In April 1907, John Green, a Black resident of Greensburg, Indiana, was accused of robbing and raping white widow Caroline Sefton. Unable to lynch Green, who had been removed from the town, white residents rioted, attacking and injuring several Black men and threatening at least one Black family. Some accounts claim that in response to the riot African Americans fled Greensburg and it became a sundown town. In his recently published article, Dr. Robert White, Professor of Sociology in the IU School of Liberal Arts at IU Indianapolis, examines the history of racism in Greensburg and Decatur County and demonstrates that the riot was a symptom of a broader racial intolerance. Racism, which existed prior to the riot and persisted after the riot, drove African Americans from Greensburg, Decatur County and surrounding counties. Racism created an almost entirely white area of southeastern Indiana that persisted as a sundown region for decades. Dr. White’s article, “The Greensburg Race Riot of 1907: Race and a Sundown Town,” has just been published in the March 2023 issue of Indiana Magazine of History.
Posted on April 3rd, 2023 in Announcements, Article, Community Engagement, Faculty, Publication, Research by David E. Hoegberg