Yesterday marked the 80th anniversary of one of the most despicable displays of public support for lynching. NPR did a nice feature on this and I thought I would share it with you. On August 7, 1930, an angry crowd of white townspeople stormed a jail and removed Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith from their cells. They had been accused, but not convicted of murdering a white man and raping his wife. The photograph of the lynching, taken by Lawrence Beitler, has become one of the most iconic illustrations of that era and came to inspire the civil rights movement. The picture captures the same power, emotion, sadness as the famous Dorothea Lange photo "Migrant Mother" which came to represent the anxiety and desperation of the Great Depression.
Check out NPR's
Strange Fruit: Anniversary of a Lynching to read more about this moment in our history. While you are at it, listen to Billie Holliday's classic
Strange Fruit.
In 1993 Sting recorded his version of this song, but it does not top the original.
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