At the Dark End of the Street

Recy Taylor honored at the National Press Club in Washington DC

Danielle McGuire — Sun, 15 May 2011 03:17:26 +0000

On Thursday, I went to Washington DC to honor Recy Taylor and to “reintroduce” Rosa Parks as a militant detective and fierce activist for human dignity and civil rights at the National Press Club. We started the day with a private tour of the White House, which was incredibly moving. I first met Recy Taylor the same day Barack Obama was inaugurated as President and Michelle Obama became the First Lady. I never thought we would be in the White House together and I’m pretty sure she never expected to be there, either; especially as a guest of honor. That evening, Ms. Taylor got to see just how many people have been inspired by her courageous testimony and bold truth-telling since she was kidnapped and assaulted in 1944. Taylor, 91, wept as the standing-room-only crowd at the National Press Club celebrated her tenacity and strength and recognized her as a civil rights heroine. “I never lived in a way that nobody cared about my feelings,” she said.”I never lived that kind of life, but I always wanted it. Now I believe that a lot of people care about me and that makes me feel good.” Seeing her cry broke my heart and made me proud at the same time–all I ever wanted in writing the book was to make history recognize Taylor’s (and the other women I write about) humanity and get justice if I could–even if that only meant documenting the crimes committed by white men against black women and black women’s testimony and resistance. So that it was part of American history. But this history is painful and I feel terrible about digging up past wounds and buried shame. At the same time, it’s so important. I think this event showed me–as I’ve always known–that history has consequences and it really matters. It affects real people and their lives. In this case, I hope that the history I’ve researched and written about wil, in some small way, benefit Ms. Taylor and the women who share her history.

See photos of the event and Mrs. Taylor or the album on the At the Dark End of the Street facebook page.

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The Alabama Legislature Officially Apologizes to Recy Taylor

Danielle McGuire — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 15:02:29 +0000

Here’s the article by Bob Johnson and Errin Haines at the AP:

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — The Alabama Legislature has officially apologized to an elderly black woman who was raped nearly seven decades ago by a gang of white men as she walked home from church.

The Senate gave final approval Thursday on a voice vote to a resolution that expresses “deepest sympathy and deepest regrets” to Recy Taylor, now 91 and living in Florida. She told The Associated Press last year that she believes the men who attacked her in 1944 are dead but that she still wanted an apology from the state of Alabama.

The House approved the resolution last month. It now goes to Gov. Robert Bentley, who said Thursday he’s not personally familiar with details of the case, but sees no reason why he wouldn’t sign it.

Reached by phone Thursday by the AP, Taylor said she welcomed the Legislature’s action.

“I think that’s nice,” she said. “It’s been a long time. I’m satisfied.”

The resolution by Democratic state Rep. Dexter Grimsley of Newville says the failure to prosecute the men was “morally abhorrent and repugnant.” He has said police bungled the investigation and harassed Taylor, and local leaders recently acknowledged that her attackers escaped prosecution in part because of racism.

The AP does not typically identify victims of sexual assault but is using her name because she has publicly identified herself.

Taylor was 24 when she was confronted by seven men who forced her into their car at knife- and gun- point and drove her to a deserted grove of trees where six of the men raped her in Abbeville in southeastern Alabama. She was then left on the side of the road in an isolated area.

Two all-white, all-male grand juries refused to indict the suspects after the attack. Recy Taylor’s brother, 74-year-old Robert Corbitt, said law enforcement authorities tried to blame the attack on his sister. He said his family was threatened after the attack, his sister’s house was firebombed and his father had to guard the house.

“I’m so glad they (the Legislature) decided to do the right thing,” Corbitt said.

Corbitt said Taylor is in poor health, but he hopes she will come back to Abbeville by Mother’s Day in May. Grimsley said he hopes to present her with a copy of the resolution at that time.

Taylor said officials in Abbeville expressed regret that she was not present earlier this year when her hometown issued an apology in the case.

“Since I wasn’t there, they said they should’ve had somebody on the phone to let me know that they were sorry about the length of time that it’s been,” she said. “I don’t even know what they said. They said they did the wrong thing.”

Taylor has returned to Abbeville frequently since moving to Florida more than 30 years ago and said she expects to visit her brother there next month. She is not sure she will feel differently now that the town has apologized.

“A lot of people have gone on,” she said. “There’s nobody to fear there now.”

There was no opposition to the resolution in the Legislature and no debate in the Senate before Thursday’s vote.

“The family deserves someone to say that was a tragedy and the lady was done wrong,” said Republican Sen. Scott Beason of Gardendale, chairman of the Rules Committee that asked the Senate to approve the resolution.

Democratic Sen. Billy Beasley, whose district includes Abbeville, said Taylor wanted an apology and the Senate wanted to provide one.

“The state of Alabama apologizes for the incident that occurred to Mrs. Taylor many years ago, and we wish God’s speed for her and continued best wishes,” Beasley said.

Grimsley said the apology shows Alabama officials were able to do the right thing on a racial matter.

“I think it’s going to take things like this for the state to move forward” from the racial turmoil of the past, he said.

Grimsley said he pushed the apology through the Legislature for Taylor.

“I just knew I had to do something for her while she’s still here,” he said.

Taylor’s story, along with those of other black women attacked by white men during the civil rights era, is told in “At the Dark End of the Street,” a book by Danielle McGuire, a professor at Wayne State University in Detroit. Activists including Rosa Parks took up the causes of Taylor and others, but their efforts were later overshadowed by other civil rights battles.

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Recy Taylor’s Brother: Rape Apology to Give ‘Closure’

Danielle McGuire — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 15:19:02 +0000

This is an excellent article by Cynthia Gordy, a journalist at the Root.com:

———————————————

Recy Taylor hadn’t asked for much. More than six decades after she was raped by six white men in her hometown of Abbeville, Alabama – a horrific crime that the sheriff’s department covered up, never to speak of again – she wasn’t interested in reopening the case or pressing charges. Taylor, now 91 years old, just thought an apology was in order.

On Tuesday the Alabama House finally acted. By a unanimous voice vote, the body passed a resolution apologizing for the state’s failure to pursue justice for Taylor, who was a 24-year-old sharecropper in 1944 when she was kidnapped and raped at gunpoint. An all-white jury in Jim Crow-era Alabama refused to indict her assailants. A subsequent investigation initiated by the governor’s office elicited some admissions of guilt, but without an indictment in the county in which the crime took place, the case couldn’t go forward.

Expressing “deepest sympathies and solemn regrets,” the resolution called the state’s response “morally abhorrent and repugnant.” It now moves to the Senate. The resolution comes a week after Abbeville Mayor Ryan Blalock and Henry County Probate Judge JoAnn Smith held a press conference apologizing to Taylor’s family for the way she was treated. The influx of attention has came as a bit of a shock.

“I couldn’t believe it happened so fast,” Taylor’s 74-year-old brother, Robert Corbitt, who lives in Abbeville, told The Root. After working tirelessly for years, to no avail, for government officials to even recognize that the crime happened, he says he’s grateful for the recent surge of activity.

“Sometimes Recy’s not fully aware of what’s going on, and she has her good days and bad days,” he said. “But when I told her about the resolution last night she was very happy. At first she thought it had gone completely through, but I told her, ‘No, next it has to go through the Senate.’ But I’m very confident.”

Last month The Root wrote about Recy Taylor’s brutal assault, which sparked a Rosa Parks-led justice movement in the 1940s before all but disappearing from history over the years. Word of her story continued to spread through a Change.org petition calling on government officials to issue apologies for Taylor.

But the case was first pushed back into the spotlight by historian Danielle McGuire, who featured Taylor in her book At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance–A New History of the Civil Rights Movement from Rosa Parks to the Rise of Black Power.McGuire and Taylor will both attend a Washington, D.C. event this May at the National Press Club, “Reintroducing Rosa,” examining the role that black women fighting sexual violence played throughout the civil rights movement.

“This couldn’t have happened without Danielle McGuire, The Root, Change.org and Colorlines. Your articles really put a lot of pressure on the officials,” said Corbitt, adding that days after The Root piece he started getting phone calls from people all across the country. “They were amazed by the story they’d read, and some of the calls were from people right here in Abbeville who never knew what happened. Most of them were white, and they felt so badly and wanted to apologize.”

Corbitt says that while the Alabama House resolution doesn’t give the family a full measure of justice, the regrets issued by the government mean a great deal to them.

“It means that we have some closure,” he said. “What hurt Recy maybe more than anything was the lies that were told on her. These men admitted that they kidnapped and raped her, but law enforcement said it didn’t happen. Not only that, they tried to say she was a prostitute when she was a Christian lady. Things like that really bothered her, so she’s gotten some closure in the apology.”

Just having the story acknowledged at all carries a huge weight. With the county courthouse swept clean of records on Taylor’s assault, Corbitt donated a copy of McGuire’s book to the local library when it came out last fall.

“Now the library has bought another copy, but the books are never there because they’re checked out all the time,” he said proudly. “People know all about it now.”

Cynthia Gordy is the Washington reporter for The Root. Follow her onTwitter.

Read more about Recy Taylor on TheRoot.com, including ourinterview with her.

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The Civil Rights Cold Case Project Takes Note of AL Apology to Recy Taylor

Danielle McGuire — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 15:08:28 +0000

The Alabama House made an historic move Tuesday (March 29) towards a state apology to Recy Taylor, 91, who was gang raped by 7 white men in Abbeville, Ala., in 1944. The AP reports:

The House on Tuesday approved by an apparent unanimous voice vote a resolution that expresses “deepest sympathies and solemn regrets” to Recy Taylor….

Her 74-year-old brother, Robert Corbitt, who still lives in Abbeville, said he was happy his sister was finally going to get what she wanted — an apology.

The strongly worded resolution said the failure of Alabama law enforcement and the court system to prosecute the crimes “was, and is “morally abhorrent and repugnant.”

It was introduced by freshman Rep. Dexter Grimsley, D-Newville. It now goes to the Senate, where Democratic Sen. Billy Beasley, D-Clayton, who also represents Abbeville, said he expects it to pass.

“The most important thing is to say we are sorry and we hope you are doing well. … It’s important we move on in Alabama,” Beasley said.

Read the whole article by Ben Greenberg here

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Recy Taylor Gets a Personal Sorry But No Apology from State of Alabama

Danielle McGuire — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 02:19:08 +0000

Ben Greenberg got it right: personal apologies, but nothing official for Recy Taylor from Alabama.

An official apology is the least Alabama could do: the armed perpetrators confessed to intercourse with Taylor, but falsely claimed she was a prostitute. One acknowledged forcing her at gunpoint. Several people witnessed her brutal kidnapping. The local solicitor acknowledged the crime “was committed as alleged by the victim” but the sheriff refused to arrest the rapists, the solicitor would not let state investigators interview them, and grand juries refused to indict.

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Apologies issued for unprosecuted rape of black woman in 1944 (Recy Taylor)

Danielle McGuire — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 00:42:18 +0000

Justice delayed is justice denied. But city, county and state recognition is an important first step toward recognizing Recy Taylor’s humanity and the state’s mishandling of her 1944 case.

By Lance Griffin, Dothan Eagle

It was a steamy summer night in Abbeville in 1944 when seven white men abducted, blindfolded and raped 24-year-old Recy Taylor, a black woman, while she was walking home from church.

Her younger brother, Robert Corbitt, who was 9, remembers his father’s shirt soaked with sweat after searching for Taylor for hours. He remembers his father sitting in a tree and guarding their house at night while the children slept inside.

He remembers standing on the porch of their home, crying.

“It’s just like it happened yesterday to me,” he said.

Corbitt also remembers that none of the seven men were ever indicted by a grand jury, despite what appeared to be strong evidence of their involvement.

Monday, Corbitt, who still lives in Abbeville, sat in a crowded courtroom at the Henry County Courthouse in Abbeville and heard two city leaders apologize for what happened.

“I open my heart up to say I am deeply sorry for what happened to Mrs. Recy Taylor in 1994,” Rep. Dexter Grimsley, D-Abbeville, said Monday.

Abbeville Mayor Ryan Blalock also apologized.

“Obviously, I am sorry whenever a resident of Abbeville, past or present, feels pain,” Blalock said.

Henry County Commission Chairman and Probate Judge Jo Ann Smith said it was “apparent the system failed in 1944.”

“I stand here and say, and pray, that in 2011, things are handled much differently than in the past,” Smith said.

Taylor’s story made national headlines after the incident was mentioned in the 2010 book “At the Dark End of the Street” by Danielle McGuire. Several advocacy groups picked up on the story after the book was published in September.

A petition on the website change.org, seeking an official apology from the state and Abbeville, has received more than 6,900 signatures.

Grimsley said he planned to introduce a resolution in the Alabama Legislature calling for an official apology, but said he has not finalized the language of the resolution.

Blalock said any formal apology from the city would have to come in the form of a motion from a council member, then approved by a majority vote. He added that the city did not have the authority to investigate and prosecute felonies in 1944.

Corbitt said Taylor, now 91 and living in Winter Haven, Fla., was physically unable to come to Abbeville Monday. He did say the family would still seek a formal apology from the state.

Corbitt said he kept track of the men believed to be responsible for the rape. He said six have died. He lost track of the seventh about three years ago.

Blalock said he hopes Abbeville will be recognized for the city that exists today, not the one that existed 67 years ago.

“We are better now at race relations than we have ever been,” Blalock said. “Why can’t we celebrate that?”

Corbitt said race relations in Abbeville are “very much different” now.

“This couldn’t have happened today. I believe that,” Corbitt said.

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Recy Taylor talks with NPR about her brutal assault in 1944.

Danielle McGuire — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 02:54:00 +0000

Recy Taylor was a 24-year-old mother when she was abducted at gunpoint and gang raped by a group of white men in Alabama in 1944. An activist named Rosa Parks was sent to investigate the attack. Taylor’s case, and a number of others like hers, helped spark the civil rights movement. Danielle Lynn McGuire explores the story and the pattern of racist, sexual assaults on black women, in her book, “At the Dark End of the Street”. In Tell Me More’s weekly “Behind Closed Doors” conversation, host Michel Martin speaks with the author as well as with rape survivor, Recy Taylor.

Michel Martin of NPR talks with Recy Taylor and Danielle McGuire

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Demand Alabama Publicly Apologize for Failure to Address Jim Crow-Era Gang Rape

Danielle McGuire — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 02:36:47 +0000

Nearly 70 years ago, Recy Taylor was gang-raped at gunpoint. Her attackers admitted to kidnapping and raping her. And nothing was ever done about it.

As a young African-American woman living in Abbeville, Alabama, in 1944, when Jim Crow laws institutionalized discrimination against black people, her hopes of legal redress were slim. Though Taylor’s cause gained international attention through the efforts of Rosa Parks, a young civil and human rights activist, Taylor couldn’t force racist and sexist law enforcement in Abbeville to take action.

Today, Recy Taylor’s name and story have been swept under the rug and go largely unrecognized in America. “The sheriff never even said he was sorry it happened. I think more people should know about it … but ain’t nobody [in Abbeville] saying nothing,” Taylor lamented in an interview with The Root.

Her brother, Robert Corbitt, has spent the last decade of his retirement searching for information on her case and seeking a long-delayed justice, after Taylor broke down into tears while telling him about the gang rape 55 years after the fact. “I’d like a public apology from the city of Abbeville and the state of Alabama,” Corbitt asks, and Taylor agrees that this simple measure represents the least that could be done, after police took the lead in covering up the horrific assault against her.

Help Recy Taylor get the apology she deserves and public recognition of the injustice perpetrated by signing this petition to Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley, Abbeville Mayor Ryan Blalock, the Abbevile police department, and state and city representatives.

Click here to sign the petition

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Reliving a Nightmare: Betty Jean Owens had the courage to testify 52 years ago

Danielle McGuire — Tue, 22 Feb 2011 15:47:54 +0000

The Tallahassee Democrat tells the story of the 1959 gang rape, by four white men, of Florida A&M student Betty Jean Owens. At the Jim Crow trial, Owens testified against her rapists; one defense attorney referred to her as a “(N-word) wench” in front of the all-white, all-male jury. Nevertheless, the four men were convicted and sentenced to life in prison. The life sentence was a first for the South and the trial was a civil rights watershed, helping to end the conspiracy of silence around white sexual violence against black women–a practice that was rooted in slavery. Here is the link

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Recy Taylor: A Symbol of Jim Crow’s Forgotten Horror

Danielle McGuire — Sat, 12 Feb 2011 01:46:39 +0000

After her brutal gang rape, Recy Taylor became a global symbol of American injustice and helped inspire the civil rights movement. So why has nobody heard of her today? Read this moving and important essay by Cynthia Gordy of TheRoot.com

Recy Taylor-Symbol of Jim Crow’s Forgotten Horror

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