Early Twentieth Century

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Taylor Sisters (Lynching of)

Two African-American women known only as the Taylor sisters were killed on Sunday, March 17, 1907, in McKamie (Lafayette County) while they were detained on charges of murderous assault against Ella Roton and her married daughter, Nora Ogelsby. According to some counts, there were only eight women ever lynched in Arkansas, all of them African American, and so this case constitutes a quarter of all such murders in the state. According to the Arkansas Gazette, the two sisters were aged twenty and fifteen. The likeliest pair of women in the area are sisters Suffronia and Lela Taylor, born in 1885 and 1890, respectively. They appear on the 1900 census, living in Steele Township, but not thereafter. The Roton family (the …

Taylor, George Edwin

George Edwin Taylor was a native of Arkansas and the first African-American standard-bearer of a national political party to run for the office of president of the United States. George Edwin Taylor was born in Little Rock (Pulaski County) on August 4, 1857, to Bryant (Nathan) Taylor, a slave, and Amanda Hines, a “free Negro” woman; he had eleven siblings, none of whom are known by name. Nothing is known about his parents, except Amanda Hines was forced to leave Arkansas in 1859 in compliance with the state’s Free Negro Expulsion Act, signed into law on February 12, 1859. She fled with infant Taylor to Alton, Illinois, a major center of the Underground Railroad. Little is known about Taylor’s time …

Thomas, Wade (Lynching of)

On December 26, 1920, a gambler and petty thief named Wade Thomas was lynched in Jonesboro (Craighead County) for the alleged shooting of Elmer “Snookums” Ragland, a white police officer. Thomas, also known as “Boll Weevil,” was a Jonesboro native but had recently returned from “up North.” According to the Arkansas Gazette, he was known as a “‘bad’ and impudent negro,” who had formerly served time in the Arkansas penitentiary for highway robbery. According to Jonesboro historian Lee A. Dew, Thomas made his living by playing craps and engaging in petty thievery. Dew recounts that Ragland had arrived in Jonesboro from Pine Bluff (Jefferson County) not long before he was killed. The Gazette reported that he was an “efficient and …

Thompson, Alex (Lynching of)

On April 23, 1903, a young African-American man named Alex Thompson was hanged in Gurdon (Clark County) for allegedly attacking a local doctor (named Cuffman) with a knife. There is no record of a man named Alex Thompson living in Clark County during this period. The 1900 census, however, does list a doctor named Cuffman who was living there. He is listed in the census as George A. Cuffman, but subsequent marriage and census records indicate that he was probably John Henry Cuffman. At the time of the census, he was thirty-six, single, and living in a boarding house. Later that year, on June 28, he married Mary Euella Littlejohn in Gurdon. The Arkansas Gazette reported that trouble had been …

Thurman, Sue Bailey

Author, lecturer, historian, and editor Sue Bailey Thurman was a pioneer in civil rights and equality long before the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s. Her contributions in her advocacy, writings, and speeches helped lay a foundation that many others have built upon. Sue Elvie Bailey was born in Pine Bluff (Jefferson County) on August 26, 1903, one of ten children of educators Rev. Isaac Bailey and Susie Ford Bailey. Her parents emphasized education, religious instruction, and missionary work. They helped to found the forerunner of what became Morris Booker Memorial College in Dermott (Chicot County), a private college funded by African-American Baptists throughout the state. She completed her high school studies at Spellman College in Atlanta, Georgia, …

Tucker, Frank (Lynching of)

On September 15, 1932, an African-American man named Frank Tucker was lynched in Crossett (Ashley County) for allegedly attacking deputy city marshal Henry Reed with a razor. Reed had been in Crossett for about eight years and had worked as a marshal for three. According to the Arkansas Gazette, he was “well and favorably known among the business men of the city.” Frank Tucker had lived in Crossett almost his whole life, and at the time of the 1920 census, he was twelve years old and living there with his parents, Sidney and Melissa Tucker. His father was working in a lumber mill, and Tucker was attending school; both could read and write. By 1932, Tucker, too, was working in …

Tuggle, Browning (Lynching of)

Twenty-eight-year-old jitney (vehicle for hire) driver Browning Tuggle was lynched in Hope (Hempstead County) on March 15, 1921, for allegedly attacking a white woman. According to the 1910 U.S. census, Tuggle, then eighteen, was living in Hope with his widowed mother, Minnie. Both were native Arkansans. At the time, Tuggle was working in a factory as a handle grinder. On February 26, 1919, Tuggle married Alice Harris. At the time of the 1920 census, they were living in Hope with their daughter, Vadaleen. Both Browning and Alice could read and write. He was working as a jitney driver, and she was a washerwoman. On March 14, 1921, an unidentified middle-aged white woman arrived in Hope to visit her daughter, who …

Turner, John (Lynching of)

An African American man named John Turner was lynched in Warren (Bradley County) on April 5, 1903, after having allegedly “attempted assault” on a local white woman. The victim of the alleged assault (referred to as both Mrs. Neeley and Mrs. Neely in various sources) was referenced in newspaper reports as “Mrs. W. H. Neeley, a white lady who resides about seven miles west of town.” There was, at the time of the 1900 census, a Lillian A. Neely, wife of Walter H. Neely, residing in Pennington Township in Bradley County. The identity of John Turner is much more difficult to trace, there being multiple Black men of that name on the 1900 census. According to an early report in …

Turner, William (Lynching of)

Nineteen-year-old William Turner was lynched in Helena (Phillips County) on November 18, 1921, for allegedly attacking a young white girl. According to newspaper accounts, it was the first lynching in Helena. Early on the morning of November 18, Turner allegedly attacked a teenaged girl as she was walking to her job at the telephone exchange. He was arrested and placed in the jail, which adjoined the courthouse. According to the Arkansas Gazette, local citizens, in a state of “suppressed excitement,” began to gather near the courthouse during the afternoon. In an attempt to protect Turner from harm, two deputy sheriffs put him into a car shortly after dark to take him to jail in nearby Marianna (Lee County). They were …