It’s one of the largest migrations of people in the world, from the South to the North. They w

It’s one of the largest migrations of people in the world, from the South to the North. They w
It’s one of the largest migrations of people in the world, from the South to the North. They w
It’s one of the largest migrations of people in the world, from the South to the North. They w
It’s one of the largest migrations of people in the world, from the South to the North. They w
It’s one of the largest migrations of people in the world, from the South to the North. They w
It’s one of the largest migrations of people in the world, from the South to the North. They w
It’s one of the largest migrations of people in the world, from the South to the North. They w
It’s one of the largest migrations of people in the world, from the South to the North. They w
It’s one of the largest migrations of people in the world, from the South to the North. They w
It’s one of the largest migrations of people in the world, from the South to the North. They w

It’s one of the largest migrations of people in the world, from the South to the North. They were fleeing, basically as refugees. —Tarabu Betserai KirklandTarabu Betserai Kirkland calls Los Angeles home today, but he grew up often hearing his mother’s story about fleeing the South as a young girl. Mamie Lang Kirkland was seven years old when her family was forced to flee Ellisville, Mississippi. “Her father came home after midnight in terror,” Mr. Kirkland recalled, “and told my grandmother, ‘Gather the kids on the first train in the morning,’ but he had to leave now. Put yourself in a situation where you’re seven, you pack up everything you can fit in the two or three little suitcases, and you leave right away.” Her father feared that he and his friend John Hartfield would end up “hanging from a tree” if they didn’t leave.The Lang family moved to East St. Louis, Illinois, but John Hartfield soon returned to Mississippi. An angry mob accused him of assaulting a white woman and announced in newspapers days in advance that they would lynch him. The governor of Mississippi refused to intervene. On June 26, 1919, Mr. Hartfield was hanged from a tree and then burned before a crowd of ten thousand white men, women, and children. “If the persons responsible were brought to justice, you would need a courtroom that could accommodate ten thousand people,” Mr. Kirkland said.The Lang family did not stay in East St. Louis. After race riots erupted there, they fled yet again, this time to Ohio. Recalling her time there, Mrs. Kirkland remembers hiding under her bed while a cross burned on her lawn. Today, Mrs. Kirkland is 109 years old. She regularly visits her son in Los Angeles, where he is working on a film about his family’s history, 100 Years from Mississippi. It is a story inextricably linked to the Great Migration and all those who fled as refugees in their own country. Click here to hear their story, and explore The Legacy of Lynching at the Brooklyn Museum now through September 3.Tarabu Betserai Kirkland at home in Los Angeles with his mother, Mamie Lang Kirkland, 109, who fled Mississippi at age seven. 2017. Original photography by Kris Graves for Equal Justice Initiative, 2017 -- source link
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