Warren Read - The Lyncher in Me: A Search for Redemption in the Face of History

THE LYNCHER IN ME

THE LYNCHER IN ME

A SEARCH FOR REDEMPTION IN THE FACE OF HISTORY

WARREN READ

Borealis Books is an imprint of the Minnesota Historical Society Press.

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2008 by Warren Read. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, write to Borealis Books, 345 Kellogg Blvd. W., St. Paul, MN 55102-1906.

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ISBN-13: 978-0-87351-607-5 (cloth)

ISBN-10: 0-87351-607-9 (cloth)

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

Read, Warren

The lyncher in me : a search for redemption in the face of history / Warren Read.

p. cm.

ISBN-13: 978-0-87351-607-5 (cloth : alk. paper)

ISBN-10: 0-87351-607-9 (cloth : alk. paper)

Ebook ISBN: 978-0-87351-683-9

1. LynchingMinnesotaDuluthHistory20th century. 2. Duluth (Minn.)Race relationsHistory20th century. 3. Duluth (Minn.)Biography. 4. Read, Warren, 1967 Family. 5. Read, Warren, 1967 Childhood and youth. 6. Family secretsCase studies. 7. RedemptionCase studies. 8. Read, Warren, 1967 TravelWest (U.S.) 9. West (U.S.)Description and travel. I. Title.

HV6462.M6R43 2008

364.1'34dc22

2007044847

PICTURE CREDITS

p. 98, bottom: Courtesy of the Kansas State Historical Society

p. 99: Minnesota Historical Society Collections

p. 104, top: Josephine Lawrence Collection, 18441896, Western Historical Manuscript CollectionColumbia, Missouri

Photograph of rope for part titles by Craig Davidson

All other photos Read collection

Evil is unspectacular and always human,

and shares our bed and eats at our own table.

W. H. AUDEN

The following memoir is a work of nonction. The people depicted in the book are, or were, living and have been illustrated to the best of my recollection or, in the case of historical gures, by thorough research. In some cases, the names have been changed to protect the identity of a living person not connected with the publication of this book or whose family members might be negatively impacted by the persons depiction. All historical gures are recounted according to researched documents; no names have been changed in those cases.

THE LYNCHER IN ME

CHAPTER

Two men are back to back, their bodies slightly touching just at the elbows. A thick wooden pole stands between them, beginning just behind their heels and rising up above their heads, disappearing from the frame of the postcard. Bare skin, arms restrained by their own torn shirts, they are the centerpiece of a gratuitous, macabre portrait.

Lines of white rope encircle their necks; a crescent of even whiter faces surrounds the hanging bodies in a proud display of heroic conquest. They are scarecrows nailed to a tree, hovering just inches above the ground. Of the dozens of bystanders in the scene, only one is smiling unabashedlya brilliant, ecstatic grin that is all the more incongruous when one notices, nearly touching his right shoe, the head of a third victim, his body lying in a pummeled heap at the mans feet.

Ive been among people who Im sure would sooner see me dead than living with another man and I know that there are times and places that I might be discovered hanging from a hastily fashioned noose or tied to a barbed-wire fence, enveloped by men and women who see me not as a human being but as a category, an aberration, an epithet. I take in the seething hatred in the photo, the objectication of a human being set apart from the masses, and I know that as far-removed as I am from the men beaten and lynched that night long ago, I am not so different.

A shift in my perspective and Im scanning the gures in the image for something else entirely. The faces surrounding the dead men are stoic, satiated; a few even look uncomfortable. I search apprehensively for the familiar, peering at heads that crane above the crowd, men vying to be captured by the photographers lens. There is one whose frown could be my mothers and my heartbeat falters. Another one has my eyes. A blurred gure just on the edge of the frame has the prominent nose that Ive come to recognize as my relation, but the jawline isnt right. This jaw is soft, not squared and chiseled as if from granite and once again I am relieved. Its not him. I am pulled into the muted imagery of the crowd and before I know it, I become lost trying to force the past into the present. What I am seeking exists somewhere in that photo and I know that as far removed as I am from the men standing in that crowd eight decades ago, I am not so different.

I imagine that I might crawl into the scene, like a photographic version of Alices looking glass. And from my vantage point some eighty years later and a thousand miles away, I could actually be in Duluth, on that June night of 1920. I would walk among the mob, passing between them, and perhaps then I would see all sidesthe trembling arms, the sweat along the backs of their necks, the deep scratches on the edges of their shiny black bootsand maybe then their evil would become less potent. I would ask them, is this what you really wanted all along? When the morning light shines down on this corner will you return to stand again in smug satisfaction? I would move into the headlights beam and stand at the post, reaching out to touch the hands of the murdered, and I would promise them that one day they would be raised again, only this time in admiration and atonement. Then I might turn and go beyond the cameras eye, back down Second Avenue to the battered jailhouse with its bricks scattered in the street among shards of broken window and maybe there I would nd him and I would nally be able to ask, Pa, do you know what you have done? And when I take his hands in mine I would show him, make him see the blood, show him that the blood covering his hands has traveled three lifetimes to stain the hands of his descendants. And maybe then he would tell me what I need to hear.

CHAPTER

I crouched behind the bushes; spines of holly leaves scratched the sides of my face. A wild throw and both my ten-year-old son Dylan and I were digging through the one spot in the garden Id hoped not to have to search for a baseball. Still I smiled condently, knowing that if nothing else, my son wasnt afraid to be where he was, by my side, seeking to correct a less-than-perfect effort on his part.

On a night not too long ago in the relative realm of generational time, when I was just a few years older than my son is now, a holly bush of this size would play a completely different role for me. Its invasive scratch on my skin would be a strange comfort, dancing ever so lightly against the esh. The holly bush then was an irritating reassurance of camouage, safety from him, a man whose life would have been much less complicated with me, his wifes burdensome young son, out of the picture. I scraped the dirt aside as my son asked again if Id found the ball. I told him no, wed keep looking, while in my private thoughts I remembered how, twenty-ve years earlier, in the cover of the thorny brush, the Rolodex of escape routes had spun wildly in my mind, each card coming up frustratingly empty. What the hell could I have done then? Run away? To where? Even today, I try to reach back to reassure a scared adolescent who has long since grown to adulthood that there was nothing else he could have done but hide and wait. My lip had begun to swell; a taste of iron, blood leaking from my mouth. Mom cant ignore this, Id thought, not this time.