I went to the University of Texas and lived in Simkins Hall named after a Professor of the Law School. Oh yeah. He helped found both the Texas and Florida Klan.
The University was SHOCKED to find this out, but his association with the Klan was well known. The dorm was built in the early 1960s at the time civil rights was becoming a big issue. I don’t think the naming of the dorm was an accident. A lot of buildings and schools were named after Klan leaders during this time period. It was also the time when a few Southern states added the Confederate Battle flag to their state flags.
When I was a neophyte reporter working an internship in Jacksonville in 1981 (is that enough prepositions in one sentence?), I wrote an article pointing out that there was a high school named for Forrest. Which got me a couple of nice angry letters from people who should have known better. The wall lockers in the hallways were painted gray and red, I guess to mimic the corn-federate uniforms and battle flags.
The real shame is that almost no southern whites stop to think that the confederacy oppressed southerners with an all-encompassing draft, and funded its war effort by confiscating the crops of farmers. The woods between Gainesville and Tallahassee became a no-man’s-land where deserters from the confederate army hid out, and confederate government raiders terrorized the population while hunting deserters. If you ever see a confederate monument in front of a southern courthouse, look at he date on it: it’s almost always put up 30 to 40 years after the Civil War.
According to the “Southern Unionist” article in Wikipedia, some 3,500 white Floidians served the Union cause. Sad to think that their decsendants are driving around white rebel flags on their trucks.
Speaking of Florida’s shameful backstory: Did you know there’s an old oak tree in Brooksville, Florida with a sign in front, describing it as the tree of choice for lynching Afro-Americans in the bad old days? Odd that they can take all the ‘n’ words out of Mark Twain, yet still leave something like that up! Forrest High School used to be the redneck school when I went to school in Jacksonville. Not surprising they held onto the name for so long. I guess the school’s demographic has changed!
I grew up in King County, Washington; it was originally named after anti-Abolitionist Vice President William Rufus DeVane King; in 1986, it was changed to honor Martin Luther King, Jr. Nothing like a little historical revisionism to assuage the guilt.
I went to the University of Texas and lived in Simkins Hall named after a Professor of the Law School. Oh yeah. He helped found both the Texas and Florida Klan.
The University was SHOCKED to find this out, but his association with the Klan was well known. The dorm was built in the early 1960s at the time civil rights was becoming a big issue. I don’t think the naming of the dorm was an accident. A lot of buildings and schools were named after Klan leaders during this time period. It was also the time when a few Southern states added the Confederate Battle flag to their state flags.
When I was a neophyte reporter working an internship in Jacksonville in 1981 (is that enough prepositions in one sentence?), I wrote an article pointing out that there was a high school named for Forrest. Which got me a couple of nice angry letters from people who should have known better. The wall lockers in the hallways were painted gray and red, I guess to mimic the corn-federate uniforms and battle flags.
The real shame is that almost no southern whites stop to think that the confederacy oppressed southerners with an all-encompassing draft, and funded its war effort by confiscating the crops of farmers. The woods between Gainesville and Tallahassee became a no-man’s-land where deserters from the confederate army hid out, and confederate government raiders terrorized the population while hunting deserters. If you ever see a confederate monument in front of a southern courthouse, look at he date on it: it’s almost always put up 30 to 40 years after the Civil War.
According to the “Southern Unionist” article in Wikipedia, some 3,500 white Floidians served the Union cause. Sad to think that their decsendants are driving around white rebel flags on their trucks.
Speaking of Florida’s shameful backstory: Did you know there’s an old oak tree in Brooksville, Florida with a sign in front, describing it as the tree of choice for lynching Afro-Americans in the bad old days? Odd that they can take all the ‘n’ words out of Mark Twain, yet still leave something like that up! Forrest High School used to be the redneck school when I went to school in Jacksonville. Not surprising they held onto the name for so long. I guess the school’s demographic has changed!
I grew up in King County, Washington; it was originally named after anti-Abolitionist Vice President William Rufus DeVane King; in 1986, it was changed to honor Martin Luther King, Jr. Nothing like a little historical revisionism to assuage the guilt.