orange groves on their own. There's a man
by the name of Moses Norman. Now Moses Norman had
lived in this community for some thirty years. He was
not just some you know, young guy. He was a
well established individual, well known in town. He had his
own car. He was known to be a labor broker.
(09:39):
Most Norman at the time was driving around in a
car that was worth about seventy five to a hund
thousand dollars. Pamela Grady is the executive director of the
July Perry Foundation. That's a Mercedes, that's a Jaguar, you know,
that's what he was driving around. And at a time
when nobody even had cars. There was only maybe one
or two other cars in the whole town of Akoe.
(10:00):
And here's this black guy driving through the town this
nice car. You know, they had to infuriate him. The
foundation is named from most Norman's good friend, another prominent
black Cystan of the Koe, Julius July Perry. Nothing really
happened in Okoe without him. Florida State Senator Randolph Bracy.
He was kind of like a broker or even white
(10:20):
businessman who wanted to come in and do some farming
transactions of what have you. He ran the town July
Perry and Most Norman were pillars of the Koe community
history and Paul Artiz they were successful individuals. They're very
hard workers, they were they're very good family men. Um
(10:40):
they were highly respected. And the reason I mentioned the
term highly respected, and this is the most important element
I think about Most Norman and July Perry and why
why they represent such a threat to white supremacy, Because
these two exceptionally respected men were involved in an exceptionally
threatening activity helping black citizens vote. In the wake at
(11:02):
World War One, black Floridians had organized a remarkable statewide
voter registration movement, and the movement really prested and built
momentum as African American soldiers returned from from Europe. A
lot of black pressions came back to the South and
(11:23):
they had third in Europe and they were not going
to accommodate themselves to the racism that was in there
in that community. And Most Norman and Gelatter in particularly
were among those who came back with that attitude. The
two veterans joined hundreds of other Floridians who were mobilizing
to combat white supremacy. In nineteen twenty, there is a
shoot black voter registration drive that's supported not only by
(11:45):
the black community, but also by white Republicans, not all
of them, most of them. This was at a time
when most African Americans were members of Abraham Lincoln's Republican Party.
In many places in the South, blacks could not even
join in the Democratic Party, and thanks to the Nineteenth Amendment,
women would be voting for president for the first time
(12:06):
in nineteen twenty. This is a whole new voting block
and that includes black women. And what it's doing is
it's causing a lot of tension. People don't always accept change,
and so with this you also see sort of a
resurgence and an ongoing rise with white supremacy in the
Ku Klux Klan clan members were not the only white
(12:27):
supremacists trying to hold back the new wave of black voters.
Once the white you know, white white elites and white
media and white leaders realize this is happening, they use
their op ed space, their their banner headlines. White women,
it's up to you to save the republic. This is
the greatest crisis in our nation's history. And a typical
(12:52):
op ed will say, uh, white ladies, do you want
your Negro washer women to lord over you, to take control.
Do you want that Negro custodian to marry your daughter?
The threats heated up as the election approached. White supremacies
(13:13):
in a crisis. They're much more honest and races today
because they're very blunt about it. They're like, white supremacy
is our way of life as an American. Some white
Republicans in Orlando, including a local judge named John Cheney,
helped July Perry and most Norman organized black voters. About
(13:34):
a month before the Echoing massacre, they receive a letter
from the Florida ku Klux Klan signed by the ku
Klux Klan that basically says, stop or else, sir, while
stopping in your beautiful little city this week, I was
informed that you are in the habit of going out
among the Negroes of Orlando and delivering lectures explaining to
(13:58):
them how to as their rights. The grand master of
the Florida ku Klux Klan reminded them what happened when
white people tried to help black voters during reconstruction. You
will remember that these things forced the loyal citizens of
the South to organize clans of determined men who pledge
themselves to maintain white supremacy and to safeguard our women
(14:22):
and children. We shall always enjoy white supremacy in this country,
and he who interferes must face the consequences. So there
is a threat, there is and this is this is
a primary starch. We have the original in our museum
collection that that that states this. Just days before the
(14:43):
Echoe massacre, there are marches throughout the state of Florida.
If you ask a black person to register a vote Florida,
you're asking them to take the risk. They're asking them
to risk their lives. You're asking them to risk their livelihoods,
You're asking them to risk their physical safety. On the
morning of November, two black citizens of a Koe, Florida
(15:07):
made a heroic decision. They ignored the clan marches, the torches,
the letters, and the threats. They prepared to exercise their
most fundamental democratic right to vote. They knew it would
be challenging, but they had no idea of the horrors
that awaited them. Well on election day. From what we know,
(15:46):
you know most Norman and July Perry are with African
Americans who are trying to vote. Historian Paul Ortisse, and
what happens in the Koe is again similar to what
happens in many parts of the state. Um people are
standing in a line. We don't know how many people,
and if they're black, you're not allowed to vote. Historian
(16:08):
Marvin Dunn. This was a plan attempt to challenge the
the denial of the right to vote, and coy in
center more broadly armed white deputies declared themselves poll monitors,
poll workers challenged black voters. Names mysteriously disappeared from the
(16:28):
voter rolls. Poll taxes, it was claimed, had not been
paid and a coe anyone turned away from voting had
to go to the local Justice of the peace to
contest it, and he had conveniently gone fishing that day.
Most Norman was among the people who tried to cast
a ballot, and he um goes to the polls to vote,
(16:52):
he has turned away. His name had been placed on
the stricken list for a voting and he was never
re stored. They claimed that most Norman, a wealthy landowner
deeply involved in voter registration efforts, had somehow failed to
pay his own poll tax. There are conflicting accounts of
(17:13):
what happened after most Norman was turned away at the polls.
One of the biggest problems with this event is how
few true primary source documents there are because why they
weren't kept intentionally. It's it's intentional erasure of the history.
Black systems of a Koe and their descendants have spent
decades trying to unearth what exactly happened on election Day
(17:37):
nineteen twenty. Pamela Grady, I'm a resident of a Koe,
and you know, nobody knows these people. You have forty
thousand residents, you know, and most of them don't even
know that the lands they're living on what happened to history?
The rich history. Pamela Schwartz collected oral histories and documents
for an exhibition at the Orange County Regional History Center.
(17:58):
There are hundreds and hundreds of versions. We actually took
one hundred and nine and synthesize them into one mega
account in the exhibit. So it's this huge, like twenty
ft wall. It's like fourteen pages of text and it's
all in line. You can see where the twists and
the faults of memory and the lies in all of
these different ways. The story has um changed over one
(18:21):
hundred years. In one version of the story, most Norman
returned to the pulse with his shotgun, sparking an altercation
with armed white deputies. In another more likely account, Norman
took his case to Judge John Cheney and Orlando historian
Paul artis again, he's trying to find ways to let
(18:44):
you know, people in power know that this corruption is
happening in a koe, you know. But the problem is,
even he was able to contact similar Judge Chaney, there's
really nothing Judge Chaney could do. Um If he's able
to contact the super revisor of elections in Orange County,
that guy is not going to do anything. Jud Cheney
(19:05):
is said to have advised Norman to go back to
the polls in a koe and get the names of
people preventing black citizens from voting. This is likely to
file a complaint to lawsuit, but it was a very
dangerous errand according to one version of events, Norman enlisted
his good friend July Perry to help. The most important
thing I think about most Norman Julip Perry is that
(19:27):
black people trusted them, and both men felt irresponsibility because
of that trust to see things through. On election day,
and that is a testament to their you know, their
character and their courage. I mean, they could have stayed home.
The safest thing for black people on election day was
(19:49):
stay home. But neither man played it safe. Historian Marvin Dunn.
The two men went back to the polls. Uh, they
were harmed white men there who chased them away. There
was some sort of a confrontation and this men, these
two men went to his home retreated there. Pastor Stephen
(20:10):
Nunn is the founder of the July Perry Foundation and
president of its board. He's July Perry's great grandson. His grandmother,
July Perry's daughter, Carritha, was a teenager when Mois Norman
was turned away at the polls. She told me that, Um,
he wasn't allowed to vote, and a conflict took place,
(20:31):
and in the process there was a fight that broke out.
That fight ended up at the Perry's front doorstep. She
told me that ultimately, Uh, there was a rumor that
spread around town that UM, the black residents of Okoe
had gathered at July Perry's home to um discuss a
(20:52):
revote to go back and demand their right to vote
if you would, um, which she said was not true.
In the following hours that this white mob, actually they
called themselves the posty had been deft as actually to
go and find out about the disturbance of the polls,
and they knew that July Parry and those Normen were
(21:13):
among the activists involved in voting. So the attention of
the white people sort of focused on them, but they
weren't really sure about it was involved in terms of
the the rumor that blacks were armed at July Parry's
home that circulated very quickly in the white community following
the confrontation at the polls. Now Anna's Burly Jones, black
(21:36):
man who was a former slave who was owned ettle
white man, and Burnie Jones, who was a quintesidential Uncle
Tom told the white people that blacks were arming themselves
and were ensconced in July Parry's home, and that's where
the mob went to Julia Parry's house. At some point
(21:57):
later that night, after the polls closed, a white mob,
an armed white mob, goes to the home of his
friend and fellow labor broker, July Perry, and violence breaks out.
Bull shots are fired. She told me that at a
certain point in time, Uh, some of the white residents
men of the city of Okoe came to their home
(22:21):
and basically made a demand for father to come outside,
and they wanted to talk, and of course he refused
and said no. And she did tell me that there
was an attempt to force someone attempted to force their
way in, and there was some gunfire. There's a lot
of people that are still trying to cover up the
story and so because so for example, when I first
(22:45):
came to Florida in the summer um, I was told
by white middle class people, even scholars, Oh, Paul, why
are you coming to Florida. We've had such progressive race
relations here. We didn't have jim role like they had it.
You know, you should go to Uh, We're not nearly
as bad as Mississippi. Pall Uh, you know, you should
(23:06):
go to Georgia. What was this funny? Because I had
already been I've already done field work in Mississippi. Are
already done at field work in Georgia. Because when I
talked to black Floridians, they told me, oh my gosh,
who was telling you this nonsense? You know? Or it
was just as bad as any other state in terms
of race relations. So there was really no place where
black people to find sanctuary from that. That kind of
(23:28):
the kind of white violence. You know that that occurred
in Orange County and other places. So it's an organized attack.
It's organized assault on neighborhoods, you know, on on a community.
(23:51):
And the next episode of the election day massacre, she
said that, um, the gunfire was so great that you
could see the League tracers coming through all angles in
the house, just flying all over the place. I mean, basically,
people are defending their homes as this white you know,
a pair of military operation is tearing through their their
(24:14):
their neighborhoods, and they begin to torch and burn and
loot and pillage this entire community. There is no way
we will ever factually probably know how many black people
were killed that night. Records were intentionally not kept. One
man told him I shot seventeen negroes. He shot seventeen himself,
(24:37):
and he was bragging about it. Basically, you had a choice.
You can leave and get shot, or you can stay
and burn. Uh. And they burned to death. We don't
like to use the term ethnic cleansing unless we can
use in Eastern Europe, right, but it happens here. This
(24:58):
episode of flash Back, The Election Day Massacre, was written
by Sean Braswell and voiced by me Eugene S. Robinson,
was produced by Maeve mcgoran and your A Oh Diggi Zua.
Chris Hoff engineered our show.
I'm Sean Braswell. Welcome to Flashback. We're doing something a
little different in this episode. We're running a special series
about the worst incident of election violence in American history,
an event that is almost forgotten today. It happened a
century ago on Election Day ninety and the town of
a Kohe, Florida. The victims were hundreds of black residents.
(00:27):
The perpetrators were their white neighbors. And the reason was
that black citizens had gone to the polls and tried
to vote. One hundred years ago in the center of Florida,
just a few miles from where Disney World stands today,
(00:50):
there was an exodus. Hundreds of black families piled their
chilled and into wagons. They trudged all night along roads
and railroad tracks and through sugarcane fields. They barely escapped
with their lives. Dozens of their loved ones did not.
(01:10):
They were lynched, shot, burned to death in the wreckage
of their own homes. Today, this is forgotten, largely missing
from history books, handed down only as a secret memory
between generations of the families who escaped. But in ninety
(01:31):
that November nine, the town of Okoe, Florida, wasn't a secret.
It made headlines around the world. There was a grand
jury investigation, even a hearing before Congress, and Americans black
and white, knew exactly why it had happened. They knew
what it meant. This exodus was a warning Danny black
citizen who dared to try to vote. I'm Eugene S.
(02:03):
Robinson and this is the election day massacre from Ossie media.
In two thousand and twelve, Randolph Bracy became the first
representative from a new state House district in central Florida.
(02:26):
Less than one sixth of the members of the Florida
House were black. I I was looking for office space
after I won my election, and I had recently moved
to Koe, and I decided to put my office in
oh Koe. Koe is just a dozen miles from Disney World,
but it still has the feel of a small town.
(02:46):
It's a pretty lake, splash park for the kids, but
beloved ice cream stand, the perfect place to live and work.
And I remember it was an African American woman, older woman,
and she almost lost it when I thought I was
moving my office Koe. But she was from the age
where she the era where she remembered that it was
(03:07):
a sundown town where you couldn't be in Okoe unless
you had some business and you had to be going
before dark. Bracy, now, a Florida State Senator, was shocked,
but many people who live in the area longer are not.
Historian Marvin Dunn is Professor emeritus at Florida International University.
(03:28):
He grew up in central Florida. My father told us,
told me and my brothers about picking oranges in in
Okoe when they would leave to come back to the land,
so driver of the white drive at Landridge until almost dark,
they would walk out of Ocoe rather than be confident
after dark. Cooee is a diverse community today, and it
(03:50):
had a thriving black population long ago. But for half
a century of Coe had almost no black residents. But
this was in the ninety late nineties, and eight told me, please,
don't tell anyone now you're coming here, that we've invited
you here, that we're showing you where the black communities
used to be. Paul Ortiz is a professor of history
at the University of Florida. Don't tell anyone because it
(04:13):
could put your life in jeopardy. It could put us
in jeopardy. There are good reasons why no black person
wants to live there for so many years. A Koe
resident and community historian Pamela Grady, you can see that's
what happened there. You can feel that energy there. It's
still it's still alive and well. What happened in a
Koe a century ago remains the worst incident of election
(04:37):
day of violence in US history. What happened in a
Koe was not an altercation. It was more than a
lynching or shooting or riot. What happened in a Koe
was a massacre. And what happened is all too relevant today.
Florida is still active involved in Phota suppression. I didn't
(04:58):
even get why she is so scared for me, and
then I kind of learned the history, and I think
it's so appropriate to talk about it in this year
election because it is still to this date of bloody
It's day in American political history have an on a
presidential election. One hundred years ago, African Americans in Florida
(05:27):
were preparing for a historic election. Soldiers had come home
after serving their country in World War One, the local
economy was booming, women had earned the right to vote
the promise of America seemed closer than ever before, and
then in a night of unspeakable violence, everything changed. There
(05:50):
was no question who was in charge in central Florida
a century ago. Often at the time, many of law
enforcement and local politicians here were also members of the
Ku Klux Klan. Pamela Schwartz is the chief curator of
the Orange County Regional History Center in Orlando, Florida. One
prominent white citizen at the time estimated that about nine
(06:12):
of law enforcement officers, judges, and lawyers and their Coe
area were clan members. There's a new rise in the
Ku Klux Klan um. There's a resurgence of white supremacy. Uh,
there's an active movement for white supremacists to try to
disenfranchise black voters. In the days leading up to the
election in November ninety the k k k was especially active.
(06:38):
There are marches throughout the state of Florida, Jacksonville, Daytona,
Orlando of Ku Klux Klan sending that same message of
do you not get out to vote if you're black
or else. In Orlando, around five hundred hooded men paraded
behind three figures on horseback. They used megaphones to get
their message out. Paul Ortiz is, the author of Emancipation,
(07:01):
betrayed the hidden history of black organizing and white violence
in Florida, from reconstruction to the bloody election of ninety
in Daytona the night before election that they marched through
Mary mccloyd Bethune's campus, you know, and the municipal authority
um controlling the electricity actually kind of electricity, you know,
(07:22):
to Daytona industrial world school, so that the clan could
march through with their torches and terror tactics and and
accurately scary. It's just all of this stuff is boiling
and boiling, and the events of November two and third
send it over the top. This was an event hundreds
(07:43):
of years in the making, from the first enslavement here
up through black holes and Jim Crow laws and the
suppression of women, the suppression of black voters, the suppression
in all these different ways leading up to something like
this event erupting. Five hundred years ago, Florida was under
Spanish rule. It was a sanctuary if the slaves were
(08:06):
able to escape the British colonies. But after Florida came
unto the control of the United States. In eighteen nineteen,
President Thomas Jefferson sent the American troops to help capture
former slaves and returned them to their chains. Slavery ended
with the Civil War, but segregation and ideas of white
supremacy remained strong. Centta Florida was especially attractive to former Confederates.
(08:31):
Marvin Dunn is the author of a History of Florida
through Black Eyes. Center Florida was a was a magnet
for people who had lost the Civil War because keith A,
Florida was untouched by the war. Uh and Center Florida
the cattle. That said, the Confederate Army. So businessman in
Santa Florida made money during the war while other parts
(08:54):
of the South had being destimated by the war. By
nineteen twenty or this economy was booming. The citrus industry
was exploding, so a lot of black people were attracted
into some to Florida for that reason to work. The
town of a Koe, with its lush orange groves and
farms nestled along Stark Lake, was especially attractive a number
(09:17):
of black people, black men in particular, had managed to
get property orange groves on their own. There's a man
by the name of Moses Norman. Now Moses Norman had
lived in this community for some thirty years. He was
not just some you know, young guy. He was a
well established individual, well known in town. He had his
own car. He was known to be a labor broker.
(09:39):
Most Norman at the time was driving around in a
car that was worth about seventy five to a hund
thousand dollars. Pamela Grady is the executive director of the
July Perry Foundation. That's a Mercedes, that's a Jaguar, you know,
that's what he was driving around. And at a time
when nobody even had cars. There was only maybe one
or two other cars in the whole town of Akoe.
(10:00):
And here's this black guy driving through the town this
nice car. You know, they had to infuriate him. The
foundation is named from most Norman's good friend, another prominent
black Cystan of the Koe, Julius July Perry. Nothing really
happened in Okoe without him. Florida State Senator Randolph Bracy.
He was kind of like a broker or even white
(10:20):
businessman who wanted to come in and do some farming
transactions of what have you. He ran the town July
Perry and Most Norman were pillars of the Koe community
history and Paul Artiz they were successful individuals. They're very
hard workers, they were they're very good family men. Um
(10:40):
they were highly respected. And the reason I mentioned the
term highly respected, and this is the most important element
I think about Most Norman and July Perry and why
why they represent such a threat to white supremacy, Because
these two exceptionally respected men were involved in an exceptionally
threatening activity helping black citizens vote. In the wake at
(11:02):
World War One, black Floridians had organized a remarkable statewide
voter registration movement, and the movement really prested and built
momentum as African American soldiers returned from from Europe. A
lot of black pressions came back to the South and
(11:23):
they had third in Europe and they were not going
to accommodate themselves to the racism that was in there
in that community. And Most Norman and Gelatter in particularly
were among those who came back with that attitude. The
two veterans joined hundreds of other Floridians who were mobilizing
to combat white supremacy. In nineteen twenty, there is a
shoot black voter registration drive that's supported not only by
(11:45):
the black community, but also by white Republicans, not all
of them, most of them. This was at a time
when most African Americans were members of Abraham Lincoln's Republican Party.
In many places in the South, blacks could not even
join in the Democratic Party, and thanks to the Nineteenth Amendment,
women would be voting for president for the first time
(12:06):
in nineteen twenty. This is a whole new voting block
and that includes black women. And what it's doing is
it's causing a lot of tension. People don't always accept change,
and so with this you also see sort of a
resurgence and an ongoing rise with white supremacy in the
Ku Klux Klan clan members were not the only white
(12:27):
supremacists trying to hold back the new wave of black voters.
Once the white you know, white white elites and white
media and white leaders realize this is happening, they use
their op ed space, their their banner headlines. White women,
it's up to you to save the republic. This is
the greatest crisis in our nation's history. And a typical
(12:52):
op ed will say, uh, white ladies, do you want
your Negro washer women to lord over you, to take control.
Do you want that Negro custodian to marry your daughter?
The threats heated up as the election approached. White supremacies
(13:13):
in a crisis. They're much more honest and races today
because they're very blunt about it. They're like, white supremacy
is our way of life as an American. Some white
Republicans in Orlando, including a local judge named John Cheney,
helped July Perry and most Norman organized black voters. About
(13:34):
a month before the Echoing massacre, they receive a letter
from the Florida ku Klux Klan signed by the ku
Klux Klan that basically says, stop or else, sir, while
stopping in your beautiful little city this week, I was
informed that you are in the habit of going out
among the Negroes of Orlando and delivering lectures explaining to
(13:58):
them how to as their rights. The grand master of
the Florida ku Klux Klan reminded them what happened when
white people tried to help black voters during reconstruction. You
will remember that these things forced the loyal citizens of
the South to organize clans of determined men who pledge
themselves to maintain white supremacy and to safeguard our women
(14:22):
and children. We shall always enjoy white supremacy in this country,
and he who interferes must face the consequences. So there
is a threat, there is and this is this is
a primary starch. We have the original in our museum
collection that that that states this. Just days before the
(14:43):
Echoe massacre, there are marches throughout the state of Florida.
If you ask a black person to register a vote Florida,
you're asking them to take the risk. They're asking them
to risk their lives. You're asking them to risk their livelihoods,
You're asking them to risk their physical safety. On the
morning of November, two black citizens of a Koe, Florida
(15:07):
made a heroic decision. They ignored the clan marches, the torches,
the letters, and the threats. They prepared to exercise their
most fundamental democratic right to vote. They knew it would
be challenging, but they had no idea of the horrors
that awaited them. Well on election day. From what we know,
(15:46):
you know most Norman and July Perry are with African
Americans who are trying to vote. Historian Paul Ortisse, and
what happens in the Koe is again similar to what
happens in many parts of the state. Um people are
standing in a line. We don't know how many people,
and if they're black, you're not allowed to vote. Historian
(16:08):
Marvin Dunn. This was a plan attempt to challenge the
the denial of the right to vote, and coy in
center more broadly armed white deputies declared themselves poll monitors,
poll workers challenged black voters. Names mysteriously disappeared from the
(16:28):
voter rolls. Poll taxes, it was claimed, had not been
paid and a coe anyone turned away from voting had
to go to the local Justice of the peace to
contest it, and he had conveniently gone fishing that day.
Most Norman was among the people who tried to cast
a ballot, and he um goes to the polls to vote,
(16:52):
he has turned away. His name had been placed on
the stricken list for a voting and he was never
re stored. They claimed that most Norman, a wealthy landowner
deeply involved in voter registration efforts, had somehow failed to
pay his own poll tax. There are conflicting accounts of
(17:13):
what happened after most Norman was turned away at the polls.
One of the biggest problems with this event is how
few true primary source documents there are because why they
weren't kept intentionally. It's it's intentional erasure of the history.
Black systems of a Koe and their descendants have spent
decades trying to unearth what exactly happened on election Day
(17:37):
nineteen twenty. Pamela Grady, I'm a resident of a Koe,
and you know, nobody knows these people. You have forty
thousand residents, you know, and most of them don't even
know that the lands they're living on what happened to history?
The rich history. Pamela Schwartz collected oral histories and documents
for an exhibition at the Orange County Regional History Center.
(17:58):
There are hundreds and hundreds of versions. We actually took
one hundred and nine and synthesize them into one mega
account in the exhibit. So it's this huge, like twenty
ft wall. It's like fourteen pages of text and it's
all in line. You can see where the twists and
the faults of memory and the lies in all of
these different ways. The story has um changed over one
(18:21):
hundred years. In one version of the story, most Norman
returned to the pulse with his shotgun, sparking an altercation
with armed white deputies. In another more likely account, Norman
took his case to Judge John Cheney and Orlando historian
Paul artis again, he's trying to find ways to let
(18:44):
you know, people in power know that this corruption is
happening in a koe, you know. But the problem is,
even he was able to contact similar Judge Chaney, there's
really nothing Judge Chaney could do. Um If he's able
to contact the super revisor of elections in Orange County,
that guy is not going to do anything. Jud Cheney
(19:05):
is said to have advised Norman to go back to
the polls in a koe and get the names of
people preventing black citizens from voting. This is likely to
file a complaint to lawsuit, but it was a very
dangerous errand according to one version of events, Norman enlisted
his good friend July Perry to help. The most important
thing I think about most Norman Julip Perry is that
(19:27):
black people trusted them, and both men felt irresponsibility because
of that trust to see things through. On election day,
and that is a testament to their you know, their
character and their courage. I mean, they could have stayed home.
The safest thing for black people on election day was
(19:49):
stay home. But neither man played it safe. Historian Marvin Dunn.
The two men went back to the polls. Uh, they
were harmed white men there who chased them away. There
was some sort of a confrontation and this men, these
two men went to his home retreated there. Pastor Stephen
(20:10):
Nunn is the founder of the July Perry Foundation and
president of its board. He's July Perry's great grandson. His grandmother,
July Perry's daughter, Carritha, was a teenager when Mois Norman
was turned away at the polls. She told me that, Um,
he wasn't allowed to vote, and a conflict took place,
(20:31):
and in the process there was a fight that broke out.
That fight ended up at the Perry's front doorstep. She
told me that ultimately, Uh, there was a rumor that
spread around town that UM, the black residents of Okoe
had gathered at July Perry's home to um discuss a
(20:52):
revote to go back and demand their right to vote
if you would, um, which she said was not true.
In the following hours that this white mob, actually they
called themselves the posty had been deft as actually to
go and find out about the disturbance of the polls,
and they knew that July Parry and those Normen were
(21:13):
among the activists involved in voting. So the attention of
the white people sort of focused on them, but they
weren't really sure about it was involved in terms of
the the rumor that blacks were armed at July Parry's
home that circulated very quickly in the white community following
the confrontation at the polls. Now Anna's Burly Jones, black
(21:36):
man who was a former slave who was owned ettle
white man, and Burnie Jones, who was a quintesidential Uncle
Tom told the white people that blacks were arming themselves
and were ensconced in July Parry's home, and that's where
the mob went to Julia Parry's house. At some point
(21:57):
later that night, after the polls closed, a white mob,
an armed white mob, goes to the home of his
friend and fellow labor broker, July Perry, and violence breaks out.
Bull shots are fired. She told me that at a
certain point in time, Uh, some of the white residents
men of the city of Okoe came to their home
(22:21):
and basically made a demand for father to come outside,
and they wanted to talk, and of course he refused
and said no. And she did tell me that there
was an attempt to force someone attempted to force their
way in, and there was some gunfire. There's a lot
of people that are still trying to cover up the
story and so because so for example, when I first
(22:45):
came to Florida in the summer um, I was told
by white middle class people, even scholars, Oh, Paul, why
are you coming to Florida. We've had such progressive race
relations here. We didn't have jim role like they had it.
You know, you should go to Uh, We're not nearly
as bad as Mississippi. Pall Uh, you know, you should
(23:06):
go to Georgia. What was this funny? Because I had
already been I've already done field work in Mississippi. Are
already done at field work in Georgia. Because when I
talked to black Floridians, they told me, oh my gosh,
who was telling you this nonsense? You know? Or it
was just as bad as any other state in terms
of race relations. So there was really no place where
black people to find sanctuary from that. That kind of
(23:28):
the kind of white violence. You know that that occurred
in Orange County and other places. So it's an organized attack.
It's organized assault on neighborhoods, you know, on on a community.
(23:51):
And the next episode of the election day massacre, she
said that, um, the gunfire was so great that you
could see the League tracers coming through all angles in
the house, just flying all over the place. I mean, basically,
people are defending their homes as this white you know,
a pair of military operation is tearing through their their
(24:14):
their neighborhoods, and they begin to torch and burn and
loot and pillage this entire community. There is no way
we will ever factually probably know how many black people
were killed that night. Records were intentionally not kept. One
man told him I shot seventeen negroes. He shot seventeen himself,
(24:37):
and he was bragging about it. Basically, you had a choice.
You can leave and get shot, or you can stay
and burn. Uh. And they burned to death. We don't
like to use the term ethnic cleansing unless we can
use in Eastern Europe, right, but it happens here. This
(24:58):
episode of flash Back, The Election Day Massacre, was written
by Sean Braswell and voiced by me Eugene S. Robinson,
was produced by Maeve mcgoran and your A Oh Diggi Zua.
Chris Hoff engineered our show.
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