EXPELLED

Sundown towns. County-wide bans. Violent expulsions of entire Black populations. Sociologist James Loewen documented more than 10,000 American municipalities that excluded Black residents — by ordinance, by deed covenant, or by the implicit understanding that staying after dark meant dying.

10,000+ sundown towns documented · 50+ violent expulsions · $0 restitution paid

10,000+

Documented Sundown Towns

50+

Violent Expulsions on Record

1831–1954

Span of Documented Cases

"N****r, Don't Let The Sun
Go Down On You Here."

Signs posted at city limits of documented sundown towns across the United States

States with Notable Exclusion Records

Illinois

Estimated 708 sundown towns — the most of any state

Indiana

Entire counties banned Black residents

Missouri

Multiple documented county-wide expulsions

Georgia

Forsyth County expelled all 1,000+ Black residents in 1912

Arkansas

Harrison expelled Black residents twice; documented sundown town into 2000s

Oregon

Oregon Constitution (1857) banned Black residents entirely

California

Hundreds of sundown communities despite no segregation law

Documented Violent Expulsions

Year	Location	Population	Trigger	Outcome
1831	Portsmouth, OH	80	Ohio 'Black Laws'	All Black residents expelled by law.
1878	Celina, TN	Unknown	Sustained mob violence	Entire Black population fled over months.
1886	Comanche County, TX	Unknown	Fabricated accusations	Black residents expelled county-wide.
1894	Monett, MO	300+	Lynching	300 Black residents driven out. Homes seized.
1897	Elwood, IN	Unknown	Mob violence	Black community expelled.
1901	Pierce City, MO	300+	Lynching of 3 men	300 expelled. Property taken. Never returned.
1903	Joplin, MO	Unknown	Lynching	Entire Black population expelled.
1903	Sour Lake, TX	Unknown	500-man white mob	Black community driven out.
1905/1909	Harrison, AR	Unknown	Race riots	Two separate expulsions. Documented sundown town into 21st century.
1912	Forsyth County, GA	1,000+	Night Rider terrorism + lynchings	Entire county cleared. Land seized. Kept out for 75+ years.
1912	Dawson County, GA	Unknown	Concurrent with Forsyth	Black residents expelled.
1920	Ocoee, FL	Entire community	Voting on Election Day	30–50 killed. Everyone expelled. No prosecutions.

Forsyth County, Georgia — 1987

When Oprah Winfrey visited Forsyth County in 1987 to report on racial hostility, residents held signs reading "Keep Forsyth White." The expulsion of every Black resident had happened 75 years earlier, in 1912. Three generations of exclusion. Not history — living memory.

The Economic Calculation

Each expulsion transferred property. Homes, farms, businesses, savings — left behind or seized at nothing-price. The post-WWII era was when American real estate values multiplied fastest. The sundown towns that expelled Black communities before that era ensured those communities could not participate in the primary mechanism by which American middle-class wealth was built.

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