On January 25, 1942, a few weeks after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, a black oil-mill worker knifed Grace Sturgeon, a white soldier's wife, in her home. When apprehended, Cleo Wright also knifed a marshal, and was shot repeatedly. Hours later, while his victims were recuperating in a hospital and Wright lay dying in an unsecured jailhouse, a white Sikeston, Mo., mob kidnapped him, lynched him, then dragged him through the streets by car and set him on fire in the black community. The lynching set off a storm of protest that was led by the NAACP and the black press. Considered a national outrage on the heels of Pearl Harbor (the Japanese used the lynching for anti-American propaganda), the need for the appearance of a united front and the desire to develop a real anti-lynching law pressed the involvement of the Justice Department's civil rights section. Capeci, who teaches history at Southwest Missouri State University, offers a case study of the incident and examines the area's history, community mores, as well as the aftermath. His extensive research, including interviews with survivors, is evident in his intricate and engrossing perspective, especially when describing the lynching and the bloodshed that led to it. The book is most successful when examining the lives of Grace and Cleo and the events that drew them together and pushed their communities apart. It's less successful when it reduces to weak sociology, such as "Wright beckoned his own destroyers." And while the ironic revelation that mob members believed their actions supported the boys overseas is stunning, a chapter designed to show one white family's reaction to the lynching seems peripheral. (June)
Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly
Between 1889 and 1941, 3,842 deaths by lynching were recorded nationwide. Then, on January 25, 1942, a mob lynched black mill worker Cleo Wright in the 8000-person town of Sikeston, MO. Apparently, he had assaulted a white woman in her home and then attacked the police officer who arrested him. Later that day, Wright was dragged from the city hall and burned alive. Capeci (Layered Violence, Univ. Pr. of Mississippi, 1991) has written a detailed, scholarly analysis, heavily footnoted, of a case that symbolized the clash of traditional, racist culture with an emerging modernity sparked by World War II. He discusses its impact on local, state, and national historyfor the first time, the U.S. Justice Department intervened in a lynching, although it failed to secure any indictments. Augmenting this account are interviews with Wright's contemporaries, including his sister and the woman he assaulted. Recommended for academic collections on race relations.Gregor A. Preston, formerly with Univ. of California Lib., Davis
Examines the events surrounding and proceeding from the January 1942 lynching of Cleo Wright in Silkeston, Missouri. While the case was not unique in its particulars, it became one of the most widely known lynchings of its time, eventually drawing the federal government into an investigation of the mob and local law enforcement. The author argues that the lynching was to have long range significance for civil rights which reflected a fundamental shift in race relations in this country, and was to eventually bring the federal government into the most activist protection of the rights of African Americans since the reconstruction era. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.
A creatively conceptualized anatomy of a lynching. Capeci places the lynching of Cleo Wright within the context of the city of Sikeston, the state of Missouri, and the nation. -- Arvarh E. Strickland
A pat, scholarly reconstruction and analysis of the 1942 incident that occasioned the first federal investigation of lynching. Just weeks after America entered WWII, a black oil-mill worker named Cleo Wright assaulted a white woman and a white police officer in Sikeston, Mo., severely injuring both. Wright was seized by an angry mob, dragged across town behind a car, doused with gasoline, and burned alive. Such brazen savageryþat a time when unity against a supposedly barbaric totalitarian enemy was considered a matter of national survivalþignited public censure nationwide (though not, significantly, in Sikeston). It also, Capeci (History/Southwest Missouri State Univ.) notes, raised pressing questions þabout personal responsibility and civic duty in a democratic society founded upon law and order.þ While Capeci delves into the sociological and psychological roots of Wright's violent crime and the violent reaction it instigated, he relies too much on the jargon of those disciplines and too little on original interpretation. His most provocative assertion (that the Wright case marked the beginning of a long federal activism that ultimately culminated with the prosecution of the murderers of civil rights workers Schwerner, Cheney, and Goodman in the 1960s) is undercut by a chapter detailing the way in which Wright's lynching was both demographically divergent from and similar to other Missouri lynchings. That chapter highlights the book's awkward straddle between a micro-view (which analyzes the lynching as just one of 85 in Missouri between 1889 and 1942) and the macro-view (which posits it as a benchmark of Progressive-era federal activism). Capeci does aservice in shining the light of history on the little-known incident that "signaled the beginning of the end of one kind of racial oppression," but it raises more questions than it answers about the pivotal, lasting impact of Wright's lynching. (7 b&w photos, not seen)
Capeci's account of a lynching in the small city of Sikeston, Missouri, in 1942 adds to a growing list of investigations into the relationship between mob justice and race relations.
A cogent guide and a milepost for understanding the history of lynching in Missouri.
Missouri Historical Review
Capeci touches on the social forces behind the attack and the reactions that followed.
A valuable complement to broader-gauged scholarship, because Capeci constructed it so patiently and assiduously.
Reviews in American History
A meticulous and dynamic examination of a pivotal incident during the age of lynching.
Journal of American History
Illustrates the national significance of Cleo Wright's murder.
A painstaking and valuable study of these tragic events that confirms and extends the findings of other recent scholars of lynching.
American Historical Review
Concludes that the Sikeston event contributed more to the subsequent history of civil rights and race relations than any other in the state.... A fascinating book packed with surprises.
Capeci skillfully dissects the thoughts and actions of supporters and white opponents of the mob.
Georgia Historical Quarterly
"A painstaking and valuable study of these tragic events that confirms and extends the findings of other recent scholars of lynching." — American Historical Review
"A creatively conceptualized anatomy of a lynching. Capeci places the lynching of Cleo Wright within the context of the city of Sikeston, the state of Missouri, and the nation." — Arvarh E. Strickland
"Capeci touches on the social forces behind the attack and the reactions that followed." — Booklist
"Capeci's account of a lynching in the small city of Sikeston, Missouri, in 1942 adds to a growing list of investigations into the relationship between mob justice and race relations." — Choice
"Capeci skillfully dissects the thoughts and actions of supporters and white opponents of the mob." — Georgia Historical Quarterly
"A meticulous and dynamic examination of a pivotal incident during the age of lynching." — Journal of American History
"For the first time, the U.S. Justice Department intervened in a lynching, although it failed to secure any indictments." — Library Journal
"A cogent guide and a milepost for understanding the history of lynching in Missouri." — Missouri Historical Review
"His extensive research, including interviews with survivors, is evident in his intricate and engrossing perspective, especially when describing the lynching and the bloodshed that led to it." — Publishers Weekly
"A valuable complement to broader-gauged scholarship, because Capeci constructed it so patiently and assiduously." — Reviews in American History
"Concludes that the Sikeston event contributed more to the subsequent history of civil rights and race relations than any other in the state.... A fascinating book packed with surprises." — Richard S. Kirkendall
"Illustrates the national significance of Cleo Wright's murder." — Southern Historian
