Editorial: Story of Jay proves how racist past shapes present identity, reality

As Gov. Ron DeSantis and loyalist legislators carry on a campaign to control and silence curriculum pertaining to the role historic racism has played in shaping America, research from local historian Tom Garner puts a harsh light on the moral and factual wrongness of how Florida Republicans are trying to manipulate public education and whitewash history that's already been hidden for far too long. 

The fact is that historic racism from white Americans against Black Americans continues to shape the places we call home today. The town of Jay is a living local example of that which contradicts the dishonest "culture wars" being pushed by Florida politicians. 

As reported by Jim Little, in the early 1920s the Jay area was home to as many as 175 Black residents, almost all of whom were farmers. Today, there are only 13 Black residents in the Jay area and only four in the town itself, according to 2020 census data. 

Two Florida cities, two paths:Former ‘sundown towns’ grapple with their pasts

Closer look:A fight over a stalk cutter in 1922 turned into a mass exodus of Black residents of Jay

What is a sundown town?: When and where American racism was in full public view

What triggered that exodus of generations of local black farmers was a story largely hidden from public knowledge. After nearly 15 years of research, Garner explains how an argument between a Black farmer and a white farmer started it all.

In short, when a white farmer became angry that he could not immediately use a piece of farming equipment owned by the Black farmer, he attacked the Black farmer with an iron bar. The Black farmer pulled out a gun and shot the white farmer in self defense. But he was forced to flee from being lynched before he was arrested. The resulting uproar from white outrage in the 1920's drove nearly the entire population of Black farmers from their land by 1930 and Jay infamously became a "sundown town" in the decades afterward. 

Under today's state law, the Black farmer most likely would have justifiably been exonerated from shooting the white man under Florida's "Stand Your Ground Law." Yet the story shows how vicious and deep rooted Southern racism drove generations of family off of land and totally reshaped a town that would most likely look extremely different today had those Black families and farmers been allowed to exist freely in peace. 

In other words, yes, racism shaped America. And we're living within or near communities that have been created by it every single day, whether we know it or not. 

This is just the latest hard look at hidden history that's come to light thanks to Garner and other local historians. In recent years, the Pensacola community was compelled to have a very public reckoning when troves of archived documents revealed that how T.T. Wentworth was "Exalted Cyclops" of the KKK in the very same era that the persecution of Black residents in Jay took place. 

It isn't a guilt trip against white citizens to talk about these stories. It isn't an effort to make modern white children feel remorse for the color of their skin, as DeSantis and other state leaders have implied about education on racism's historic influence on modern society.

It is simply the truth. And citizens who regularly laud the brashness and supposed straight talk from politicians should be more than willing to be brave enough to look unflinchingly at the ugly and unpleasant reality of our own local history.

Remarkably, people like former Pensacola City Council member Jewel Cannada-Wynn are living proof of how the history in Jay continues to shape our modern story. Cannada-Wynn told the PNJ that she was 7 years old and working as a field hand helping her family in peanut and soybean fields in Jay in the late '60s. Her father was in charge of the field workers and would end shifts in time to make sure Black workers could get back across the river to Escambia County before nightfall. 

“The rule was that you had to be out of Jay by sundown,” Cannada-Wynn said. 

Now a candidate for mayor of Pensacola, Canada-Wynn said she had grown up hearing stories about Black citizens being forced from their land in the Jay area, but never knew the buried history of the fight between farmers that ignited the persecution of Black residents.

Two Florida cities, two paths: Former ‘sundown towns’ grapple with their pasts

Little's reporting on Garner's research in local history should be mandatory reading for every citizen who wants to truly understand the depth of the place we call home. 

And this hard, local history underscores the shameful effort by Florida's political class to whitewash, control and manipulate education and history that has already been buried for far too long. 

Yes, there are places in the world where government officials take active roles in policing and dictating specifically what lessons can be studied, what books can be read and how national histories are taught to school children. But those are places like Cuba, China, Russia and North Korea.

It's extremely unsettling that government leaders in Tallahassee are employing some of the same policies on education as authoritarians in those countries. And it's even more troubling to see citizens accept or celebrate such government overreach under the un-American allegiance to partisan loyalties and political personalities.

That's how historic crimes like what happened in Jay transpire in the first place. When groups of citizens collectively sacrifice their individualism, critical thinking and moral reasoning in order to be part of a mob, the worst of things happen, and their impacts go on for 100 years.

It goes without saying that we know that modern residents of Jay are people far removed from the hatreds of the past. But regardless, the community, like so many others, stands as a monument forever marred by the hammer of inhumane histories. And like other communities throughout the South have found, there is pride, hope and healing in unearthing, exploring and confronting these things.    

We strongly encourage all local residents to learn about this history with an open mind and heart. And we hope all elected officials who are brash enough to rant about how history is taught in classrooms, will instead find the moral and intellectual courage to look at the truth about where they live, and to understand how this place continues to be shaped by the injustices from our past.