Basic Information
- Type of Place
- Independent City or Town
- Metro Area
- Politics c. 1860?
- Unions, Organized Labor?
Sundown Town Status
- Sundown Town in the Past?
- Surely
- Was there an ordinance?
- Don't Know
- Sign?
- Don’t Know
- Year of Greatest Interest
- Still Sundown?
- Probably
Census Information
| Total | White | Black | Asian | Native | Hispanic | Other | BHshld | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1860 | ||||||||
| 1870 | ||||||||
| 1880 | ||||||||
| 1890 | ||||||||
| 1900 | ||||||||
| 1910 | ||||||||
| 1920 | ||||||||
| 1930 | 2,099 | 1 | ||||||
| 1940 | ||||||||
| 1950 | 2,433 | 10 | ||||||
| 1960 | 2,690 | 2 | ||||||
| 1970 | 3,239 | 10 | ||||||
| 1980 | ||||||||
| 1990 | 3,804 | 0 | ||||||
| 2000 | 4,117 | 2 | ||||||
| 2010 | ||||||||
| 2020 |
Method of Exclusion
- Violence Towards NewcomersUnknown
Main Ethnic Group(s)
- Unknown
Group(s) Excluded
- Black
Comments
“One summer night in 1965, 12-year-old Carolyn Wagner watched as Klansmen bound a young black man to a tree in her father’s field, accused him of violating the “sundown” rules in nearby Booneville, Ark., that forbade blacks from staying in town after dark, and lashed him a few times with a bullwhip as he cried out in pain and fear.
It was no different from beatings at other Klan gatherings her father had attended, but what happened next remains vivid in her memory: the Klansmen decided to tie the man to the railroad tracks below the pasture. When they were done, they ambled back to the field to discuss crops and politics. Wagner, a reluctant witness to her father’s Klan meetings, couldn’t stand it anymore. She stole down to the tracks, used a knife she kept in her boot to slash the rope that bound the man, and told him he could follow the tracks to Fort Smith, the nearest large town.” — Sonie Sherr, %u201CChildren of Hate Fighting Back Against Racist Parents,%u201D Southern Poverty Law Center, splcenter.org/get-informed/intelligence-report/browse-all-issues/2009/winter/children-of-hate, 2/2010.