Land Stolen From Black Americans Through Racism, Violence and Murder

In the 19th and 20th centuries, Blacks were robbed of their land across the United States through a variety of techniques. Here are three resources to teach about this chapter of U.S. history and how it relates to wealth inequality today.

In his 2007 documentary Banished, filmmaker Marco Williams examined four examples of primarily white communities violently rising up to force their African-American neighbors to flee town.

In 2001, results from an 18-month investigation of Black land loss in America were published by The Associated Press. It turned up 107 of these land takings, 57 of which were violent, the other cases involved trickery and legal manipulations. Here are eight of these heartbreaking stories. [Atlanta Blackstar]

Here are the eight locations:

Birmingham, Kentucky

Pierce City, Missouri

Ocoee, Florida

Hickman, Kentucky

Holmes County, Mississippi

Sweet Water, Alabama

Lincoln County, Mississippi

Jasper County, Mississippi

Here is a lesson from the Zinn Education Project about a Black community that was terrorized in Tulsa, Oklahoma.