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Sundown Towns: A Hidden Dimension of American Racism
Bestselling author of Lies My Teacher Told Me , James W. Loewen, exposes the secret communities and hotbeds of racial injustice that sprung up throughout the twentieth century unnoticed, forcing us to reexamine race relations in the United States.
In this groundbreaking work, bestselling sociologist James W. Loewen, author of the national bestseller Lies My Teacher Told Me , brings to light decades of hidden racial exclusion in America. In a provocative, sweeping analysis of American residential patterns, Loewen uncovers the thousands of “sundown towns”—almost exclusively white towns where it was an unspoken rule that blacks could not live there—that cropped up throughout the twentieth century, most of them located outside of the South. These towns used everything from legal formalities to violence to create homogenous Caucasian communities—and their existence has gone unexamined until now. For the first time, Loewen takes a long, hard look at the history, sociology, and continued existence of these towns, contributing an essential new chapter to the study of American race relations.
Sundown Towns combines personal narrative, history, and analysis to create a readable picture of this previously unknown American institution all written with Loewen’s trademark honesty and thoroughness.
In this groundbreaking work, bestselling sociologist James W. Loewen, author of the national bestseller Lies My Teacher Told Me , brings to light decades of hidden racial exclusion in America. In a provocative, sweeping analysis of American residential patterns, Loewen uncovers the thousands of “sundown towns”—almost exclusively white towns where it was an unspoken rule that blacks could not live there—that cropped up throughout the twentieth century, most of them located outside of the South. These towns used everything from legal formalities to violence to create homogenous Caucasian communities—and their existence has gone unexamined until now. For the first time, Loewen takes a long, hard look at the history, sociology, and continued existence of these towns, contributing an essential new chapter to the study of American race relations.
Sundown Towns combines personal narrative, history, and analysis to create a readable picture of this previously unknown American institution all written with Loewen’s trademark honesty and thoroughness.
576 pages, Paperback
First published September 29, 2005
673 people are currently reading
13893 people want to read
About the author
James W. Loewen
29 books1,102 followersA professor of sociology, James W. Loewen earned his bachelor's degree at Carleton College in 1964, and his master's (1967) and doctorate (1968) degrees from Harvard University. Loewen taught at Touglaloo College from 1968 until 1975, and at the University of Vermont from 1975 until his retirement as professor emeritus in 1995.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 302 reviews
September 11, 2010
I remember traveling with my family when I was very young. My mother always packed lunches for us. My father would sometimes get perrturbed when my sisters or I would not go to the restroom when he stopped for gas. Little did I know then that there were only certain places he would stop (after consulting family and friends who had made that journey before) only at certain places to avoid putting our family through needless stress while spending long hous behind the wheel driving from Milwaukee, Wisconsin to Southwestern Arkansas. After I grew up and joined the Air Force I heard many discussions in the barracks about where we (African Americans) could go off base for some recreation and a meal. The myth of the "Sundown Town" was not a myth, but a reality for African Americans, military and civilian. This book explains in depth where they are, how they got started, how they perpetuate themselves. A fantastic book. A bit lengthy for the recreational reader, but an exceptional learning tool for those who want more than a bit of titillation or escape from reality. This book hits you right in the mouth with reality. I was surprised to find my hometown, Milwaukee discussed therein, but it explained a lot about why there were certain neighborhoods we were warned aginst going into when I was growing up. Read it! You will be affected by it.
October 8, 2025
I listened to Sundown Towns: A Hidden Dimension of American Racism on audiobook and I also have the hard copy book. It's a maddening, challenging world where our lives are segregated, whether intentional or not. Sundown towns were scattered throughout the US, in the North and the South, for many decades. Signs were posted in thousands of cities that indicated African Americans should not be in specific towns after sundown.
Even once the sundown signs came down, realtors, bankers, politicians, and neighbors ensured that communities, schools, and churches remained segregated.
A sobering look at our nation.
The book is extremely lengthy and felt repetitive at times.
I also really enjoyed Loewen's book, Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong.
Even once the sundown signs came down, realtors, bankers, politicians, and neighbors ensured that communities, schools, and churches remained segregated.
A sobering look at our nation.
The book is extremely lengthy and felt repetitive at times.
I also really enjoyed Loewen's book, Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong.
February 3, 2018
I recommended this book to a friend during the first part of December last year. She read the description and laughed, “Holiday reading, something to depress me over Christmas.” She has a point. It’s not unlike being hammered with a nailgun. There aren’t any uplifting vignettes just one hard fact after another. It reminded me of Maxine Hong Kingston, “This is terrible ghost country, where a human being works her life away.”
I would prefer that it was academic with Loewen citing primary sources instead of books. I don’t dispute any of the author's claims. I tracked the reference trail on a few and arrived at United States Census Bureau records. With the US Census as a source, he could directly cite them. They’re readily available.
The single most significant takeaway message for me revolved around home ownership. Houses account for 63% of most Americans wealth. Before the Nation Housing Act (NHA) of 1934, a home buyer needs a down payment of 30-50%. Under the agency of the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), created by the NHA, a buyer needed a 10-20% down payment for a loan and would also benefit in a tax break thanks to a mortgage-interest deduction (MID). FHA and VA loans largely financed the home-owning boom that followed World War II. Two percent of those loans were to minorities. The Fair Housing Act, Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968, prohibited racial discrimination, but the oversight office, Housing and Urban Development (HUD) had no power to enforce the law.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/...
http://www.pbs.org/race/000_About/002...
https://www.npr.org/2017/05/03/526655...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economi...
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/09/ma...
I would prefer that it was academic with Loewen citing primary sources instead of books. I don’t dispute any of the author's claims. I tracked the reference trail on a few and arrived at United States Census Bureau records. With the US Census as a source, he could directly cite them. They’re readily available.
The single most significant takeaway message for me revolved around home ownership. Houses account for 63% of most Americans wealth. Before the Nation Housing Act (NHA) of 1934, a home buyer needs a down payment of 30-50%. Under the agency of the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), created by the NHA, a buyer needed a 10-20% down payment for a loan and would also benefit in a tax break thanks to a mortgage-interest deduction (MID). FHA and VA loans largely financed the home-owning boom that followed World War II. Two percent of those loans were to minorities. The Fair Housing Act, Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968, prohibited racial discrimination, but the oversight office, Housing and Urban Development (HUD) had no power to enforce the law.
FHA publications repeatedly listed “inharmonious racial or nationality groups” alongside noxious disamenities as “smoke, odors, and fog.” Again, this was the familiar “blacks as the problem” ideology, and the FHA’s solution was identical to that employed by independent sundown towns: keep “the problem” out. Palen states that loan guarantees by the FHA and Veterans Administration (VA) were the most important single cause of postwar suburbanization and more than 98% of the millions of home loans guaranteed by the FHA and VA after World War II were available only to whites. This was the money that funded the Levittowns and most other postwar sundown suburbs. America became a nation of homeowners largely after World War II, in the suburbs. Indeed, more Americans bought single-family homes in the decade after the war than in the previous 150 years, according to historian Lizbeth Cohen. African Americans were thus not only shut out of the suburbs but also kept from participating in Americans’ surest route to wealth accumulation, federally subsidized home ownership. Federal support for home ownership not only included the FHA and VA programs but also the mortgage interest tax deduction, which made home ownership in the suburbs cheaper than apartment rental in the cities—for whites. Housing prices then skyrocketed, tripling in the 1970s alone; this appreciation laid the groundwork for the astonishing 1-to-11 black-to-white wealth ratio that now afflicts African American families. (35)
When the federal government did spend money on black housing, it funded the opposite of suburbia: huge federally assisted high-rise “projects” concentrated in the inner city. We are familiar with the result, which now seems natural to us, market-driven: African Americans living near the central business district and whites living out in the suburbs. Actually, locating low-income housing of cheaper, already vacant land in the suburbs would have been more natural, more market-driven. One of Chicago’s most notorious housing projects, Cabrini Green, lies just a stone’s throw west of an expensive and desirable lakefront neighborhood north of the Loop, separated by the elevated railroad tracks. This is costly land. To justify its price, the Chicago Housing Authority had to pile hundreds of units onto the tract, building poorly devised physical structures that bred a festering, unsafe social structure. The steps taken by suburban developers and governments to be all-white were interferences in the housing market that kept African Americans from buying homes and locked them in overwhelmingly black tracts inside the city.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/...
http://www.pbs.org/race/000_About/002...
https://www.npr.org/2017/05/03/526655...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economi...
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/09/ma...
August 7, 2013
This is a difficult book to read. Not the language, or the way it's written (although the endnotes are annoying; I recommend using two bookmarks), but the subject matter. Loewen lays out, in methodical detail, all of the ways white Americans have utterly screwed over black Americans with residential segregation. If you had any illusions about America being "post-racial," they will be shattered by this book.
This is absolutely essential reading for every white American. I wish they taught this book in schools.
This is absolutely essential reading for every white American. I wish they taught this book in schools.
January 5, 2022
The author makes sure that you won’t leave this book thinking that sundown towns are exclusively a Black problem, or only present in the southern states, or are a thing of the distant past. There were hundreds of these bigoted enclaves widely dispersed throughout the United States. The only people not to be excluded are white Protestants (although occasionally homosexuals and labor union members have been banned from American towns). The vast majority of sundown towns prevented African Americans from living, or even setting foot in, them but others excluded Native Americans, Mexicans, Hindus, Chinese, Jews and Catholics. They were driven out by violence or intimidation and whole communities were created by, or with the support of, the government to be white enclaves.
The book is very thoroughly researched and recounts the history of these towns using numerous examples. The author interviewed residents and explored historical records. Although these sources were often less than candid, his research turned up a lot of people who had not one ounce of shame about their actions. There were also a lot of ludicrous justifications and denials. This was all both fascinating and disgusting, however it became redundant after a while. I think it needed some editing. 5 stars for content and 4 stars for the manner in which it was presented
The book is very thoroughly researched and recounts the history of these towns using numerous examples. The author interviewed residents and explored historical records. Although these sources were often less than candid, his research turned up a lot of people who had not one ounce of shame about their actions. There were also a lot of ludicrous justifications and denials. This was all both fascinating and disgusting, however it became redundant after a while. I think it needed some editing. 5 stars for content and 4 stars for the manner in which it was presented
October 1, 2021
Sundown Towns is an anthology of the racism that led to towns creating covenants (sometimes unwritten) that excluded minorities from living in these towns, working in these towns, and even in some cases passing through these towns. The book is more generally about the racism directed at African Americans, Chinese and Jewish Americans. There is some coverage of lynchings. Heavy stuff for sure. Most of the focus of the book is on the midwest in Illinois, Indiana and Michigan but there are examples from the west coast and many other states.
Although the author’s aims are laudable, the book struggles in a few areas. First off, the quality of the writing is poor. Essentially we see a dense collection of thin paragraphs around lynchings, discrimination and sundown towns. As such the writing is very repetitive. I counted the use of the word sundown no less than 1,809 times in this 500 page book. Imagine reading a book and seeing that word an average of 4 times per page! There were many others.
The second area where this book suffers is that there is no real depth to any of the stories. As I alluded to earlier, there is often only a sentence or two to reference the hundreds of towns identified.
Since this book is repetitive from the first page of the book, the author is preaching to the choir. I did not need any convincing as I grew up in a town that fit all the parameters of a sundown town and educated people will acknowledge that there is a heck of a lot of racism in this country. However I wanted to learn about the human stories rather than town x did not have any African Americans in the 1930 census. In contrast I think of the great books covering America’s history of racism and they all told compelling stories.
On the plus side, I strongly concur with the messaging in the book that pervasive racism led to the formation of sundown towns in the midwest and elsewhere. A lot of racism and discrimination still exists today especially in areas like housing.
This is a prescient book since the current president was successfully sued for housing discrimination and the dog whistles from this administration sound an awful lot like the language used by these historical sundown towns.
Although the author’s aims are laudable, the book struggles in a few areas. First off, the quality of the writing is poor. Essentially we see a dense collection of thin paragraphs around lynchings, discrimination and sundown towns. As such the writing is very repetitive. I counted the use of the word sundown no less than 1,809 times in this 500 page book. Imagine reading a book and seeing that word an average of 4 times per page! There were many others.
The second area where this book suffers is that there is no real depth to any of the stories. As I alluded to earlier, there is often only a sentence or two to reference the hundreds of towns identified.
Since this book is repetitive from the first page of the book, the author is preaching to the choir. I did not need any convincing as I grew up in a town that fit all the parameters of a sundown town and educated people will acknowledge that there is a heck of a lot of racism in this country. However I wanted to learn about the human stories rather than town x did not have any African Americans in the 1930 census. In contrast I think of the great books covering America’s history of racism and they all told compelling stories.
On the plus side, I strongly concur with the messaging in the book that pervasive racism led to the formation of sundown towns in the midwest and elsewhere. A lot of racism and discrimination still exists today especially in areas like housing.
This is a prescient book since the current president was successfully sued for housing discrimination and the dog whistles from this administration sound an awful lot like the language used by these historical sundown towns.
April 24, 2017
What I learned
The Democratic party was the white man’s party and didn’t become everybody’s party until 1964
Nadir 1890-1940 Incubator of Sundown Towns
Anna: Ain’t No Niggers Allowed
NDLTSGDOY: Nigger, Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on You
Boy: adult male African Americans who are less than a man
NMNMNN: No Malaria, No Mosquitoes, and No Negroes/Niggers
…had Sundown Towns until 2002
Sundown Towns aka gray towns—sunset towns—any organized jurisdiction that for decades (until the 1970s) kept African Americans or other groups from living in it and was thus “all-white” on purpose.
--no Negro or Mulatto shall migrate or settle in this state, by a vote of 1,583 to 98. (Sidebar: Mulattos were conceived by black women who were raped by white men).
Some famous white people who grew-up in and/or lived in and who might have supported Sundown Towns
Teddy Roosevelt—Warren G. Harding—Herbert Hoover—Thomas Dewey—Woody Guthrie—Frank Lloyd Wright—Ernest Hemingway—Edgar Rice Burroughs—Harry Truman—Lyndon Johnson—George W. Bush—Dick Cheney—Joe McCarthy—Emily Post—Edna Ferber—James Jones
Even today, whites feel most strongly about differentiating themselves from African Americans, not Jewish, Mexican, Native or Asian Americans.
What was invented in Sundown Towns
Spam—Kentucky Fried Chicken—Heath Bars—Krispy Kreme—Tootsie Rolls.
As I read Sundown Towns what kept coming to mind was how these white bigots came to America, swindled and stole the land from the Indians (stole their heritage, language, freedom, culture, etc.) and claimed the Indians land as their own, and afterwards had the nerve to say who and who could not live on that stolen land. I had to keep reminding myself that this is what people who don’t live in integrity do—what narcissists do—what psychopaths and sociopaths do by any means necessary. These bigots justified what they did as the “white” thing to do because they were superior.
Sundown Towns should be required reading by every American a minimum of three times before graduating college: at the middle school level, the high school level and again at the college level. Every non-white adult American should read Sundown Towns to learn their history.
Sundown Towns is an essential read for those whites who question why Blacks can’t get over slavery and just move on. And, to learn their ancestry.
Never forget
White men who raped and impregnated slaves are the original absentee fathers who denied their biological black children the life styles their white children enjoyed.
White men who raped and impregnated slaves are the original absentee fathers who did not pay child support and who plunged their biological black children into poverty that many have been unable to rise above to date.
White men who raped and impregnated slaves are the ones who denied their biological black children the right to the same education as their biological white children. Even today whites in power are carrying on the traditions of their ancestors.
The Democratic party was the white man’s party and didn’t become everybody’s party until 1964
Nadir 1890-1940 Incubator of Sundown Towns
Anna: Ain’t No Niggers Allowed
NDLTSGDOY: Nigger, Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on You
Boy: adult male African Americans who are less than a man
NMNMNN: No Malaria, No Mosquitoes, and No Negroes/Niggers
…had Sundown Towns until 2002
Sundown Towns aka gray towns—sunset towns—any organized jurisdiction that for decades (until the 1970s) kept African Americans or other groups from living in it and was thus “all-white” on purpose.
--no Negro or Mulatto shall migrate or settle in this state, by a vote of 1,583 to 98. (Sidebar: Mulattos were conceived by black women who were raped by white men).
Some famous white people who grew-up in and/or lived in and who might have supported Sundown Towns
Teddy Roosevelt—Warren G. Harding—Herbert Hoover—Thomas Dewey—Woody Guthrie—Frank Lloyd Wright—Ernest Hemingway—Edgar Rice Burroughs—Harry Truman—Lyndon Johnson—George W. Bush—Dick Cheney—Joe McCarthy—Emily Post—Edna Ferber—James Jones
Even today, whites feel most strongly about differentiating themselves from African Americans, not Jewish, Mexican, Native or Asian Americans.
What was invented in Sundown Towns
Spam—Kentucky Fried Chicken—Heath Bars—Krispy Kreme—Tootsie Rolls.
As I read Sundown Towns what kept coming to mind was how these white bigots came to America, swindled and stole the land from the Indians (stole their heritage, language, freedom, culture, etc.) and claimed the Indians land as their own, and afterwards had the nerve to say who and who could not live on that stolen land. I had to keep reminding myself that this is what people who don’t live in integrity do—what narcissists do—what psychopaths and sociopaths do by any means necessary. These bigots justified what they did as the “white” thing to do because they were superior.
Sundown Towns should be required reading by every American a minimum of three times before graduating college: at the middle school level, the high school level and again at the college level. Every non-white adult American should read Sundown Towns to learn their history.
Sundown Towns is an essential read for those whites who question why Blacks can’t get over slavery and just move on. And, to learn their ancestry.
Never forget
White men who raped and impregnated slaves are the original absentee fathers who denied their biological black children the life styles their white children enjoyed.
White men who raped and impregnated slaves are the original absentee fathers who did not pay child support and who plunged their biological black children into poverty that many have been unable to rise above to date.
White men who raped and impregnated slaves are the ones who denied their biological black children the right to the same education as their biological white children. Even today whites in power are carrying on the traditions of their ancestors.
March 28, 2012
Ever wonder why all the poor white people live in tiny towns, while poor black people tend to live in the inner city? This book explains that phenomenon-- apparently many poor black people used to live in tiny towns as well, but they were systematically driven out by lynch mobs, housing ordinances, covenants, banks, and real estate agents. The federal government did its part too, denying black families subsidized loans, and requiring white homeowners to buy homes in segregated neighborhoods. This book explains a lot of our current racial problems in terms of residential segregation. There are still places where Blacks are not welcome, and the damage of a century of segregation still affects our race relations.
This book helped me to understand the subtle racism that persists in any all-white community, including the past and current discriminatory policies of my own nearly all-white church. Understanding the factors that contribute to this racism is an important part of recognizing and eliminating this shameful part of our culture.
This book helped me to understand the subtle racism that persists in any all-white community, including the past and current discriminatory policies of my own nearly all-white church. Understanding the factors that contribute to this racism is an important part of recognizing and eliminating this shameful part of our culture.
April 30, 2015
In 1968, my family moved from Queens to Great Neck, a suburb of NY - one of the only NY suburbs at the time that allowed black people to own houses (as a largely Jewish suburb, it accepted us, because they also had been rejected from most suburbs in NY.) So I knew very personally what happened in the suburban US around redlining, and various other tactics, some quite violent, to keep non-whites from living in them.
In 2008, I decided to leave Oakland, and move to Sonoma County, a nice, bucolic rural area, which is not at all diverse. I've lived in other rural areas, also not diverse. I asked myself, why is it that there are so few black or interracial rural or semi-rural communities? I thought perhaps it was because that's not where the jobs are. Or that's just how the demographics played out.
What I learned from reading this book made me realize I should have taken the lesson from my youth - there was an active, purposeful purge of non-whites from rural communities all over the country, and policies to keep them away. Did you know there were blacks in every county in Montana at one point? There were significant populations of african-americans in small rural communities all over the US prior to 1900.
This book is a great historic overview of what happened to those communities, and how the suburban US was formed to specifically exclude blacks, and often also Jews and others as well. It's extremely well researched, evenhanded, and is a worthy companion to helping to understand the issues that plague us today. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in history and social justice.
In 2008, I decided to leave Oakland, and move to Sonoma County, a nice, bucolic rural area, which is not at all diverse. I've lived in other rural areas, also not diverse. I asked myself, why is it that there are so few black or interracial rural or semi-rural communities? I thought perhaps it was because that's not where the jobs are. Or that's just how the demographics played out.
What I learned from reading this book made me realize I should have taken the lesson from my youth - there was an active, purposeful purge of non-whites from rural communities all over the country, and policies to keep them away. Did you know there were blacks in every county in Montana at one point? There were significant populations of african-americans in small rural communities all over the US prior to 1900.
This book is a great historic overview of what happened to those communities, and how the suburban US was formed to specifically exclude blacks, and often also Jews and others as well. It's extremely well researched, evenhanded, and is a worthy companion to helping to understand the issues that plague us today. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in history and social justice.
November 3, 2017
When White Americans are confronted with the topic of affirmative action, voting rights, housing practices, or other programs designed to offset systemic injustice, the most common response seems to be that racism is something from the past and isn’t an issue now or simply that it’s not their problem that Black people are just lazy and can’t get ahead. James Loewen in “Sundown Towns” examines how these beliefs led to the formation of all White towns and suburbs across America that continue to exist to the present day.
First and foremost, this is not an easy read both in the sheer length and scope of the book but also its relentlessly shocking cataloging and analysis of how these towns came into being and maintain themselves. There isn’t enough space in this review to cover all the territory that Loewen details but essentially we discover that prior to 1890, there was a remarkable amount of integration across the North and South. While both areas had their segregated areas, the former remembered Black union veterans in particular and had no malice toward many of them while the latter saw the newly emancipated slaves as a continued source of cheap labor and while still treating them as second class citizens, had little desire to drive them out.
With the backlash over Reconstruction, competition for jobs, and the removal of Black representatives from positions of power however, things turned ugly quite rapidly. Black citizens were terrorized or murdered, houses burned, and families driven out of towns who never returned. Once towns became all White, intimidation and quasi-legal methods kept them that way for over a century, with many continuing into the present. These methods included, firebombing homes, lynchings, signs at county lines that read “Nigger, don’t let the sun fall down on you in_______”, a whistle in one town that blew at 6pm to let the Black workers know they had to leave the city limits, and many other similarly vile things. Loewen also details how banks, realtors, and the federal government played a large part in ensyring Black people didn’t move into these towns. Towns that often had 5,000+ people and were adjacent to large Black population centers and yet somehow had no black residents.
Loewen ends the book on a hopeful note that as of 2005 when this book was written, some towns had begun to integrate (albeit slowly) and that such integration can only lead to better understanding and less fear of each other. I did some brief research of census data for many of the towns that he references and while indeed some towns Black population has risen to 3 or 4 percent when it was formerly zero, clearly we still have a long, long way to go. As Loewen writes, the first step is acknowledgement of this shameful practice in our past and our present. Speaking the truth is a major first step toward rectifying past wrongs and putting everyone on a path to a more enlightened future. Loewen’s book is a great place to start that journey.
First and foremost, this is not an easy read both in the sheer length and scope of the book but also its relentlessly shocking cataloging and analysis of how these towns came into being and maintain themselves. There isn’t enough space in this review to cover all the territory that Loewen details but essentially we discover that prior to 1890, there was a remarkable amount of integration across the North and South. While both areas had their segregated areas, the former remembered Black union veterans in particular and had no malice toward many of them while the latter saw the newly emancipated slaves as a continued source of cheap labor and while still treating them as second class citizens, had little desire to drive them out.
With the backlash over Reconstruction, competition for jobs, and the removal of Black representatives from positions of power however, things turned ugly quite rapidly. Black citizens were terrorized or murdered, houses burned, and families driven out of towns who never returned. Once towns became all White, intimidation and quasi-legal methods kept them that way for over a century, with many continuing into the present. These methods included, firebombing homes, lynchings, signs at county lines that read “Nigger, don’t let the sun fall down on you in_______”, a whistle in one town that blew at 6pm to let the Black workers know they had to leave the city limits, and many other similarly vile things. Loewen also details how banks, realtors, and the federal government played a large part in ensyring Black people didn’t move into these towns. Towns that often had 5,000+ people and were adjacent to large Black population centers and yet somehow had no black residents.
Loewen ends the book on a hopeful note that as of 2005 when this book was written, some towns had begun to integrate (albeit slowly) and that such integration can only lead to better understanding and less fear of each other. I did some brief research of census data for many of the towns that he references and while indeed some towns Black population has risen to 3 or 4 percent when it was formerly zero, clearly we still have a long, long way to go. As Loewen writes, the first step is acknowledgement of this shameful practice in our past and our present. Speaking the truth is a major first step toward rectifying past wrongs and putting everyone on a path to a more enlightened future. Loewen’s book is a great place to start that journey.
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May 15, 2022Incredible, essential nonfiction about the history of sundown towns throughout America. Think it wasn't in your northern state? Think again.
The audiobook is fine, though Dietz's voice is not going to blow back your hair, but it gets the job done.
The audiobook is fine, though Dietz's voice is not going to blow back your hair, but it gets the job done.
February 1, 2020
There is never a good time to read a book like this. I'm grateful researchers like James Loewen exist because I could never delve into this unctuous topic and harvest the breadth and depth of material he presents. As a black man, this book, sadly, confirms everything I knew or suspected about the majority of white spaces within the United States. White relatives and friends frequently call me paranoid whenever I express anxiety and trepidation in majority-white rural or suburban areas. But now I know my insecurities are justified.
To read about the atrocities, the violation of human rights, and the violence my people suffered--and not so very long ago--roils me. It is no wonder most African Americans live with trauma that is passed down from generation to generation. Loewen's book is a tome of sorrow and evil. Yet Sundown Towns lacks a narrative. This is a stats heavy book, weighted down by the venom of racism. Anyone who lives in a town or suburb above the Mason-Dixon line will be appalled to realize it most likely began as a sundown or enforced sundown policies. After a while the horrific tales and research information Loewen presents become numbing and repetitive. Despite this, the book never loses its stomach-churning effect on readers.
That African Americans, Jews, Asians and other terrorized groups can still thrive in the twenty-first century is a miracle to me. Your home is supposed to be the safest place you can go, a place where you can rest, love, experience joy, and feel tremendous pride. To think that so many of our ancestors could not experience this, that physical and psychological abuse were inflicted upon them unremittingly, is just unconscionable. Anyone who reads this book will feel rage. Prepare for it. But the rage will transform to sadness, and the sadness will become pride in how African Americans and others managed to endure in spite of white terrorism.
To read about the atrocities, the violation of human rights, and the violence my people suffered--and not so very long ago--roils me. It is no wonder most African Americans live with trauma that is passed down from generation to generation. Loewen's book is a tome of sorrow and evil. Yet Sundown Towns lacks a narrative. This is a stats heavy book, weighted down by the venom of racism. Anyone who lives in a town or suburb above the Mason-Dixon line will be appalled to realize it most likely began as a sundown or enforced sundown policies. After a while the horrific tales and research information Loewen presents become numbing and repetitive. Despite this, the book never loses its stomach-churning effect on readers.
That African Americans, Jews, Asians and other terrorized groups can still thrive in the twenty-first century is a miracle to me. Your home is supposed to be the safest place you can go, a place where you can rest, love, experience joy, and feel tremendous pride. To think that so many of our ancestors could not experience this, that physical and psychological abuse were inflicted upon them unremittingly, is just unconscionable. Anyone who reads this book will feel rage. Prepare for it. But the rage will transform to sadness, and the sadness will become pride in how African Americans and others managed to endure in spite of white terrorism.
September 25, 2020
This is the book to read if you want to learn about “white history” i.e. the problem of having all white towns and suburbs and how these are directly related to racial discrimination and injustice in America. Through overt and covert violence, ordinances, restrictive covenants, urban legends and group mentality, many towns and suburbs exclude African Americans, but in general, they deny having anything to do with it and can’t remember how that happened. A must read for anyone wanting to learn about real American history!
July 14, 2014
Aargh! Reading this is just maddening. I hate that sundown towns have ever existed, and I hate that so many segregate communities still exist.
November 4, 2012
I picked this up for research towards an article, and haven't been able to put it down.
A few pages into the book I was shocked by the revelation that so many northern cities (hundreds or thousands) prohibited blacks not only from traveling through after dark but from living in them at all.
James Loewen did an astounding amount of research towards this hefty and exhaustively detailed book.
He spells out a truth that has been hidden in plain sight for decades, but that polite middle class people never speak about: The all-white suburbs were created, not by accident, but by deliberate, systematic and concerted efforts. The federal government refused to back loans, except in all-white neighborhoods. Homeowners associations created deed restrictions that forbade the sale of homes to nonwhites. More shockingly, when blacks moved into almost anyplace other than a large, multiracial city, they faced the danger of being run out of town or killed.
America is the most segregated country in the world, and Americans continue to pretend that this happened by accident, he points out.
The racism Loewen discusses did no take place long ago, or in some forgotten pocket of the deep south. The apex of violence, in this war to keep communities white, was reached in the 1980s. Most of the battles took place north of the Mason Dixon Line. Loewen recounts a multitude of shocking stories about cities small and large that intimidated their black residents into moving away, or simply slaughtered them and burned their homes down. Most of these incidents happened in the northern part of the U.S., despite conventional wisdom that racism has been quarantined in The South.
He also details how white residents, and most businesses, have abandoned cities or neighborhoods where blacks were able to settle.
Lowen goes on to explain that Sundown Suburbs are the cause of problems associated with inner cities (e.g. violent crimes, drugs and poverty).
This book can change your perspective on almost everything, because the world looks a lot different when you consider that white neighborhoods were rioting to drive out black homeowners in the 1970s and 1980s. When you know this, it's difficult to even listen to the morons who would oppose affirmative action. And it really should remove the scales from the eyes of people who previously did not understand the reaction of blacks to the Rodney King incident and the O.J. Simpson trial.
A few pages into the book I was shocked by the revelation that so many northern cities (hundreds or thousands) prohibited blacks not only from traveling through after dark but from living in them at all.
James Loewen did an astounding amount of research towards this hefty and exhaustively detailed book.
He spells out a truth that has been hidden in plain sight for decades, but that polite middle class people never speak about: The all-white suburbs were created, not by accident, but by deliberate, systematic and concerted efforts. The federal government refused to back loans, except in all-white neighborhoods. Homeowners associations created deed restrictions that forbade the sale of homes to nonwhites. More shockingly, when blacks moved into almost anyplace other than a large, multiracial city, they faced the danger of being run out of town or killed.
America is the most segregated country in the world, and Americans continue to pretend that this happened by accident, he points out.
The racism Loewen discusses did no take place long ago, or in some forgotten pocket of the deep south. The apex of violence, in this war to keep communities white, was reached in the 1980s. Most of the battles took place north of the Mason Dixon Line. Loewen recounts a multitude of shocking stories about cities small and large that intimidated their black residents into moving away, or simply slaughtered them and burned their homes down. Most of these incidents happened in the northern part of the U.S., despite conventional wisdom that racism has been quarantined in The South.
He also details how white residents, and most businesses, have abandoned cities or neighborhoods where blacks were able to settle.
Lowen goes on to explain that Sundown Suburbs are the cause of problems associated with inner cities (e.g. violent crimes, drugs and poverty).
This book can change your perspective on almost everything, because the world looks a lot different when you consider that white neighborhoods were rioting to drive out black homeowners in the 1970s and 1980s. When you know this, it's difficult to even listen to the morons who would oppose affirmative action. And it really should remove the scales from the eyes of people who previously did not understand the reaction of blacks to the Rodney King incident and the O.J. Simpson trial.
June 18, 2018
Loewen's book is a must read for anyone who lives in the United States. While lacking the more informal format and tone of his books about historic places and textbooks, Sundown towns sheds light on a little known and little acknowledged evil in America's past and current life.
This book is more of a formal study , which is understandable because Loewen is in part agruing that Sundown Towns existed. His points about neighborhoods and subarbs are equally valid. While he uses harsh (racist) language, it is when he quoets from sources and is used to not hid what happened. So he doesn't do it with a thrill or to be simply transgressive. If we are to have a conversation about race and crime and cities, this book is a must read.
This book is more of a formal study , which is understandable because Loewen is in part agruing that Sundown Towns existed. His points about neighborhoods and subarbs are equally valid. While he uses harsh (racist) language, it is when he quoets from sources and is used to not hid what happened. So he doesn't do it with a thrill or to be simply transgressive. If we are to have a conversation about race and crime and cities, this book is a must read.
September 25, 2017
An interesting dimension of racism, and American racism in particular, is that when whites are confronted with it, their reaction is often to blame the victims of its injustice for creating racism in the first place. To them, blacks create the racism merely by protesting or highlighting that racism. I have found this to be particularly true with reactions to the Black Lives Matter movement and the counterprotests against the recent ugly resurgence of blatant white supremacy. In fact, I recently heard one conservative activist, Sandy Rios, claim that celebrities raising money for hurricane victims are “stoking the fires of racism.” Perhaps it is racism provoking the fires of racism? Racists have become emboldened by a president whose racism is well-documented and whose dog-whistles provide ample cover for him to retreat from accusations of support for white supremacy.
While I was reading this book, Trump launched into one of his rambling monologues, this time in front of the Boy Scouts of America, and talked at length and with great admiration about William Levitt, the founder of Levittown (including the infamous “he had a very interesting life. I won’t go any more than that . . . Should I tell you?” lines). It was interesting for me to read about Levittown’s segregation while at the same time hearing Trump express admiration for the man who forbade the resale of properties to blacks and Jews. Trump’s family also famously refused to sell to blacks, something which the man has never expressed regret or shame for. In short, Trump is one manifestation of the de facto segregation that Loewen documents in this book.
While I did learn a great deal from this book, the most interesting thing that I learned was that Sundown Towns were far more common in the north than in the south. That shook up and rearranged a lot of what I thought I knew about this topic. I was fascinated by this book, and its importance cannot be minimized. The links between the nadir, lynching, segregated housing policies, and racism should not be denied. The continued impact these events have had on black/white relations should not be ignored.
The narrative that is told by many whites to justify or ignore casual racism is one that tells a story of lazy entitled blacks who lack the drive or knowledge to get themselves out of poverty. This is why they are often heard commenting about how long ago slavery was, implying or stating the need for blacks to “get over it.” Reading a book like this could do a great deal to upend that narrative and allow an open-minded reader to see that black Americans are doing amazingly well despite the barriers they have faced and continue to face.
Clearly, and Loewen admits this, more research needs to be dedicated to this area of history. It is a challenging thing to research, given that most towns tend to bury such history and written documentation is scarcer than is ideal. However, honestly and bravely exploring this history could do a lot to move forward in healing the wounds that American racism continues to inflict in the United States.
While I was reading this book, Trump launched into one of his rambling monologues, this time in front of the Boy Scouts of America, and talked at length and with great admiration about William Levitt, the founder of Levittown (including the infamous “he had a very interesting life. I won’t go any more than that . . . Should I tell you?” lines). It was interesting for me to read about Levittown’s segregation while at the same time hearing Trump express admiration for the man who forbade the resale of properties to blacks and Jews. Trump’s family also famously refused to sell to blacks, something which the man has never expressed regret or shame for. In short, Trump is one manifestation of the de facto segregation that Loewen documents in this book.
While I did learn a great deal from this book, the most interesting thing that I learned was that Sundown Towns were far more common in the north than in the south. That shook up and rearranged a lot of what I thought I knew about this topic. I was fascinated by this book, and its importance cannot be minimized. The links between the nadir, lynching, segregated housing policies, and racism should not be denied. The continued impact these events have had on black/white relations should not be ignored.
The narrative that is told by many whites to justify or ignore casual racism is one that tells a story of lazy entitled blacks who lack the drive or knowledge to get themselves out of poverty. This is why they are often heard commenting about how long ago slavery was, implying or stating the need for blacks to “get over it.” Reading a book like this could do a great deal to upend that narrative and allow an open-minded reader to see that black Americans are doing amazingly well despite the barriers they have faced and continue to face.
Clearly, and Loewen admits this, more research needs to be dedicated to this area of history. It is a challenging thing to research, given that most towns tend to bury such history and written documentation is scarcer than is ideal. However, honestly and bravely exploring this history could do a lot to move forward in healing the wounds that American racism continues to inflict in the United States.
August 3, 2013
This book is one sided in its thinking. The author, Loewen, comes out in his intro and basically states white vs. black. I would like to have seen more about black society and how they treated "others" whether they were white or Asian. Being put into second class status, blacks often had to compete with Hispanics and other minorities for jobs, how did this play a role in segregation or stereotypes? I understand that most of the sunset towns were geared towards blacks, but it would have been nice to get a more complete picture of the whole situation. Instead of just writing about whites and blacks and how they acted and reacted toward each other and the social policies of the day. There is a chapter on how these sunset towns affected whites, which Loewen does not do much to differentiate between the whites in racist towns and those being excluded. He also does not give much thought into the fluidity of whiteness, nor talk about how much whiteness, and who was white, has changed over the course of the roughly 100 years that this book covers. He does not go into great detail about segregation and racism against Middle Easterners and non black people coming from Africa. These groups have been coming into the United States for decades, yet there is not a mention of them in this book. Does Loewen mean to tell us that these groups have been openly welcomed by one and all?
I do like the fact that Loewen does mention non black sunset towns, though I was hoping for more information about these towns and policies instead of just one or two sentences in each chapter. All this being said I think that Jaspin's book Buried in Bitter Water was much better in regards to the topic of the destruction of black towns and neighborhoods. And Pfaelzer's Driven Out about the Chinese Americans.
I do like the fact that Loewen does mention non black sunset towns, though I was hoping for more information about these towns and policies instead of just one or two sentences in each chapter. All this being said I think that Jaspin's book Buried in Bitter Water was much better in regards to the topic of the destruction of black towns and neighborhoods. And Pfaelzer's Driven Out about the Chinese Americans.
July 30, 2009
Black concentration in large cities is no accident. Other ethnic groups, say immigrants, over time disperse. All white towns, suburbs, neighborhoods, counties...are that way by design. And exist almost exclusively in the north and west of the United States. They are almost non-existent in the traditional south. Whether it was by outright violence, or much more subtle means such as ordinances either written or left unwritten, all white neighborhoods et al, are by design. At times maybe one black or even a few live in housekeepers were allowed to stay, but for the most part African-Americans had to be out of town by sundown, or not even allowed in at all. One interesting story was a college dorm which housed some visiting athletes or soldiers. They were housed in a dorm which had one wing of it over the county line.
Real estate, and even federal government policy have had a hand in creating sundown towns. Besides documenting this much hidden history, the author proposes a couple of ways to help end this disgrace.
I found this book a more interesting read than the author's "Lies My Teacher Told Me"
Maybe because I had already read Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States"
Another book on hidden racism history is
"Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II"
by Douglas A. Blackmon
because the US constitutional amendment outlawing slavery did so, except for punishment of a crime. You can guess the rest of that story.
Real estate, and even federal government policy have had a hand in creating sundown towns. Besides documenting this much hidden history, the author proposes a couple of ways to help end this disgrace.
I found this book a more interesting read than the author's "Lies My Teacher Told Me"
Maybe because I had already read Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States"
Another book on hidden racism history is
"Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II"
by Douglas A. Blackmon
because the US constitutional amendment outlawing slavery did so, except for punishment of a crime. You can guess the rest of that story.
September 17, 2014
While interesting, with some compelling arguments, it was so poorly written and so repetitive I could barely read it. It could've been half the length.
June 23, 2008
Here are some highlights from the book thus far (first two chapters)>> very important book:
Sundown Towns
By James Loewen
Sundown town is any organized jurisdiction that for decades kept African Americans or other groups from living in it and was thus “all-white on purpose.” (p4)
Between 1890- 1968 white Americans established themselves in SDTs across the USA. (p.4)
Between 1890- 1940s race relations in America grew worse. After the abolishment of slavery steps were being taken to make things better for ex-slaves. Republicans were actively involved in improving their lot shortly after the civil war. Between 1865 (when slavery ended) and 1890 there was an anti-racism vibe in the North. It was patriotic to be anti-racist, in fact the Republicans added the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to give the ex-slaves “equal rights.” During this time AAs moved everywhere throughout the North. During this time AAs voted, served in Congress, received some spoils from the Republican Party, worked as barbers, railroad firemen, midwives, mail carriers, and landowning farmers, and played other fully human roles in American society (p.29).
The “Fusion” Period, 1877-1890
“With the increasing tenacity and Ku Klux Klan violence, Democrats fought the interracial Republican coalitions for control of each southern state (p.30). The Democrats had control of the southern states, more or less. AAs still voted during this time, though not freely.
“In 1890, trying to get the federal government to intervene against violence and fraud in southern elections, the Republican senator from Massachusetts, Henry Cabot Lodge, introduced his Federal Elections Bill. It lost just one vote in Senate. After its defeat, when Democrats again tarred Republicans as “nigger lovers,” now the Republicans replied in a new way. Instead of assailing Democrats for denying equal rights to AAs, they backed away from the subject. The Democrats had worn them down. Thus the springtime of race relations during Reconstruction was short, and it was followed not by summer blooms but by the Nadir winter, and not just in South but throughout the country (p30-31).”
What caused the collapse? The three I’s
The idealism immediately after the Civil war was fading. By 1890, only one American in three was old enough to have been alive when it ended, and millions more migrated to the US long after the war’s end and played no role in it (p31). The ideology of anti-racism was further strained by three developments>> the three i’s
1) Indian Wars>> The federal government discovered gold and took away and from the Indians that had been promised to them “forever.” If it was OK to take Indian’s land because they weren’t white, wasn’t it OK to deny rights to AAs, who weren’t white either (p.31)?
2) Immigrants>> Irish, Italian, Polish immigrants tended to vote for the Democrats because of the Republicans intolerance of alcohol and Catholicism. These immigrants learned quickly that it was to their advantage to be “white,” in that AAs were in competition for the available jobs. Perhaps Republicans converted to a more racist position to win ethnic votes. Or perhaps their anti-immigrant thinking, manifesting itself in jokes, slurs, and anti-immigrant cartoons, spilled over into increased racism vis-à-vis AAs (pp.31-32).
3) Imperialism>> After 1890, imperialism led the US to dominate Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Cuba, the Philippines, Nicaragua, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, the Virgin Islands, and several other Caribbean and Central American nations. Democrats pointed out the inconsistency of denying self-government to these places on the basis of the alleged racial inferiority, while insisting on the equal rights of AAs. The Republicans had no real answer (p.32).
Other factors causing the decline of Republican anti-racism…
1) The “Gilded Age”>> capitalist amassed huge fortunes>> many Republicans made this a goal which made it hard to reconcile with the party’s former talk of social justice.
2) Decay of Idealism>> the times were changing, the civil war was in the past.
** ultimately, racism has its foundation in slavery.
In 1890 the Confederate South finally won the war. New laws outlawing interracial marriages, lynchings started happening more frequently, and Jim Crow was in full effect. No AA served in Congress again until 1929, and none from the South until 1973. In 1912, Ohioans made it clear that they wanted black voting to stop (pp.33-34). AAs started getting bad press in the newspapers, and AA’s started getting expelled from their occupations. Many AA’s were still at the bottom, and white s began to blame them as the problem (p.38). Many of the generalization white fols had of AA are still held by those living in predominantly white towns today.
From 1913-21 Woodrow Wilson became president (racist). He segregated the Navy for the first time.
______________________________________
“Residential exclusion is bad for our nation. In fact, residential segregation is one reason race continues to be such a problem in America. But race really isn’t the problem. Exclusion is the problem. The ghetto—with all of its pathologies—isn’t the problem; the elite sundown suburb—seemingly devoid of social difficulties—is the problem. As soon as we realize the problem is white supremacy, rather than black existence or black inferiority, then it becomes clear the sundown towns and suburbs are an intensification of the problem, not a solution to it. So long as racial inequality is encoded in the most basic single fact in our society—where one can live—the US will face continuing racial tension, if not overt conflict” (p17).
check out this link. Dag my home town of Huntington, IN is a historic sundown town... http://www.uvm.edu/~jloewen/sundownto...
Sundown Towns
By James Loewen
Sundown town is any organized jurisdiction that for decades kept African Americans or other groups from living in it and was thus “all-white on purpose.” (p4)
Between 1890- 1968 white Americans established themselves in SDTs across the USA. (p.4)
Between 1890- 1940s race relations in America grew worse. After the abolishment of slavery steps were being taken to make things better for ex-slaves. Republicans were actively involved in improving their lot shortly after the civil war. Between 1865 (when slavery ended) and 1890 there was an anti-racism vibe in the North. It was patriotic to be anti-racist, in fact the Republicans added the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to give the ex-slaves “equal rights.” During this time AAs moved everywhere throughout the North. During this time AAs voted, served in Congress, received some spoils from the Republican Party, worked as barbers, railroad firemen, midwives, mail carriers, and landowning farmers, and played other fully human roles in American society (p.29).
The “Fusion” Period, 1877-1890
“With the increasing tenacity and Ku Klux Klan violence, Democrats fought the interracial Republican coalitions for control of each southern state (p.30). The Democrats had control of the southern states, more or less. AAs still voted during this time, though not freely.
“In 1890, trying to get the federal government to intervene against violence and fraud in southern elections, the Republican senator from Massachusetts, Henry Cabot Lodge, introduced his Federal Elections Bill. It lost just one vote in Senate. After its defeat, when Democrats again tarred Republicans as “nigger lovers,” now the Republicans replied in a new way. Instead of assailing Democrats for denying equal rights to AAs, they backed away from the subject. The Democrats had worn them down. Thus the springtime of race relations during Reconstruction was short, and it was followed not by summer blooms but by the Nadir winter, and not just in South but throughout the country (p30-31).”
What caused the collapse? The three I’s
The idealism immediately after the Civil war was fading. By 1890, only one American in three was old enough to have been alive when it ended, and millions more migrated to the US long after the war’s end and played no role in it (p31). The ideology of anti-racism was further strained by three developments>> the three i’s
1) Indian Wars>> The federal government discovered gold and took away and from the Indians that had been promised to them “forever.” If it was OK to take Indian’s land because they weren’t white, wasn’t it OK to deny rights to AAs, who weren’t white either (p.31)?
2) Immigrants>> Irish, Italian, Polish immigrants tended to vote for the Democrats because of the Republicans intolerance of alcohol and Catholicism. These immigrants learned quickly that it was to their advantage to be “white,” in that AAs were in competition for the available jobs. Perhaps Republicans converted to a more racist position to win ethnic votes. Or perhaps their anti-immigrant thinking, manifesting itself in jokes, slurs, and anti-immigrant cartoons, spilled over into increased racism vis-à-vis AAs (pp.31-32).
3) Imperialism>> After 1890, imperialism led the US to dominate Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Cuba, the Philippines, Nicaragua, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, the Virgin Islands, and several other Caribbean and Central American nations. Democrats pointed out the inconsistency of denying self-government to these places on the basis of the alleged racial inferiority, while insisting on the equal rights of AAs. The Republicans had no real answer (p.32).
Other factors causing the decline of Republican anti-racism…
1) The “Gilded Age”>> capitalist amassed huge fortunes>> many Republicans made this a goal which made it hard to reconcile with the party’s former talk of social justice.
2) Decay of Idealism>> the times were changing, the civil war was in the past.
** ultimately, racism has its foundation in slavery.
In 1890 the Confederate South finally won the war. New laws outlawing interracial marriages, lynchings started happening more frequently, and Jim Crow was in full effect. No AA served in Congress again until 1929, and none from the South until 1973. In 1912, Ohioans made it clear that they wanted black voting to stop (pp.33-34). AAs started getting bad press in the newspapers, and AA’s started getting expelled from their occupations. Many AA’s were still at the bottom, and white s began to blame them as the problem (p.38). Many of the generalization white fols had of AA are still held by those living in predominantly white towns today.
From 1913-21 Woodrow Wilson became president (racist). He segregated the Navy for the first time.
______________________________________
“Residential exclusion is bad for our nation. In fact, residential segregation is one reason race continues to be such a problem in America. But race really isn’t the problem. Exclusion is the problem. The ghetto—with all of its pathologies—isn’t the problem; the elite sundown suburb—seemingly devoid of social difficulties—is the problem. As soon as we realize the problem is white supremacy, rather than black existence or black inferiority, then it becomes clear the sundown towns and suburbs are an intensification of the problem, not a solution to it. So long as racial inequality is encoded in the most basic single fact in our society—where one can live—the US will face continuing racial tension, if not overt conflict” (p17).
check out this link. Dag my home town of Huntington, IN is a historic sundown town... http://www.uvm.edu/~jloewen/sundownto...
April 18, 2019
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.
October 21, 2013
Valuable research here, though I agree with another reviewer that it’s best read in conjunction with other books on U.S. history and race relations (particularly those regarding overarching, oppressive structural changes: a proliferation of racist laws and the growing prison system, for example, or trends in urbanization and employment) after the Civil War. Loewen’s reasons for disintegrating race relations from 1890 onward are absolutely valid, but they feel incomplete. While the sundown towns were an undeniable – and underexplored – part of this disintegration, they’re an example of a much larger sickness.
Part of the issue is the sheer difficulty of editing and organizing such a vast amount of research, but Loewen uses enough examples and empirical data to show that the sundown towns were indeed a nationwide presence. Much of the data is anecdotal, though credible, and the research is understandably incomplete; the task of exploring the racial history of every town across the U.S. is beyond the scope of one person and one text (Loewen encourages readers to research their own towns for themselves and send their findings to his website: http://sundown.afro.illinois.edu/sund...), and many towns’ “whites-only” policies were never officially codified. It certainly made me wonder about my hometown, especially as some of the neighboring towns do have lingering bad reputations (to be fair, a few were notable—surprisingly—for their efforts toward equality, though I came across that information in books specifically related to Ohio).
Overall, it’s well worth a read; it gives some great insight into the history and current mentality of some of these small towns and suburbs (the ones some people currently refer to as “the real America,” I believe), and some of the information here is truly shocking. It definitely prompted me to look further into things I’d vaguely questioned but never really explored about places I’ve lived; I expected a dicey history in small-town Northeast Ohio, for example, but have been unpleasantly surprised the more I've researched Oregon, one of the most historically exclusionary states. It’s astonishing how little we – me included – know about our recent history.
Part of the issue is the sheer difficulty of editing and organizing such a vast amount of research, but Loewen uses enough examples and empirical data to show that the sundown towns were indeed a nationwide presence. Much of the data is anecdotal, though credible, and the research is understandably incomplete; the task of exploring the racial history of every town across the U.S. is beyond the scope of one person and one text (Loewen encourages readers to research their own towns for themselves and send their findings to his website: http://sundown.afro.illinois.edu/sund...), and many towns’ “whites-only” policies were never officially codified. It certainly made me wonder about my hometown, especially as some of the neighboring towns do have lingering bad reputations (to be fair, a few were notable—surprisingly—for their efforts toward equality, though I came across that information in books specifically related to Ohio).
Overall, it’s well worth a read; it gives some great insight into the history and current mentality of some of these small towns and suburbs (the ones some people currently refer to as “the real America,” I believe), and some of the information here is truly shocking. It definitely prompted me to look further into things I’d vaguely questioned but never really explored about places I’ve lived; I expected a dicey history in small-town Northeast Ohio, for example, but have been unpleasantly surprised the more I've researched Oregon, one of the most historically exclusionary states. It’s astonishing how little we – me included – know about our recent history.
June 5, 2021
I’m sure I’m not the only Millennial historian who owes a lot to James W. Loewen; reading his Lies My Teacher Told Me as a teenager helped me learn how to critically assess the teaching and writing of history. His magnum opus, however, might be his 2005 tome Sundown Towns. Loewen provides a damning, excruciatingly thorough account of how far American towns, villages and cities have gone to preserve an all-white identity. Recounted here are the 19th and 20th Century “ethnic cleansings” of Asian immigrants in the West, discrimination and violence against Italians and Jews in the Northeast and pogroms targeting African Americans in the South and Midwest; formal, legal segregation and redlining, restrictive covenants and other discriminatory real estate practices; white resistance to desegregation from Boston to Los Angeles, from protests and riots to murders and lynchings. As Loewen shows, the methods of discrimination varied from place to place, from explicit laws to “gentleman’s agreements” to keep out racial and religious minorities; some towns embraced, and even advertised their all-white status while others swept it under the rug, leaving it a shameful secret. And, hardly restricted to the Deep South or rural redneck havens, these practices expanded to wealthy suburbs and planned communities across the country; nor is it a distant memory, as many towns remain nearly all-white into the 21st Century. The toll of such bigotry is immense: whites, denied challenges to their assumptions and limited in interactions with minorities, are confirmed in their prejudice s and sense of superior; nonwhites, denied access to good homes, resources and jobs, are shunted to second-class communities and poor jobs, cementing a caste structure that prevents social and economic mobility. More recent books like Richard Rothstein’s The Color of Law and Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste have built and expanded upon Loewen’s findings, but the sheer breadth, depth and comprehensiveness of Sundown Towns renders it a must-read to anyone seriously interested in American racism.
September 3, 2025
A simply excellent book of the history of sundown towns in America. In addition to covering the "no blacks" ones, Loewen looks at others. For example, the first officially documented post-Civil War sundown town was NOT in the South. It was the "no-Chinese" Rock Springs, Wyoming, as racial animosity at the tail end of the building of the transcontinental railroad boiled over. The reality, though, per Michael Luo, is that Chinese returned, after the 1885 massacre, to similar living sites, in just a few weeks; the greater Rock Springs area had a segregated "Chinatown," but Chinese kept living there well into the 20th century.
So, why does Loewen claim this? Is it to make sundown towns more "inclusive"? Anyway, given that I've had "problems" with a critical reading of some of Loewen's other books, I ding him a star.
Some sundown towns, in Texas, as well as New Mexico, Arizona and California, barred Mexican-Americans. (Some in West Texas, of course, barred any blacks as well.)
Then, there were the (often more genteel) no Jews allowed sundown towns. These were primarily in suburbs of northern big cities. So, too, were a number of no-blacks sundown towns, largely paralleling the rise of the Second Klan.
Loewen also goes deep in the weeds of how school segregation, both in the south and beyond, and restrictive real estate covenants, were among tools used to perpetuate sundown towns.
So, why does Loewen claim this? Is it to make sundown towns more "inclusive"? Anyway, given that I've had "problems" with a critical reading of some of Loewen's other books, I ding him a star.
Some sundown towns, in Texas, as well as New Mexico, Arizona and California, barred Mexican-Americans. (Some in West Texas, of course, barred any blacks as well.)
Then, there were the (often more genteel) no Jews allowed sundown towns. These were primarily in suburbs of northern big cities. So, too, were a number of no-blacks sundown towns, largely paralleling the rise of the Second Klan.
Loewen also goes deep in the weeds of how school segregation, both in the south and beyond, and restrictive real estate covenants, were among tools used to perpetuate sundown towns.
December 16, 2020
Very technical and very sobering. As a middle aged white male, you assume these places are in our distant past. Then you realize we're still pushing this awful agenda today, and not in just the obvious States you'd think. It's an eye-opening book, a massive volume about racism today and yesteryear.
February 10, 2023
Like many other Americans, I learned very little about Black history in school. Years were spent on slavery and a few lessons on the Civil Rights Movement and we were led to believe that nothing else happened to Black people beyond that. As an adult I'm making it a point to teach myself about the history we weren't taught in school, particularly the racist history that still impacts minorities (particularly the Black community) to this day due to its consequences.
I first heard about sundown towns a couple of years ago and was both horrified and fascinated in learning more. I listened to podcasts on it and watched Lovecraft Country, which was heavily influenced by the sundown town phenomenon. I wanted to read a book on Black history this month for Black History Month and this was a great place to start.
This book is heavy, fascinating, and filled to the brim with historical data and information. It's not a quick read, as there's a lot of information that hits you at once. I think this is a must-read for people who want to learn more about the Black history many white Americans don't know about, and for people who are looking for ways to be more anti-racist through education.
James Loewen does a great job at carefully dissecting the information and history as well as explaining how it has caused consequences for modern-day systemic racism. For instance, did you know HOAs were created to keep Black people out of neighborhoods? And why the suburbs to this day are largely white? There's a lot of shocking info in here that's critical to know to be a better citizen. I'm glad I spent the time on this book.
A couple of dings: The book got a little redundant and repetitive at times. Also, I listened to the audiobook, and the narration didn't work for me. The inflections felt old-timey and something about a white narrator saying the n-word a thousand times felt gross to me.
I first heard about sundown towns a couple of years ago and was both horrified and fascinated in learning more. I listened to podcasts on it and watched Lovecraft Country, which was heavily influenced by the sundown town phenomenon. I wanted to read a book on Black history this month for Black History Month and this was a great place to start.
This book is heavy, fascinating, and filled to the brim with historical data and information. It's not a quick read, as there's a lot of information that hits you at once. I think this is a must-read for people who want to learn more about the Black history many white Americans don't know about, and for people who are looking for ways to be more anti-racist through education.
James Loewen does a great job at carefully dissecting the information and history as well as explaining how it has caused consequences for modern-day systemic racism. For instance, did you know HOAs were created to keep Black people out of neighborhoods? And why the suburbs to this day are largely white? There's a lot of shocking info in here that's critical to know to be a better citizen. I'm glad I spent the time on this book.
A couple of dings: The book got a little redundant and repetitive at times. Also, I listened to the audiobook, and the narration didn't work for me. The inflections felt old-timey and something about a white narrator saying the n-word a thousand times felt gross to me.
March 16, 2020
As someone who strives to be an anti-racist, I read as much as I can about the history and background to racism as well as the way it insidiously permeates all aspects of our society to this day. This was a very educational book for me, although I have to admit that I found it hard going at times. By that I mean that the overwhelming evidence and pervasiveness of these so called "Sundown towns" means that we are told essentially the same story over, and over, and over again.
This is depressing in its own right. It isn't a criticism of the narrative, which is clearly well researched and its abundance increases the credibility and weight on the argument. Rather, it becomes repetitive and one feels as though we have heard it before - especially as the signs themselves are brought up often. It is a shocking account and I must admit I was ignorant of much of this. As JWL mentions, many people assume that the prevalence of such towns would be found in the ex-Confederate south whereas the vast majority are in the North.
As much as I have studied the history of racism, it is clear I had and have a great deal to learn. I hadn't appreciated the twist and turns of racist policies outside the macro situation of emancipation, segregation, Jim Crow, Civil rights etc. I had not appreciated the awful rise of blatant, violent and open racism against African Americans from 1890, that is manifested in these despicable towns. This is a relatively old book (written in 2002) so I would be interested to see if the sundown towns that are claimed to exist "today" (i.e. in 2002) have changed at all in 2020. With the current regime in place, I wouldn't be surprised if they were again becoming established. It is clear that, as society became less tolerant of open racism, the signs ("Don't let the sun go down on you in this town") have disappeared, but the attitudes and policies not necessarily.
It is hard to read this narrative that doesn't pull its punches. It uses the language that was openly spouted at the time and this is explained in the preface. Nothing is softened into euphemisms such as "the n-word". We get the whole thing here. It is almost as prevalent as reading The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. It is hard to read to be honest. So this is a very educational book and I am certainly much more informed than I read it which is the whole point.
However, it took me a long time to read. I found it dense and repetitive although, as I say, that makes the point and points to the extensive research. Maybe it is also preaching to the choir. This is a horrible history and the vile bigotry that was (and is) on display in towns like this is hard for me to see so displayed, but I know full well how it exists to this day. It's manifestation in sundown towns is racism in full view and it certainly deserves to be more widely known.
This is depressing in its own right. It isn't a criticism of the narrative, which is clearly well researched and its abundance increases the credibility and weight on the argument. Rather, it becomes repetitive and one feels as though we have heard it before - especially as the signs themselves are brought up often. It is a shocking account and I must admit I was ignorant of much of this. As JWL mentions, many people assume that the prevalence of such towns would be found in the ex-Confederate south whereas the vast majority are in the North.
As much as I have studied the history of racism, it is clear I had and have a great deal to learn. I hadn't appreciated the twist and turns of racist policies outside the macro situation of emancipation, segregation, Jim Crow, Civil rights etc. I had not appreciated the awful rise of blatant, violent and open racism against African Americans from 1890, that is manifested in these despicable towns. This is a relatively old book (written in 2002) so I would be interested to see if the sundown towns that are claimed to exist "today" (i.e. in 2002) have changed at all in 2020. With the current regime in place, I wouldn't be surprised if they were again becoming established. It is clear that, as society became less tolerant of open racism, the signs ("Don't let the sun go down on you in this town") have disappeared, but the attitudes and policies not necessarily.
It is hard to read this narrative that doesn't pull its punches. It uses the language that was openly spouted at the time and this is explained in the preface. Nothing is softened into euphemisms such as "the n-word". We get the whole thing here. It is almost as prevalent as reading The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. It is hard to read to be honest. So this is a very educational book and I am certainly much more informed than I read it which is the whole point.
However, it took me a long time to read. I found it dense and repetitive although, as I say, that makes the point and points to the extensive research. Maybe it is also preaching to the choir. This is a horrible history and the vile bigotry that was (and is) on display in towns like this is hard for me to see so displayed, but I know full well how it exists to this day. It's manifestation in sundown towns is racism in full view and it certainly deserves to be more widely known.
May 13, 2016
This was a difficult read. I remember asking my mom when I was kid why there was this neighborhood outside of town that was only black families and she couldn't give me an answer. It was just "there." As were other neighborhoods that were a majority Latino.
Sundown Towns gives us the real history of why we still live in mostly segregated communities. If a city or neighborhood is mostly white today, it is not by accident. There is most likely a history of systematic exclusion of people of color. There were also federal
policies that prohibited blacks from benefitting from FHA loans that went to mostly white people. Even after fair housing laws went into effect local communities still rebelled and the national government refused to enforce their laws.
After the civil war, free blacks settled in communities all across the country. But by the 1890s a change occurs and population records show a sudden decline of African Americans in the North. What happened? Where did they go? Loewen traces this tragic pattern that repeats in our history to the present day.
Every white person needs to read this book. We need to understand the reality of systematic oppression our country has placed on African American citizens. We need to come to grips with the fact that we largely remain ignorant and that our ancestors for the most part just let it happen. The evidence is overwhelming. And now we see the repercussions but are reluctant to take responsibility first in our own hearts. That's where it is going to need to start.
After finishing this book I did a little research on my home town and surrounding cities. It was shocking to read that my little town in California did indeed have policies in place before the 1960s to excluded African Americans from buying property. As late as the 1990s the city tried to use eminent domain to raze another traditionally black neighborhood to expand a shopping mall. Palm
Springs, our more famous neighboring city actually used eminent domain to raze a whole section of town that was home to African Americans and forced them to move to another part of town many people lost the personal possessions and were never compensated. This happened in the early 1960s to make way for the Palm Springs convention center. Indian Wells, also near my home town of Indio, is one of the wealthiest communities in the country that also excluded blacks and to this day is still predominantly white. Knowing this is it a surprise that Serena Williams faced racist jeers at the Indian Wells tennis tournament In 2001?
At the end of the book Loewen gives some suggestions for moving forward. I'm thankful for his research and bringing this painful subject into the light so we can be more understanding and move in the direction of real change.
Sundown Towns gives us the real history of why we still live in mostly segregated communities. If a city or neighborhood is mostly white today, it is not by accident. There is most likely a history of systematic exclusion of people of color. There were also federal
policies that prohibited blacks from benefitting from FHA loans that went to mostly white people. Even after fair housing laws went into effect local communities still rebelled and the national government refused to enforce their laws.
After the civil war, free blacks settled in communities all across the country. But by the 1890s a change occurs and population records show a sudden decline of African Americans in the North. What happened? Where did they go? Loewen traces this tragic pattern that repeats in our history to the present day.
Every white person needs to read this book. We need to understand the reality of systematic oppression our country has placed on African American citizens. We need to come to grips with the fact that we largely remain ignorant and that our ancestors for the most part just let it happen. The evidence is overwhelming. And now we see the repercussions but are reluctant to take responsibility first in our own hearts. That's where it is going to need to start.
After finishing this book I did a little research on my home town and surrounding cities. It was shocking to read that my little town in California did indeed have policies in place before the 1960s to excluded African Americans from buying property. As late as the 1990s the city tried to use eminent domain to raze another traditionally black neighborhood to expand a shopping mall. Palm
Springs, our more famous neighboring city actually used eminent domain to raze a whole section of town that was home to African Americans and forced them to move to another part of town many people lost the personal possessions and were never compensated. This happened in the early 1960s to make way for the Palm Springs convention center. Indian Wells, also near my home town of Indio, is one of the wealthiest communities in the country that also excluded blacks and to this day is still predominantly white. Knowing this is it a surprise that Serena Williams faced racist jeers at the Indian Wells tennis tournament In 2001?
At the end of the book Loewen gives some suggestions for moving forward. I'm thankful for his research and bringing this painful subject into the light so we can be more understanding and move in the direction of real change.
December 14, 2015
I grew up in Peoria, Illinois in the 80's. We all heard stories about Pekin, the little town 10 miles away. That their high school team name and mascot, until a few years earlier, had been the "Chinks". That there had long been a sign at the town limit (unconfirmed by me) saying "N____, don't Let the Sun Set on You Here." It didn't directly impact me much as a white kid in a fairly integrated school system in a fairly integrated mid-size city. I thought that whites-only (or whites-mostly) towns like Pekin were outliers, isolated cases of institutional racism within a larger continental backdrop of tolerance. I also thought that most problem areas, or "sundown towns", were in the deep South.
Then I read this book -- which should be required reading for pretty much everyone -- and discovered that, from about 1890 on, (1) "sundown towns" were ALMOST EVERYWHERE across the country EXCEPT the deep South, and (2) a great majority are STILL unofficially "sundown" and undeniably discriminatory. Practically every engineered suburb, and most that developed organically, and thousands of other towns smaller than 200,000 people, were historically white-only and had a long history of excluding blacks by violence, threats, quasi-legal bylaws and regulations, police intimidation, refusal to accept blacks in schools, and refusal to sell by shopkeepers and real estate agents. The main reason large cities have huge, segregated minority populations is that, historically, those were the only places minorities COULD go to live -- or, the only places they could gather in large enough numbers that a determined mob couldn't run them all out quickly enough to escape national notice.
It really puts, say, the county-by-county map of the 2008 presidential election in perspective:
Obama handily won the popular vote, but there's a whole lot more red from coast to coast, isn't there? Not saying all or most of the red areas were racist for voting for McCain... but it sure does illustrate that large city populations have a different mindset than small town America.
Anyway, this book carefully and methodically portrays the widespread history of hidden racism throughout small and mid-town (and areas of large cities as well) America, how it persists to this day, and what we can do to combat the long-term effects. There are hundreds of books about, say, lynching out there, and only one about sundown towns... though the latter has had just a big an impact, if not greater, on race relations in this country.
Then I read this book -- which should be required reading for pretty much everyone -- and discovered that, from about 1890 on, (1) "sundown towns" were ALMOST EVERYWHERE across the country EXCEPT the deep South, and (2) a great majority are STILL unofficially "sundown" and undeniably discriminatory. Practically every engineered suburb, and most that developed organically, and thousands of other towns smaller than 200,000 people, were historically white-only and had a long history of excluding blacks by violence, threats, quasi-legal bylaws and regulations, police intimidation, refusal to accept blacks in schools, and refusal to sell by shopkeepers and real estate agents. The main reason large cities have huge, segregated minority populations is that, historically, those were the only places minorities COULD go to live -- or, the only places they could gather in large enough numbers that a determined mob couldn't run them all out quickly enough to escape national notice.
It really puts, say, the county-by-county map of the 2008 presidential election in perspective:
Obama handily won the popular vote, but there's a whole lot more red from coast to coast, isn't there? Not saying all or most of the red areas were racist for voting for McCain... but it sure does illustrate that large city populations have a different mindset than small town America.
Anyway, this book carefully and methodically portrays the widespread history of hidden racism throughout small and mid-town (and areas of large cities as well) America, how it persists to this day, and what we can do to combat the long-term effects. There are hundreds of books about, say, lynching out there, and only one about sundown towns... though the latter has had just a big an impact, if not greater, on race relations in this country.
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