A review by davehershey
Sundown Towns: A Hidden Dimension of American Racism by James W. Loewen
4.0
I had never heard of sundown towns until recently. Chalk it up to poor education. Maybe white privilege. Historical amnesia. Whatever it is, I am certainly not alone. Sundown towns are surprisingly not well known, which is why James Loewen wrote this book.
Up front, this book is thorough. Loewen did tons of research to document sundown towns. This is both a benefit and a curse. It is a benefit because it is the first (only?) major book on sundown towns. The curse is that it is long, dry and at times a bit repetitive. I doubt as many people read it as probably would a shorter, more popular level book (case in point, I am the first person in a decade to check it out of our library). Regardless of any flaws though, this is a book that must be read and a story that must be told.
I mean, we all know the story Americans like to tell ourselves, right? Our country is progressively improving. We're the bulwark of freedom in the world. Sure, we've had problems in the past but once we overcome them we just get better and better.
Loewen shows this story is a myth. Race relations in America were better in 1885 then in 1930. Immediately after the civil war, during the time of reconstruction, black people were in a better place then they were during slavery. Then in 1890 everything changed. But even here, the story tends to focus on the south. Federal troops were removed from the south, southern whites quickly took over, any blacks who had been elected or gained position of power were tossed out. Loewen shows that racism grew in the north and midwest.
There were not really sundown towns in the south. To some degree, southern whites were used to living around blacks. Why throw your servants out of town, southern whites would wonder? It was in the rest of the country where blacks were kicked out of towns, signs were put up warning all blacks to be gone by sundown (some towns even sounded a whistle at 6 PM warning blacks to leave!). Loewen goes into detail for the variety of reasons that even towns that had supported the northern cause and freeing the slaves became racist (the reasons are many and varied). Its interesting that by ignoring sundown towns, northerners can see racism as a southern problem. Even books about the civil rights era and the great migration, Loewen shows, tend to focus on the south.
Further, the phenomenon of sundown towns affects us down to today. Loewen talks about how many Americans just assume black people like living in cities, which is why many urban areas are more populated by blacks. But historically, this was not the case. After the civil war, blacks were moving all over the place. It was only when small towns expelled them, and cities pushed them into certain neighborhoods, that this idea connecting black people to urban areas developed. The same goes for all or mostly white towns today. Loewen talks about asking people in a town - whether in Illinois, Ohio, Oregon or Arkansas - why no black people live here. The response is often simply, they don't want to. Maybe even some would say they never did. Yet Loewen shows from census data that they did once, they were kicked out and never came back. Or when they tried to come back, they were harassed, beaten, had rocks thrown and their houses burned down.
There really is so much here. He talks about integrated sports teams visiting sundown towns and having to schedule the game early enough they could be out by dusk. He speaks of the harassment such teams faced. He even writes of how the occasional white person who would hire or defend a black employee or friend would face attacks. Sundown towns were not limited to blacks, though blacks were the majority, but in places also expelled Mexicans, Chinese, Jews, gays and others.
I've been thinking a lot about race in America lately. I've certainly grown up with white privilege. My hometown might have been a sundown town, it was pretty much all white after all (and Loewen would argue such demographics rarely happened by accident). That story of progress is powerful, in which we assume through Civil War to Jim Crow to Civil Rights we are forever improved. But the stories Loewen tells are not the distant past and still affect us today. I'm not sure what the solution is (though Loewen mentions some), but I think more confession, admission of past evils and reconciliation (even reparations) is a good start.
Overall, read this book if you want to learn about a dark and not well known part of American history. Even if you have to skim at points (I did!) it is worth it to get a feel for this story.
Up front, this book is thorough. Loewen did tons of research to document sundown towns. This is both a benefit and a curse. It is a benefit because it is the first (only?) major book on sundown towns. The curse is that it is long, dry and at times a bit repetitive. I doubt as many people read it as probably would a shorter, more popular level book (case in point, I am the first person in a decade to check it out of our library). Regardless of any flaws though, this is a book that must be read and a story that must be told.
I mean, we all know the story Americans like to tell ourselves, right? Our country is progressively improving. We're the bulwark of freedom in the world. Sure, we've had problems in the past but once we overcome them we just get better and better.
Loewen shows this story is a myth. Race relations in America were better in 1885 then in 1930. Immediately after the civil war, during the time of reconstruction, black people were in a better place then they were during slavery. Then in 1890 everything changed. But even here, the story tends to focus on the south. Federal troops were removed from the south, southern whites quickly took over, any blacks who had been elected or gained position of power were tossed out. Loewen shows that racism grew in the north and midwest.
There were not really sundown towns in the south. To some degree, southern whites were used to living around blacks. Why throw your servants out of town, southern whites would wonder? It was in the rest of the country where blacks were kicked out of towns, signs were put up warning all blacks to be gone by sundown (some towns even sounded a whistle at 6 PM warning blacks to leave!). Loewen goes into detail for the variety of reasons that even towns that had supported the northern cause and freeing the slaves became racist (the reasons are many and varied). Its interesting that by ignoring sundown towns, northerners can see racism as a southern problem. Even books about the civil rights era and the great migration, Loewen shows, tend to focus on the south.
Further, the phenomenon of sundown towns affects us down to today. Loewen talks about how many Americans just assume black people like living in cities, which is why many urban areas are more populated by blacks. But historically, this was not the case. After the civil war, blacks were moving all over the place. It was only when small towns expelled them, and cities pushed them into certain neighborhoods, that this idea connecting black people to urban areas developed. The same goes for all or mostly white towns today. Loewen talks about asking people in a town - whether in Illinois, Ohio, Oregon or Arkansas - why no black people live here. The response is often simply, they don't want to. Maybe even some would say they never did. Yet Loewen shows from census data that they did once, they were kicked out and never came back. Or when they tried to come back, they were harassed, beaten, had rocks thrown and their houses burned down.
There really is so much here. He talks about integrated sports teams visiting sundown towns and having to schedule the game early enough they could be out by dusk. He speaks of the harassment such teams faced. He even writes of how the occasional white person who would hire or defend a black employee or friend would face attacks. Sundown towns were not limited to blacks, though blacks were the majority, but in places also expelled Mexicans, Chinese, Jews, gays and others.
I've been thinking a lot about race in America lately. I've certainly grown up with white privilege. My hometown might have been a sundown town, it was pretty much all white after all (and Loewen would argue such demographics rarely happened by accident). That story of progress is powerful, in which we assume through Civil War to Jim Crow to Civil Rights we are forever improved. But the stories Loewen tells are not the distant past and still affect us today. I'm not sure what the solution is (though Loewen mentions some), but I think more confession, admission of past evils and reconciliation (even reparations) is a good start.
Overall, read this book if you want to learn about a dark and not well known part of American history. Even if you have to skim at points (I did!) it is worth it to get a feel for this story.