The Lyncher In Me: A Search for Redemption in the Face of History

by Warren Read

In June 1920, in Duluth, Minnesota, a mob of over 10,000 convened upon the police station, inflamed by the rumor that black circus workers had raped a white teenage girl—charges that would later be proven false. Three men were dragged from their cells and lynched in front of the cheering crowd.

More than eighty years later, Warren Read—a fourth-grade teacher, devoted partner, and father to three boys—plugged his mother's maiden name into a computer search engine, then clicked on a link to a newspaper article that would forever alter his understanding of himself. Louis Dondino, his beloved great-grandfather, had incited the deadly riot on that dark summer night decades before.

In his poignant memoir, Read explores the perspectives of both the victims and the perpetrators of this heinous crime. He investigates the impact—the denial and anger—that the long-held secrets had on his family. Through this examination of the generations affected by one horrific night, he discovers we must each take responsibility for "our deep-seated fears that lead us to emotional, social, or physical violence."

Genres: Race, Nonfiction, History

208 pages, Hardcover

First published March 15, 2008

About the author

Warren Read is the author of the 2008 memoir, The Lyncher in Me (Borealis Books), and the novels One Simple Thing (2021, Ig Publishing) and Ash Falls (2017, Ig Publishing). His short fiction has been published in Hot Metal Bridge, Mud Season Review, Sliver of Stone, Inklette, Switchback and The Drowning Gull. In addition, he has had two short plays directed and produced by Tony winner Dinah Manoff. In 2015 he received his MFA from the Rainier Writing Workshop at Pacific Lutheran University. In 2022 he retired after 31 years as an elementary teacher and high school associate principal.

Reviews

[Michelle]

Ultimately, I couldn't bring myself to finish this. I wanted to, because, hey, another book toward my yearly reading goal, and I made it to 78%... But I just wanted to be done with it.

I believe the author had good intentions. I believe he had a story to tell. None of this is meant to detract from that.

The first glitch for me was to discover this book, which I borrowed digitally from my library system -- which includes Duluth -- really didn't focus on the lynchings. The author seemed to want to share a story about his dysfunctional family, generations in the making. I mean, that's not a bad story is it? I would borrow or buy a book with that as the focus, but it's not what I was in the mood for at that moment.

But I more or less accepted the new (to me) premise, but even with that, the story felt a little meandering, as if the elements weren't being sewn together or at least not in a way that told a cohesive stoy. Periodically, he would touch on the lynching and his great grandfather's role in it, but this felt random.

The author visits the site of the memorial, he was a speaker at the dedication, and barely gives it a glance when a bar reminds him of his step-father's drunkenness. And I'm reminded that the lynching is not at all the point of this non-fiction book, but it seemed that this moment, where he is standing within feet of where men were lynched, should be more about those men. For a minute.

I've visited the memorial, almost by accident. My husband and I were trying to find a book store, and the construction made it an epic journey. I saw the memorial, and knew it had to be about the lynchings. I asked my husband to park. I spent a few minutes there, disheartened to see the focus being about forgiveness. Quotes about forgiveness, one I believe by the Reverend Martin Luther King.

Forgiveness is important, maybe even more so for the person(s) who've been harmed to move on. (The saying about holding a grudge is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.) Forgiveness has probably saved the planet any number of times. But it felt incredibly wrong for this memorial to be less about penance and more about a self-serving effort to be allowed to lay down the burden of what had been done there. It seemed a bit grotesque.

Which I doubt was the conscious objective, but...

So, I borrowed a book about lynchings, that turned out to mostly not be about the lynchings, and a clear moment when it should be about that becomes about the author.

The author's father raped his daughters, the author's sisters and half sisters. Dad acts at one moment like he might, years later, accept responsibility, but then dad makes more excuses -- backs away from responsibility. The following chapter is about our author moving into a black community with his husband, and displacing a woman who could no longer live there under the rising costs of gentrification. The author kinda admits to racism at least twice, but then backs away from it -- he has an issue with black women because he was bullied by black girls, but not all black women since some are his friends. He loves his black neighbors, except the ones that sag their pants and listen to too loud music. He prefers the neighbors who are most like him and his husband, with a focus on curb appeal and pride in home ownership. And they move out pretty fast, but it's not a race thing. I kinda feel like he needed to take a few more steps toward looking at the pattern, looking inward, connecting his past with who he is at the time of the writing, the good and the bad.

And the thing is that his speech at the memorial was saying that someone had to take responsibility, someone had to apologize, someone descended from the mob had to step up and say no more. I believe the author was sincere in this, just inconsistent in the most human way possible elsewhere.

At this part, it becomes harder to go on this journey. He visits the graves of his great great grandparents to assure them that he's redeemed the family name, which reminds me that the book never really felt like a search for that redemption. The author comes from an abusive family, not just the portioned descended from his great grandfather, and he vowed to do better, to be a better father to his kids, which is amazing, but had little to nothing to do with what happened specifically in Duluth or his reaction to it ... which is why I borrowed the book.

Finally, 70-something percent into the book, he tries to imagine and research the life of one of the lynched men, explores where Elmer Jackson came from. But it's 70-something percent in, and I don't have the heart to finish.

Michael W. Fedo also wrote a book about the lynchings which, while with a more academic feel, felt more more focused. The Lynchings in Duluth So much stuck with me from that book, including my local papers reporting with the assumption the slain men were guilty, and so the crowd -- while wrong -- were behaving in a very understandable way. Essentially, they shouldn't have, but these men were rapists and so, oh, well! Much like the author of THIS book is descended from a member of the mob, I know the people around me, even my people, are descended from those who saw the crimes as kinda understandable. And that makes you think.

I didn't finish "Lyncher", and so I'm not rating it. Also, I don't have the heart to rate it when I have a fair amount of empathy for the author, who really does seem to be a good man. The book's "sins" mostly concern a misleading representation/cover which is more on the publisher, and perhaps not having an editor who helped pull this together and challenge some of the messages the author inadvertently sent to the reader. This could have been an excellent book going down a couple different paths with focus, or really soul searching, but I assume he wasn't given an opportunity to do rewrites with that focus in mind.

But whether or not I finished this book, it exists in the world as a net good, and if you're interested in this topic -- or the general topic of a man rising from abuse and dysfunction -- you might like it. You can go in with a different expectation.

[Sherry Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well written, well researched. The first book I've read about the Duluth lynchings, though I've been meaning to for sometime. Read delivers a story amongst many stories which has led me to research further into our history of lynching which, for the little I have now read on the internet, has reminded me to educate myself outside the box.

I hope Mr. Read is working on another memoir. My only complaint is I wanted more.

I purchased this book at the Indian Trading Post (Minnesota Historical Society) in Onamia, Minnesota. Hats off to the Minnesota Historical Society Press!

[Juliana · Rating 5 out of 5]

I saw Sherrilyn Ifill recommend this book on Twitter. The book is a memoir and apology by the author Warren Read about the actions of his Great Grandfather in a 1920 lynching of three young black men in Duluth, Minnesota in 1920.

if you are a therapist, anyone interested in multi-generational trauma, or just someone trying to make sense of the world right now--this is worth seeking out.

We have to look our history square in the face to move on as a nation. Scratch some dirt in your neighborhood in this country and you'll find a story of injustice. Let's own up to it.

In weird coincidences I often find in the book world, the author happens to live not too far from me.

[Marta E C R · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an important book, and well worth reading. The premise of the book is intergenerational trauma and what it does to families, something we would all do well to study. Having a person in one's ancestry who was a significant part of inciting the Duluth lynchings of 1920 has got to be excruciatingly hard, and I admire the author for the research and emotional work he has done. His speech at the 2003 unveiling of the memorial to Elmer Jackson, Elias Clayton, and Isaac McGhie in Duluth brought me to tears. That all said, his writing style (somewhat disjointed) made it somewhat difficult to follow at times, and I ended up creating the author's family tree to help me figure things out, which was extremely helpful. I recommend that to anyone reading this book. I'm giving it 3.5 stars, rounded up to 4 for Warren Read's courage and integrity in being willing to put his story out there in the world.

[Terry · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was truly a unique read about the 1920 lynching of three black men in Duluth. Purchased at the Fitger’s Brewery bookstore while celebrating 25 years with my husband, it was fun to discover that this book had been written by gay man – and he intertwines his own story into this terrible tale. The author is the great grandson of one of only 2 men who were convicted of this crime – and even then his conviction was inciting a riot, not murder. While telling the tale of his great grandfather’s involvement, he also shares other family history, as well as his own journey to discover what really happened – including a visit with relatives of one of the victims. In incredible story and journey.

[H. · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s a story that needs repeating and to be remembered. Read does a fine job of exorcising demons, but with all the crummy people in his life, a bit of added editing to help identify which crummy person it was. Still, it is as good of an atonement as an atrocity such as this could be hoped for—perhaps there is no forgiveness, only learning to recognize evil.

[Jessica · Rating 5 out of 5]

Honest and bold, this book really grapples with the past and its effect on us all.

[Melinda Fierro · Rating 4 out of 5]

“If there is an element of my being that was instrumental in bringing death,” I explained, “then I believe I have a responsibility to help make a wrong act right.” (p.193)

This book intrigued me for several reasons. I was interested in learning more about the Duluth Lynchings. I am also interested in the concept of generational trauma. The premise of the book made me wonder if this story would have that element. I was not disappointed. It was a heartbreaking memoir of a man coming to grips with several generations of disfunction in his family, uncovered by a revelation that his great-grandfather was involved in the Duluth Lynchings. Read confronts not only his family's past but his own imperfect journey of prejudice.

[Marissa · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a read recommended to me by an anti-racist group and I enjoyed it. Especially when viewed through the eyes of generational trauma. But, I already knew most of the historical attributes and found it a bit repetitive for myself. If you don't have a knowledge of the lynching in Duluth, MN I would recommend this novel.

[Jodeane · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting story

This book was not what I expected. It was a good story of trying to overcome family history and how the secrets continue to impact future generations. Well written.

[Sara Jordahl · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was pretty amazing. I feel like it's a must read as a sequel to The Lynchings In Duluth, but might be a little confusing as a book alone. I also felt like the book dragged on a little too long to make story. Over all this was a very interesting and intriguing story.

[Nick · Rating 5 out of 5]

A powerful telling of the lynching in Duluth MN.

[Jane Hinton · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to learn more about this violent event of Duluth history, but was left pained by the white saviorism and clumsy comparisons

[Gail · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ok writing and a great idea/message.

[Nicholas Whyte]

http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/1171958.html[return][return]This is a fascinating book. Subtitled "A Search for Redemption in the Face of History", it chronicles the research of Warren Read, an elementary school teacher from Washington State, into the June 1920 lynching of three black men in Duluth, Minnesota, accused of a rape that had not actually happened. To his horror, Read discovered while doing some online genealogical research that his own great-grandfather was jailed for inciting the riot. His exploration of that hot summer night in Duluth goes in parallel with exploring his own childhood experiences (his own father was also jailed, for raping his step-sister) and teasing out the unspoken parts of his own family's history. In one particularly moving chapter he visits the home town of one of the lynched men, and gives his own testimony at the local church. It's actually quite a short book, but passionate in its detailed analysis.

[Kari · Rating 3 out of 5]

I knew going in it would include his own life journey through this, but there was too much rambling about his experiences, many of which had only extremely attenuated connections to the lynchings. The writing was competent though often confusingly worded. He focused on plant metaphors heavily in the first quarter then dropped them the rest of the book. There were at least three typos where entire words were missing. It felt self-aggrandizing in places, where he doesn’t admit to his own faults and actual thoughts but glosses over them. He assumes a lot about the feelings of slaves in the civil war era, and even though he is gay and has some idea of prejudice, it’s not the same. I appreciated that he did talk about the lynchings and the memorial and the impact on Duluth, but that felt like such a small part of an already small book. Overall, I think it’s not a bad place to start if you’re like me and had never heard of the lynchings, but it’s not hard hitting or particularly important to read.

[JulieK · Rating 3 out of 5]

A family memoir anchored around the Seattle author's discovery of his great-grandfather's involvement in a 1920 lynching in Duluth, Minnesota. I was born in Duluth and my dad grew up there, so that was the hook for me, but I was drawn into the author's own story as well. He contemplates the legacy of this family secret and explores how dysfunction and violence traveled through the generations. The last section, speculating about the life of Elmer Jackson, was the weakest link in an overall well-woven story.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

We think that we are living our own lives, but it has been said that the sins of our fathers will impact generations to follow as this author has learned. He also has learned that it is a journey to break from the past and start a new life.

[Kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was written by a close friend of ours. Warren's analogies are like poetry and this book is a beautiful yet troubling read.

[Kristi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting look at Duluth's History