Tag Archives: Martin Luther King

Jefferson Davis Junior High School

Posted on February 28, 2020 | Leave a comment

Click below for this week’s story, or navigate the city through the direction buttons at the top of the page:

My father and I were the only white people on the basketball court. He was 40 years older, at least, than everybody else. I’m writing this story on his 96^th. He died six months ago tomorrow.

Of what beloved Jacksonville architect Taylor Hardwick thought of designing new schools with the names of Confederate leaders, there’s no record. The only black faces in 1960s Jeff Davis yearbooks are those of the custodial staff. And the school principal, Wilber C. Johnson, standing beside a Confederate flag and wearing blackface.

“We will hang Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree. / We will hang Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree. / We will hang Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree, / As we march along!”

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Tagged Alexander Stephens, Battle Hymn of the Republic, Battle of Yellow Tavern, blackface, Bob Gray, Brown v. Board of Education, Confederate Park, Cornerstone Speech, desegregation, Fort Pillow Massacre, Grand Wizard, In Memory of our Women of the Southland, J.D., J.E.B. Stuart, jax psycho geo, Jay Dee, Jeff Davis, Jefferson Davis, Jefferson Davis Junior High, Jefferson Davis Middle School, Jesse Jackson, Kirby Smith, Lost Cause Movement, Martin Luther King, Morrison's Cafeteria, Natham Bedford Forrest, Nathan Bedford Forrest High School, Robert E. Lee, Robert Gray, Sam Wolfson, segregation, Southernaire, Taylor Hardwick, Tim Gilmore, Trinity Baptist Church, Trinity Christian Academy, Wilmer C. Johnson

New Story: First Baptist Church

Posted on October 10, 2019 | Leave a comment

Click below for this week’s story, or navigate the city through the direction buttons at the top of the page:

First Baptist Church has perhaps received more love and more hate than any other entity in Jacksonville. It dates to a ca.-Civil War split with black church members who retained the original name, Bethel Baptist. In 1923, Pastor W.A. Hobson welcomed 200 Klansmen in full regalia into his farewell sermon. In the 1980s, Pastors Homer Lindsay and Jerry Vines ignited a showdown with more “liberal” members of the Southern Baptist Convention. In 2019, what once seemed unthinkable occurs: the church plans to sell 90 percent of its downtown campus.

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Tagged A.C. Shuler, Bethel Baptist Church, Billy Graham, Bob Gray, Calvary Baptist Church, Celebration Church, Christian Alamo, Donald Trump, Eleven22, FBC Watchdog, First Baptist Church, First Baptist Church Watchdog, Fuller Warren, Heath Lambert, Henry John Klutho, Hobson Auditorium, Homer Dome, Homer Lindsay, Homer Lindsay Jr., Human Rights Ordinance, James Fifield, Jerry Falwell, Jerry Vines, KKK, Ku Klux Klan, Lester Roloff, Liberty University, Mac Brunson, Martin Luther King, Moral Majority, Prosperity Gospel, Rebekah Home for Girls, Robert Calhoun Gray, Robert Morris, Southern Baptist Convention, Springfield Jacksonville, Tabernacle Baptist Church, Trinity Baptist Church, W.A. Hobson

When Governor Claude Kirk Hopped the Fence and Took the Mic from “Black Power Agitator,” H. Rap Brown

Posted on April 28, 2018 | Leave a comment

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This ballpark has been the heart of Durkeeville for more than a century. It was Jacksonville’s municipal baseball stadium until 1954. The Negro Leagues played here. Hank Aaron “integrated” the Jacksonville Braves and won MVP, 1953.

White people had lots of guns and white cops all had guns, so black people! should get guns too. So said H. Rap Brown, who bridged the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee to the Black Panthers.

Claude Kirk, 36th governor of Florida, Jax insurance salesman, hopped the fence at Durkee Field, tromped toward the pitcher’s mound, and snatched the mic from H. Rap Brown.

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Tagged Art Hamilton, Ax Handle Saturday, Babe Ruth, Ben Geraghty, Black Panthers, Black Power, Bubbling Small, Buck O'Neil, Charlie Griffin, Claude Kirk, Dale Carson, Durkee Field, Durkeeville, Felix Mantilla, Fred Dickinson, H. Rap Brown, Hank Aaron, Hemming Park, honkies, Horace Garner, Indianapolis Clowns, J.P. Small, Jackie Robinson, Jacksonville Braves, Jacksonville Red Caps, Jacksonville Tars, James Baldwin, James Small, jaxpsychogeo, Joseph Durkee, LaVilla, Lorraine Motel, Manuel Rivera, Manuel's Tap Room, Martin Luther King, Negro Leagues, Negroes with Guns, Robert F. Williams, Sallye B. Mathis, SNCC, Stanton School, Stokely Carmichael, Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, Sugar Hill, The Fire Next Time, Tim Gilmore, Willie Weston

Klan in Jax, Part 3/7: J.B. Stoner’s Defense of the Klan

Posted on June 5, 2017 | Leave a comment

Click below for the third story in a series of seven about the KKK in Jacksonville. On June 13th, come to Coniferous Cafe in downtown Jax at 7 pm, to hear Tim Gilmore’s talk “The Klan in Jax: Its Repugnant Rise and Hysterical Collapse.

J.B. Stoner’s defense of the Klan in the case of bombing six year old Donal Godfrey’s house in Jacksonville was apt, for Stoner was no stranger to bombs. In 1980, he’d finally be convicted of bombing Birmingham’s Bethel Baptist Church in 1958.

He also served as defense attorney for the Klan after mass violence in St. Augustine.

Later he became the defense attorney for James Early Ray, the murderer of Martin Luther King, Jr.

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Tagged Al Letson, Ancient City Hunting Club, Andrew Young, Bombingham, Byron De La Beckwith, Donal Godfrey, Edward Kallal, Imeson Airport, J.B. Stoner, Jacksonville, James Brock, James Earl Ray, KKK, Ku Klux Klan, Lincolnville, Martin Luther King, Medgar Evers, Monson Motor Lodge, Ralph Abernathy, Richard Spencer, Robert Hayling, Rudyard Kipling, St. Augustine, St. Augustine Movement, Stetson Kennedy, The Klan Unmasked, White Man's Burden

When the Klan bombed a six year old’s home

Posted on June 4, 2017 | Leave a comment

Click below for the second story in a series of seven about the KKK in Jacksonville. On June 13th, come to Coniferous Cafe in downtown Jax at 7 pm, to hear Tim Gilmore’s talk “The Klan in Jax: Its Repugnant Rise and Hysterical Collapse.

Fifty-three years later, Donal Godfrey tells me from his home in Monrovia, Liberia, that if the family had been on the side of the house where the bomb detonated deep in the night, they’d be dead.

“It blew the refrigerator through the roof,” he says. “Not too many people have survived a Klan bombing. It’s an exclusive club.”

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Tagged Burton H. Griffin, Donal Godfrey, Donald Eugene Spegal, J.B. Stoner, Jacky D. Harden, James Earl Ray, KKK, Klan bombing, Ku Klux Klan, Lackawanna Elementary, Martin Luther King, NAACP, Robert Pittman Gentry, Stetson Kennedy, The Klan Unmasked, William Rosecrans, Willie Eugene Wilson